Abstract 

Historically, Black women have had their femininity stripped away from them and have had their features and behaviors degraded in a multitude of public spaces. As Black women and femmes aim to reclaim their femininity, this movement has caused division. The question of “What is the right way for Black women to be feminine?” has become a crucial point of debate in recent years, especially on social media where people showcase their femininity in various ways. These conversations on social media have led me to ask: How do societal standards influence the ways Black people think about and interact with femininity? To study this I will be looking at the ideas circulating on social media, more specifically looking at content from content creators: Dr. Michelle Daf and Jasmyne Theodora. Through this study, ideas about the rejection of Black femininity and Black women’s lack of self love due to society’s ideas on Black women will be explored. Ultimately, through this study I aim to examine how deeply western ideas of femininity and beauty affect Black people and pose the question of how Black people can explore and define their own femininity. 

Introduction 

What it means to be feminine as a Black woman is a decades-old debate that has been a core subject of social media and scholarly discourse in recent years due to the rise of femininity coaches. Self- proclaimed “femininity coaches” subscribe to ideas of White femininity and denounce behaviors and looks that are commonly associated with Black women. They teach Black women who are not secure in their femininity how they can change themselves to fit the standard of a feminine woman. In response to this, Black women and femmes who rebel against the western, White ideals of femininity question why the ways in which Black women are feminine cannot be considered the “right” way to be feminine. This has introduced the question: How do societal standards influence the ways Black people think and interact with femininity? Whether going against the grain or conforming to societal expectations, the standard still influences thoughts on femininity. Western beauty standards celebrate White femininity and, in turn, shame Blackness and Black femininity. Such shaming forces Black women and femmes to feel as if they aren’t feminine enough, so they conform to western standards of beauty and behavior. 

To study how societal standards influence Black women’s thoughts on femininity, I will focus on the ideas that circulate within the Black femininity space on Youtube. I use Youtube as the focus platform because the longform content allows for a deeper insight into ideas circulating these spaces. I will focus on two Youtube content creators who thrive in this space and voice many of the ideas circulating in this community. I will use three videos from each content creator to get a general overview of what they teach to others and how they view femininity themselves. The content creators are Dr. Michelle Daf with 262k subscribers and Jasmyne Theodora with 20k subscribers. Both content creators are Black women who have built large platforms on how women can be feminine and stay away from what they deem are “masculine behaviors.”

Literature Review 

Mainstream media has played a crucial role in stripping Black women of their femininity. Through the use of offensive depictions of Black women in marketing campaigns and the promise to make them beautiful, the media has consistently made Black women feel that their natural features were not attractive nor feminine. In the book Ain’t I a Beauty Queen? Black Women, Beauty, and the Politics of Race written by Maxine Leeds Craig, Craig describes the derogatory images of Black women in such marketing advertisements in the early 1900s in comparison to the depictions of White women, and discusses how such portrayals deeply affected Black women. In the early 1900s, media companies advertised their products to Black audiences with “countless reproduction of derogatory images of Blacks in the form of cartoon drawings, figurines or burlesqued portrayals by White actors in Blackface…” which in turn “reinforced the widespread association of dark skin, kinky hair and african facial features with ugliness, comedy, sin or danger.”¹ Advertisements for products such as skin bleachers and chemical straighteners captured Black women’s attention by promising them a way to be beautiful through a chance at achieving the fair skin and straight hair that western societies raved about. They demeaned Black women’s features, making them feel inferior to the hegemonic beauty standard, in an effort to coax them into buying their products. 

In Hair Raising: Beauty, Culture and African American Women by Noliwe M. Rooks, Rooks expands on the concept of degrading images of Black women in the media in the chapter “Beauty, Race and Black Pride.” Rooks presents the idea that Black women’s bodies and features are consistently compared to White features so they are forced to see White women as the standard of femininity and beauty. Black women are not seen as attractive in society and the products advertised to them reinforce such an idea. Curl-I-Cure: A Cure for Curls, a chemical straightener advertised to Black women, utilized the statement “Attractiveness will contribute much to your success both socially and commercially. Positively nothing detracts so much from your appearance as short matted un attractive curly hair,” in their marketing campaign, in  an effort to get Black women to feel negatively about their natural features so they can purchase their products.² Both Craig and Rook’s chapters on this subject matter exemplifies the reasoning behind Black women seeking out femininity coaches and aiming for western images of beauty. Black women have been made to feel that their natural bodies and features are masculine and unattractive and they must change themselves in order to be beautiful. 

Differing approaches to femininity from people of different races and socioeconomic backgrounds derive from the proximity that some have to hegemonic femininity. In the article “Black and White Women’s Perspectives on Femininity” authored by Elizabeth R. Cole and Alyssa N. Zucker, there is a discussion surrounding the question of what causes the different approaches to femininity amongst Black and White women and why many Black women are “…are more invested in and concerned with their appearance than White women and men of both races and…devote a great deal of money, time, and attention to achieving and maintaining a feminine appearance.” The reason given for Black women being more devoted than White women into maintaining an outwardly feminine appearance is because Black women are placed at the bottom of the social hierarchy. Blackness is hypermasculinized which places Black women who desire to be seen as feminine into a difficult position because western society believes that “feminine appearance is central to hegemonic femininity because femininity and masculinity are premised on difference, and thus there is a cultural imperative that women should not resemble men.”³ With Blackness being hypermasculinized, as well as hegemonic femininity’s core value being a stark contrast to masculinity, society enforces the idea that Black women can never be feminine according to these standards. Such a situation forces many Black women to invest a great deal of time and effort into presenting feminine, an issue many White women do not consider for themselves due to their proximity to hegemonic femininity. 

Adia H. Wingfield and Melinda Mills’ article “Viewing Videos: Class Differences, Black Women, and Interpretations of Black Femininity” delves deep into the division amongst Black women concerning class and thoughts on Black femininity. Wingfield and Mills gather the opinions of Black women in upper and working class economic brackets on Black femininity as it relates to video vixens and images of Black women in rap music. While upper class Black women describe Black video vixens as “low class” and describe these women as having “low class morals” for displaying their body in videos as they do, working class Black women focused on agency and “implications and possible rationales…to be in music videos.”⁴ Upper class Black women consistently describe the portrayals of Black women in these videos as unrealistic while working class Black women see the way men interact with these women and the dancing shown as realistic scenarios.⁵ Mills and Wingfield’s conversations with these women examine how there is a heavy contrast between upper and working class Black women and their views on what a realistic portrayal of a Black woman looks like. Class plays a large role in the ways that upper class Black women uphold negative views of Black women and their expressions of sexuality by calling them “low class” and having “low class morals.” Racial and class differences shape the ideas of what it means to be feminine as a Black woman and how much people in various groups subscribe to the standards of western femininity. 

The consistent degredation of Black women and Black femininity in the public sphere has severely affected many Black women’s mental, physical, emotional, and sexual states. In “‘Pretty Hurts’: Acceptance of Hegemonic Feminine Beauty Ideals and Reduced Sexual Well-Being among Black Women” by Lanice R. Avery et. al, the authors discuss how the conquest of appearing feminine, beautiful, and attractive can have adverse effects on women’s, especially Black women’s, sexual and mental wellbeing. With Black women being “…judged more favorably when their appearance closely approximates Whiteness (i.e., having lighter skin) and aligns with hegemonic beauty ideals, including being thin and more feminine in their gender expression,” tBlack women who do not fit this mold of what is deemed as a beautiful Black woman are left to be othered by society. In society, one’s attractiveness heavily affects the way they are treated by others and with Black women—especially those who don’t fit the mold—not being the standard of beauty can severely affect one’s self esteem. Feelings like these about their own beauty and femininity, with hegemonic femininity in mind, can negatively affect the ways in which Black women think about themselves. 

Methods and Data 

To analyze how society’s standards of femininity affect the way Black people think and interact with it, I will be delving into the world of social media and femininity coaches. Dr. Michelle Daf and Jasmyne Theodora are two Black content creators who focus on teaching women how to be feminine. Their audience is mostly Black women as well so I want to examine how they are teaching Black women to be feminine. I will be analyzing three videos from each content creator that I believe encapsulates their views on femininity and womanhood that they teach their viewers. From Dr. Michelle Daf I will be looking at the videos “How to be Feminine | Clothes, Nails, Make-Up and Jewelry || A Feminine Impression,” “Masculine Behaviors to STOP NOW!! || Feminine Rehab || Session 3,” and “What is True Femininity? || Key Traits of a Feminine Woman || A Feminine Impression.”  For Jasmyne Theodora I will be analyzing her videos “Why embrace femininity?? (responding to femininity movement criticism),” “How to be Feminine in a Feminist World! | Femininity 101,” and “The FUNDAMENTALS of Femininity | Femininity 101.” To analyze their content I will be examining their tone,  ideas on gender and gender expression, ideas on femininity, and the visual aspects of their content. Using these points of analysis will give me an idea on what their thoughts on femininity are and how they have been impacted by western views of femininity.. 

Findings 

Dr. Michelle Daf, Black educational psychologist and femininity coach, has amassed over 262 thousand subscribers on Youtube. Her content focuses on helping women tap into their femininity and stay in their “feminine energy.” In Daf’s video ““How to be Feminine | Clothes, Nails, Make-Up and Jewelry || A Feminine Impression,” the title grabs viewers attention, promising them a simple educational guide on how to adopt a feminine appearance. In the thumbnail, Daf showcases lighter skinned Black women and White women in business casual clothing, simple jewelry and nails, and describes the styles pictured as a feminine style. With a seemingly warm and welcoming presence, Daf welcomes viewers to her channel and states her purpose of helping women find themselves and connect with their femininity. When giving advice on how to shape one’s outward appearance into a feminine one, Daf takes subtle, but sharp jabs at features she believes to be masculine. She warns viewers that having longer nails can “make people wonder about them in a negative light” and that facial and body hair are masculine features that take away from one’s femininity. Throughout the video Daf places a heavy emphasis on softness, daintiness, and smallness as feminine features that women should possess. 

In Dr. Michelle Daf’s content, this message of smallness, daintiness, and softness as constitutive of femininity is a running theme.  In Daf’s video entitled “ “Masculine Behaviors to STOP NOW!! || Feminine Rehab || Session 3” she continues to educate her audience, again in a judgemental manner, against what she deems is masculine and which masculine behaviors they participate in that are preventing them from being the feminine woman they desire to be. She tells her audience that being abrasive, boastful, a provider, and aggressive are “masculine energies.” Daf encourages women to embrace their masculine and feminine energies, but to sit in their feminine energy and leave the masculine behaviors to men. In this video, as well as the previous video on feminine appearance, there is not much emphasis on being feminine for one’s self, but being feminine for men. Daf encourages her audience to stray away from any masculine behavior because these behaviors are ones that men would be disgusted by. In the last video I selected titled “What is True Femininity? || Key Traits of a Feminine Woman || A Feminine Impression”, Dr. Michelle Daf continues to shame masculine behaviors in the name of men’s preferences for women and educate viewers on what she believes are the traits of a truly feminine woman. She uses language in her video such as “natural design” and states that “as a woman who was born a woman you inherently carry certain feminine traits.” Daf views gender and gender expression through a strict binary lens that must not be deviated from unless women want to risk their chances at being perceived well by society and most importantly, men. 

Jasmyne Theodora, a biracial femininity content creator, has garnered 20 thousand subscribers on Youtube. Jasmyne, much like Dr. Michelle Daf, focuses her content on educating women on how to be feminine and what being a woman means. While Daf’s primary motivation for adopting a feminine lifestyle is to be pleasing in the eyes of men, Theodora has similar such motivations, as well as additionally the motivation of being feminine for God. In Theodora’s video “Why embrace femininity?? (responding to femininity movement criticism),” Theodora’s title not only writes off concerns brought against the movement as criticism, but  by not specifying the view of femininity that she is embracing, she communicates to viewers that the femininity movement’s view is the only correct one. In this video Theodora addresses concerns of the femininity movement and starts off by saying she embraces gender roles because “God has a role He wants men and women to fulfill.” She goes on in this video to talk about how there are innate behavioral differences between men and women and that gender cannot simply be a social construct. Theodora continues this rhetoric in her next two videos “The FUNDAMENTALS of Femininity | Femininity 101” and “How to be Feminine in a Feminist World! | Femininity 101.” Theodora goes on in these videos to be condescending towards the feminist movement, women who don’t subscribe to hegemonic femininity, and women do not fit her definition of femininity. Much like Dr. Michelle Daf, Jasmyne portrays a kind nature with subtle jabs at women who are not soft, humble, dainty, and submissive to men. 

Jasmyne Theodora and Dr. Michelle Daf idolize hegemonic femininity and teach Black women that to become feminine they must strive to be feminine in the way society wants them to be feminine. They uphold harmful western ideology that shames and masculinizes Black women and uplifts White women as the epitome of femininity. Teaching Black women to fit into a mold that was never meant to include them perpetuates the harmful self view Black women seeking out these videos have on themselves and their femininity. There is also no emphasis from either content creator on self love nor embracement of natural features and behaviors. For Jasmyne and Dr. Daf everything about being feminine is for God and men. The same men who shame Black women’s entire being are never criticized, but the women Jasmyne and Dr. Daf described as masculine are. 

Discussion 

Dr. Michelle Daf and Jasmyne Theodora encourage their audience, composed mostly of Black women, that if they can make simple changes to their outward appearance and behave “as a feminine woman should” then they can achieve femininity. Such a notion neglects the reality that Black women, historically, are not meant to fit into the confines of hegemonic femininity. As Maxine Leeds Craig emphasized in Ain’t I a Beauty Queen?: Black Women, Beauty, and the Politics of Race, “… as long as dominant standards of beauty excluded brown skin and short, tightly curled hair, beauty status was unavailable to most Black women.”⁶ Being unable to address the root cause as to why their audience do not feel feminine and are seeking out such content in the first place validates the degradation of Blackness and Black femininity. 

With Jasmyne Theodora and Dr. Michelle Daf having closer access to hegemonic femininity through race and economic status, with Jasmyne being a biracial woman and Dr. Daf being upper middle class and highly educated, they have the privilege of making femininity seem accessible. As mentioned in  Cole and Zucker’s  “Black and White Women’s Perspectives on Femininity” and Adia H. Wingfield and Melinda Mills’ article “Viewing Videos: Class Differences, Black Women, and Interpretations of Black Femininity,” racial and class differences can shift ideas on femininity as well as one’s proximity to it. Black women in low income areas are not afforded the softness and dantiness that Theodora and Daf encourage in their content. They are masculinized by society because of their race as well as their class. They cannot interact with femininity in the ways that women like Dr. Daf and Theodora can. This lack of access has led Black women to think about femininity differently and encourage alternate expressions of femininity. 

From the ever growing subscriber count of Dr. Michelle Daf, Jasmyne Theodora and countless other Black femininity youtubers who preach the same ideas, it is clear that there is a large issue amongst Black women and their views of themselves. While this issue is not new, given the feminist movement, open conversations about gender and gender roles, and Black femininity in mainstream media one would not think that content creators like Daf and Theodora would be increasing their audience by the thousands each month. As discussed in “Pretty Hurts’: Acceptance of Hegemonic Feminine Beauty Ideals and Reduced Sexual Well-Being among Black Women” by Lanice R. Avery et. al, hegemonic femininity has affected Black women’s views of their own femininity in such a harsh manner that they feel the need to change themselves and monitor their appearance.

 Conclusion 

Hegemonic femininity has set a standard that excludes Black women, but gives them the false hope that they can fit into the mold. To ensure that love is poured back into the women that western society excludes ideas on gender, gender roles, and Blackness must be considered by the social media femininity coaches that Black women turn to in hopes of acceptance by society.

1. Maxine Leeds Craig, “Contexts for the Emergence of ‘Black is Beautiful,’” in Ain’t I a Beauty Queen? Black Women, Beauty, and the Politics of Race (Oxford University Press, 2002), 23-44.
2. Noliwe M. Rooks, “Beauty, Race and Black Pride” in Hair Raising: Beauty, Culture and African American Women (New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1996), 23-50.
3. Cole and Zucker, “Black and White Perspectives.”
4. Mills, Melinda and Adia H. Wingfield, “Viewing Videos: Class Differences, Black Women, and Interpretations of Black Femininity,” Race, Gender & Class (2012), 348-367.
5. Mills and Wingfield, “Viewing Videos.”
6. Craig, “Ain’t I a Beauty Queen?”