The Liberation of Black Women in Daughters of the Dust
*Content Warning: Mentions of sexual assault
In film and media, the term the “male gaze” refers to the way that the anticipated heterosexual male viewer is centered in the film’s perspective, producing film and media that positions women as sexual objects. Coined in 1992 in her piece The Oppositional Gaze: Black Female Spectators, bell hooks offers a critique of the male gaze and the particular way it depicts Black women in mainstream films as devoid of humanity through her theory of the oppositional gaze. Centering Black women as the primary and most significant viewers, hook’s theory of the oppositional gaze opens up a space where Black women can imagine a world unbound by the shackles of sexism and racism. The 1991 independent film, Daughters of the Dust, provides a poignant example of how films rooted in Black women’s viewership can subvert dominant narratives, allowing for moviegoers to see themselves reflected in a world where they can live fuller and freer lives compared to the reality they are in on the opposite side of the screen.
Daughters of the Dust is set in 1902 at Igbo Landing, The Sea Islands of the South. It focuses on a Gullah community – a distinct group of descendants of enslaved West African people brought to the Southeastern United States, specifically the Carolinas and Georgia, who keep many of their traditions. The movie focuses on a family, the Peazant family, who is contemplating staying on the island where they’ve been for generations or moving to the Northern United States. The main characters in the film who are referenced in this essay include Eula and Eli, a couple grappling with Eula being raped by a white man. There is also Yellow Mary, who is an estranged family member coming to visit after years away, and Nana, the eldest member and family matriarch who is headstrong about staying on the island rather than leaving.
One of the main themes of the movie is love, whether it be love for their community and facing the difficult question of moving, or romantic love for other people. In multiple interviews, Julie Dash explains why she felt the need to portray healthy representations of Black life and Black love, as seen with the two main couples in the film – Eula and Eli, and another couple with no speaking lines, but every time they are seen their love exudes through the screen. Even among the film’s characters, director Julie Dash makes it so that the Black men in Daughters of the Dust show what a truly loving relationship between a Black man and a Black woman looks like. She said “I always wanted to see a black woman riding off into the sunset with her lover and not being chased, so I put it in my film!” Black women have always deserved and will always deserve soft love. As part of imagining a reality of freedom for Black women, this movie allows them to see what Black love is, free from domestic abuse, harm, lust, fetishization, and other damaging tropes.
Throughout the film, the utopia Dash creates allows the characters to be full, whole human beings and not sexual objects. Oftentimes, the treatment of women is dictated heavily by their sexual lives and relationships, no matter if the encounters were consensual, but the characters in this film fight against this notion. This is specifically seen when Eula Peazant denounces the idea that a woman is “ruint [ruined]” because of sexual assault, pleading for the Gullah community to join her in this way of thinking. The camera focuses either on Eula’s entire body or her face, shying away from focusing on aspects that will sexualize her or take away from what she’s saying. Also, in the entire film but especially in this scene, the focus is on the women. There are mainly women close to the center near Eula while she is speaking, and at the end of the scene, Yellow Mary, Eula, and Nana embrace each other in a hug. Dash was very intentional about the way the story was told, which was with care and deep cultural understanding – “And I let the story unravel in a way an African griot would recall and recount a family’s history, rather than using the structure of the ‘tall tale’ which is very Western.” Additionally, the men in this community understand the importance and power of women – Eula’s husband is the one who pushes her to share the truth about the lasting generational impact of Black women’s sexual trauma and that you can’t heal by running away. Through this clip, it is seen that Daughters of the Dust is a film that unapologetically centers Black women and uses the camera to ensure resistance against the typical male gaze.
Moreover, in Daughters of the Dust, the autonomy and voice of women are respected. There are both matriarchs like Nana Peazant and young women like Eula Peazant and Yellow Mary who share their voices and opinions on the decision to leave the island or stay. Nana Peazant shares tremendous amounts of knowledge with her family, from the importance of remembering the ancestors to hoodoo practices and spiritual understanding. Another scene in the film shows an older Black woman in the community sharing the few indigenous words she remembers with the young children. Women in the film are carriers of knowledge and care, sustaining their community.
Julie Dash’s Daughters of the Dust is groundbreaking in its refreshing portrayal of Black women. It actively resists the dehumanization of Black women that comes from the male gaze controlled by sexism and white supremacy. In creating this world where they are free from the expectations of looking and being a certain way, Black women dare to dream of such a reality. Daughters of the Dust is part of the work in the long journey of imagining spaces where Black women can exist freely.
Nadia L (she/her) is a reproductive justice and health equity advocate born, raised, and currently based in Northern New Jersey. She is a Spring 2024 graduate …
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