Books
‘Black woman Redefined,’ by Sophia A. Nelson
“Dear Mrs. Obama, Do
you have any idea what you
mean to us? By us, I mean
the strong, independent,
accomplished black women
of America. I suspect that
on some level you do… but
please allow me this small
indulgence as I share with
you how special you are to
us.
What I am about to say
may seem a bit much, but it
is important that you
know—that everyone
know—how much you have
changed and are changing
everything for present and
future generations of black
women in this nation...
You humanize us. You
soften us. You make us
invisible no more. You made
us approachable, feminine,
sexy, warm, compassionate,
smart, affirmed, accom-
plished, and fun-filled all at
once. Your very nature most
emphatically answers
Sojourner Truth’s 160 year-
old question: ‘Ain’t I a
woman?’
Yes, we are women, too.”
family had been more stable
during slavery than it is
today.
Although the Republican
presidential candidate was
soon pressured by blowback
to distance herself from that
insensitive remark, one can-
not help but be alarmed by
both the suggestion that
blacks might have been bet-
ter off in chains and by the
verbal slap in the face of the
millions of sisters doing
their best to raise kids alone
during this age of single-
parent households.
Despite the fact that she is
also a Republican, and that
she campaigned for both
Bush I in 1992 and for Bush
Black Woman
Redefined:
Dispelling Myths and
Discovering
Fulfillment in the Age
of Michelle Obama,
by Sophia A. Nelson
— Excerpted from the Prologue
(pg. 1)
R
ecently, Congress -
woman
Michelle
Bachmann lamented
that the African-American
II in 2000 and 2004, Sophia
A. Nelson, ironically, feels
differently about herself
ever since the election of a
Democrat Barack Obama.
Page 6 The Portland Skanner July 20, 2011
She gushes at length about
how much the President’s
wife, Michelle, means to her
in “Black Woman Re -
defined.”
Nelson’s heartfelt how-to
strikes this critic as much an
appeal to black female
empowerment as a personal
coming home party for a
Prodigal Daughter possibly
harboring regrets about her
longstanding liaisons with
arch-conservatives. For, she
devotes the bulk of her book
to debunking the sort of
cruel stereotypes which the
GOP has been fond of circu-
lating for decades, like
Ronald Regan’s stump
speech assailing the prover-
bial Welfare Queen riding
around in a Cadillac and
Andrew Breitbart’s dissemi-
nation of a videotape delib-
erately doctored to make
Shirley Sherrod look like a
racist.
The author’s aim, here, is
to
discourage
anyone
inclined to jump on the “sis-
ter-bashing bandwagon”
which has enabled everyone
from DJ Don Imus (“nappy-
headed hos”) to misogynist
rappers to distort their
image. “How is it that an
A fan congratulates Sophia A. Nelson
entire race of women—so
successful, so beautiful, so
intelligent, and so power-
ful—can be so devalued,
vilified, neglected, unwant-
ed, disliked, misused,
increasingly misunderstood,
and blatantly abused?” she
asks.
The answer is complicat-
ed, and is arrived at via a
combination of anecdotal
evidence plus a collage of
illustrative contributions
from such luminaries as
CNN’s Soledad O’Brien
and Roland Martin, docu-
mentary filmmaker Janks
Morton,
Dr.
Julianne
Malveaux, NPR’s Michel
Martin,
Democratic
Congresswoman
Terrie
Sewell,
Democratic
Congressman
Jesse
Jackson, Jr., actresses
Kimberly Elise and Taraji P.
Henson, and The View’s
Sherri Shepherd.
Besides writing what
essentially amounts to a rev-
erential thank you letter to
Michelle, Nelson delineates
what she calls the “five core
goals” fundamental to blos-
soming as an accomplished
black woman, namely, (1)
creating positive multidi-
mensional relationships; (2)
establishing a satisfying
career; (3) having a bal-
anced and emotionally-
rewarding life; (4) main-
taining good health; and (5)
achieving a spirituality that
doesn’t reject sexuality.
Ardent,
inspirational,
insightful and redemptive,
“Black Woman Redefined”
is likely the only positive
book that’s going to be pub-
lished by a prominent
Republican about anyone
named Obama between now
and Election Day 2012.