Angela Davis, the Black Matriarch and History

Angela Davis writes this essay in order to refute the caricature of the ‘Black Matriarch’ and retraces history in order to reconstruct the Black woman. ‘Black Matriarch’ symbolizes a Black Woman who exuded power, collaborated with the slaveholders and stood as an impediment towards liberation. Davis undertakes a journey to the past in order to demonstrate that the caricature of the matriarch is historically constructed- the sensibility of Black womanhood is not an absolute, enduring, natural fact. History writing is thus an act of liberation, and Davis’s reflections are indeed a reminder of that. Retracing the past with the purpose of rethinking matriarchy in relation to the Black woman liberates us from the caricature embedded in our minds, and history becomes nothing but an act of liberation, manifested through imagination.

Davis begins by describing the historically constructed caricature of the ‘Black Matriarch.’ She traces the roots of this “notorious cliché” in the slave “family,” where the matriarch assumed her relation to the slaveholders as a collaborator. Davis resolutely dismantles this caricature at its historical inception by asserting that the slave system could possibly not engender a matriarchal family structure, as “power” was inherently existent within the concept of matriarchy. Therefore, it would have been extremely unlikely for the slave-holding families to associate symbols of authority with the slaves, much less female slaves. She further claims that the designation of the matriarch is a “cruel misnomer,” as it implies kinship structures within which the mother exerts authority. This is far from the reality as slave families were victims of profound trauma-  parents were separated from each other and children fell prey to “predatory economic interests,” as soon as they came of age. The Black woman was therefore nothing but a negation of matriarch– far from exercising power, she was a sufferer.

However, she was not just a helpless victim, but a key figure to the survival of the Black community, as portrayed through her resistance. This often concluded in insurgency but was also daily materialized through “minor acts of sabotage,” such as the purchasing of her friends’ and relatives’ freedom, poisoning the food of her masters or setting their houses on fire. She never fought against her comrade brother but alongside him to defeat slavery in all its forms. This rejects another connotation of Black matriarchy, namely collaboration.

Nevertheless, her insurgency meets counter-insurgency when Davis opens another exploration of her routine oppression- sexual violence.  This was a symbolic act to conquer her potential of resistance. Moreover, sexual violence was never a function of lust but a reminder of utter helplessness to the black man. She was thus a victim a patriarchy, irrevocably at the mercy of men from both sides, which comes as yet another rejection of matriarchy.

By revisiting the experiences of Black womanhood, Davis unshackles or liberates our imagination from the caricature of the ‘Black Matriarch.’ This caricature is just hurtful as it demonizes the Black woman, ignores her undying capacity to resist and erases the unprecedented trauma she suffers. In the words of Davis herself, Black matriarchy is a myth or a weapon of “ideological warfare” directed against the Black community. Decoloniality then becomes an act of imagination. It sets the imagination ablaze by re-envisioning the Black woman in her historical contours and serves to “resurrect” her. History does not merely become an act of liberation, it is indeed liberation.