Demystifying Violence: A Study of Resistant ‘Self’ Against Controlling Images in Afro-American Feminist Literature

Abstract

The debates on the epistemic, cultural, and historical erasure of Black women in White feminist discourse have been historically established, revealing the racialized gender politics against Black subjectivity. Tainted with an overarching ideological stereotyping, the chief goal is to produce controlling images that marginalize and silence the Black community. This epistemic violence blurs the affective-referential realities of the Black society and needs a reconsideration to voice the voiceless. Engaging with the canonical Black feminist texts, i.e., Their Eyes Were Watching God (1937) by Zora Neale Hurston and The Bluest Eye (1970) by Toni Morrison, the article argues that both Hurston and Morrison subvert and reposition violence not as a site of victimhood, but as a radical epistemic resource through which the Black women reclaim the lost voice and articulate a resistant selfhood. Through an in-depth intersectional feminist textual analysis rooted in constructivist worldview, the study theorizes violence as an epistemological framework, enabling Black women to resist and defy the Jezebel, mammy, and welfare mother—the imposed scripts of identity formation, and carve out an agentic niche for themselves. The study is important in unveiling the patterns of selfhood and seeks to challenge the traditional interpretations and reaffirm the Black women’s consciousness against racist and patriarchal spaces.

Conflict of Interest: The author declares that there are no conflicts of interest related to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article, and that the data presented have not been fabricated or falsified.

Funding: This research did not receive any specific grant or financial support from public, commercial, or not-for profit funding agencies.

Participant Consent:  The author confirms that Informed consent was obtained from all participants, and confidentiality was duly maintained.

Data Fabrication/Falsification Statement: The author declares that no data have been fabricated, falsified, or manipulated in this study.

Copyright: Copyright (c) 2025 Shumaila Noreen

Conflict of interest:

The author has declared no potential conflicts of interest and falsification/fabrication of data with respect to the research, authorship, and/or publication of this article.