Melanin and Curls: Evaluation of Black Women Candidates

Sister Style

10.1093/oso/9780197540572.001.0001 ◽

2021 ◽

Author(s):

Nadia E. Brown ◽

Danielle Casarez Lemi

Keyword(s):

Black Women ◽

Women Politicians ◽

Skin Tone ◽

Women's Bodies ◽

Deep Dive ◽

Women Candidates ◽

Phenotypic Profile ◽

Gendered Identities ◽

Candidate Evaluations ◽

Hair Texture

Sister Style: The Politics of Appearance for Black Women Political Elites centers Black women’s bodies, specifically their hair texture and skin tone, to argue that phenotypic differences among Black women politicians directly impact how they experience political office and how Black voters evaluate them. The book brings together an interdisciplinary, multi-method, and blended epistemological approach of positivism and interpretivism to ask whether African American women’s appearances provide a more nuanced lens through which to study how their raced-gendered identities impact their candidacies and shape their political behavior. The authors take a deep dive into intersectional theory-building, through which they examine the intra-categorical differences among Black women. They find that Black women vary in their political experiences because of their appearances, and that dominant, Eurocentric beauty standards influence the electoral chances of Black women. They observe that skin tone and hair texture, along with the historical legacies that have shaped the current cultural and political contexts, dictate Black women elites’ political experiences and voter evaluations of them. The book asks the following questions: What do the politics of appearance for Black women mean for Black women politicians and for Black voters who evaluate them? What are the origins of the contemporary focus on Black women’s bodies in public life? How do Black women politicians themselves make sense of the politics of appearance? Is there a phenotypic profile into which most Black women politicians fit? What is the effect of variation in Black women’s phenotypes for candidate evaluations? And how do voters process the appearances of Black women candidates?

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“Glass half full: cautious optimism and the future of Black women political elites in America”

The Journal of Race Ethnicity and Politics ◽

10.1017/rep.2020.44 ◽

2020 ◽

pp. 1-13

Author(s):

Nadia E. Brown ◽

Sarah Allen Gershon

Keyword(s):

Black Women ◽

Policy Making ◽

Democratic Party ◽

Political Elites ◽

Scholarly Research ◽

Women Candidates ◽

The Future ◽

Challenges And Opportunities

Abstract In this essay, we place Black women's electoral challenges and opportunities in context. We situate this year of “Black Women Candidates” as an anomaly, but one that has been a long in the making. We also point to the appeal of Black women lawmakers among voters to mirror Alberder Gillespie's claims in this epigraph. We note that Black women have long been the backbone of the Democratic Party and are willing to use their clout for their own political means. Furthermore, given the unique ways that Black women represent their constituents, an influx of Black women into governing bodies may have a substantial, lasting impact on policy-making. We conclude with insights from our own research and that of other scholars on Black women to demonstrate future avenues of scholarly research.

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Is There a Black Woman Candidate Prototype?

Sister Style ◽

10.1093/oso/9780197540572.003.0006 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 120-134

Author(s):

Nadia E. Brown ◽

Danielle Casarez Lemi

Keyword(s):

Content Analysis ◽

Black Women ◽

Black Woman ◽

Local Level ◽

Visual Content ◽

Women Candidates ◽

Original Dataset ◽

Political Office ◽

Woman Candidate

This chapter conducts a visual content analysis of Black women candidates’ headshots to examine whether there is a “phenotypic archetype” of Black women candidates to which Black women are exposed. Findings from an original dataset on the appearances of Black women candidates who sought office in 2018 align with prior research on colorism and representation. The chapter presents data that shows that the pool of Black women candidates skews lighter-skinned with straightened hair, and that candidates who wear braids or locs may disproportionately lose their contests. These findings suggest that Black women who seek local-level offices with natural styles like locs may find it difficult to enter political office and to rise to higher levels of office. The exploratory findings presented in the chapter illustrate a patterned preference for a certain type of Black women candidate, but it is noted that more research should be done on a larger scale to assess this trend.

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Linked Fate, Black Voters, and Black Women Candidates

Sister Style ◽

10.1093/oso/9780197540572.003.0008 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 164-171

Author(s):

Nadia E. Brown ◽

Danielle Casarez Lemi

Keyword(s):

Experimental Data ◽

Black Women ◽

Relevant Literature ◽

Black Politics ◽

Vote Choice ◽

Men And Women ◽

Women Candidates ◽

Linked Fate ◽

Group Members ◽

Black Voters

This chapter examines how linked fate—a feeling of closeness to group members—may shape how Black voters respond to Black women candidates. It provides a brief review of the relevant literature on linked fate and colorism, a novel inclusion to this foundational concept in Black politics. The chapter includes colorism in an analysis of linked fate and its significance to vote choice, and it more fully fleshes out these implications for the appeal of Black women candidates to men and women voters who report a sense of linked fate. Using experimental data, the authors do not find strong evidence of heterogeneity by linked fate. The chapter ends with a discussion of how Black women candidates’ bodies influence vote choice.

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The Journal of Race Ethnicity and Politics ◽

10.1017/rep.2019.18 ◽

2019 ◽

Vol 4 (2) ◽

pp. 259-296 ◽

Cited By ~ 3

Author(s):

Danielle Casarez Lemi ◽

Nadia E. Brown

Keyword(s):

Black Women ◽

Black Male ◽

White Women ◽

Skin Tone ◽

Negative Effects ◽

Women Candidates ◽

Discrimination Hypothesis ◽

And Gender ◽

Hair Texture ◽

Positive Effect

AbstractResearch on candidate evaluation has delved into questions of how voters evaluate women candidates, Black male candidates, as well as how candidates’ appearances may condition electoral opportunities. Combined, this scholarship has tended to focus on how race, gender, and skin tone privilege or undermine evaluations of Black male or White women candidates. We intervene to study Black women candidates and draw on research on colorism and Black women's hairstyles and ask: How does variation in skin tone and hairstyle affect Black voter evaluations of Black women candidates? We develop and test two hypotheses: the empowerment hypothesis and the internal discrimination hypothesis. We mostly find support for the latter. Importantly, we find that the interaction of dark skin and non-straight hair has mostly negative effects on Black men and women's trait evaluations, but a positive effect on Black women's willingness to vote for the candidate. Furthermore, this research shows that hair texture is an important aspect of responses to Black women candidates—hair is not just hair for Black women candidates. This research shows that understanding the effects of candidate appearance on voter behavior necessitates considering the intersection of racial and gender phenotypes.

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Candid Conversations: Black Women Political Elites and Appearances

Sister Style ◽

10.1093/oso/9780197540572.003.0004 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 75-94

Author(s):

Nadia E. Brown ◽

Danielle Casarez Lemi

Keyword(s):

Black Women ◽

Political Action ◽

Political Elites ◽

Women Candidates ◽

Aesthetic Experiences ◽

Age Cohorts ◽

Political Implications ◽

Action Committee ◽

Political Office ◽

The Aesthetic

This chapter showcases how conversations are a generative tool to assess the differences and similarities in the aesthetic experiences of Black women political elites. The authors partnered with the Black Women’s Political Action Committee of Texas to provide the first ever scholarly focus group with Black women political elites. Through an organic conversation, they found that Black women candidates and elected officials face challenges from others, including fellow Black women, about how they choose to present themselves for political office. The authors documented generational splits in how age cohorts of Black women decide to style themselves and the political implications of these choices. Most notably, Millennial Black women political elites detailed discrimination and hostilities based on their styling preferences, often at the hands of older Black women.

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Sisterly Discussions about Black Women Candidates

Sister Style ◽

10.1093/oso/9780197540572.003.0005 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 95-119

Author(s):

Nadia E. Brown ◽

Danielle Casarez Lemi

Keyword(s):

Black Women ◽

Focus Group ◽

Historically Black ◽

Cultural Norms ◽

Political Elites ◽

Women Candidates ◽

Natural Hair ◽

Delta Sigma ◽

Political Implications ◽

Elected Office

In this chapter, through a focus group with members of Delta Sigma Theta Sorority, Inc., the authors query a set of highly politically engaged Black women about the importance of appearance to this group of political elites. As a historically Black Greek Letter Organization, this sorority has, throughout its history, upheld restrictive and controlling cultural norms that disproportionately impact Black women. Yet, the authors’ findings demonstrate that while there are different preferences and tactics that Black sorority-member voters think are most useful for other Black women to gain elected office, those voters are uniform in their desire to see successful Black women political elites. The authors also observe a generational split regarding the perceived political implications for Black women candidates with natural hair, which the focus group participants tie back to respectability politics. The chapter concludes by highlighting the differences in how younger Black sorority members think about the politics of appearance and the implications for these differences for the future of Black women political elites.

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Voter Responses to Black Women Candidates

Sister Style ◽

10.1093/oso/9780197540572.003.0007 ◽

2021 ◽

pp. 135-163

Author(s):

Nadia E. Brown ◽

Danielle Casarez Lemi

Keyword(s):

Black Women ◽

Real World ◽

Skin Tone ◽

Women Candidates ◽

Black Candidates ◽

Mayoral Election ◽

Survey Experiments ◽

Black Voters

This chapter presents findings from two survey experiments on Black voters. As many Black candidates run in majority-minority districts, the chapter’s focus on Black voters approximates realistic scenarios. Experiment 1 focuses on Black voters’ evaluations of a single candidate as her skin tone and hairstyle are varied, and Experiment 2 focuses on Black Democratic voters’ evaluations of two Black women candidates to determine whether appearances have the potential to split Black Democrats’ votes. Experiment 2 approximates real-world scenarios like the 2019 mayoral election in Chicago between Lori Lightfoot and Toni Preckwinkle. This chapter speaks to how Black voters evaluate Black women candidates who vary in phenotype.

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