Bodies in a Frame: Black British, Working Class, Teenage Femininity and the Role of the Dance Class

Camilla Stanger

Sociological Research Online, 2013, vol. 18, issue 2, 204-213

Abstract: Historically the working class, black, female body has been defined by its sexuality and socially constructed as an object for heterosexual consumption; this article is concerned with how this manifests itself for young British women in educational settings today. I will argue that this historical bodily construction has been compounded for young women in this context by a contemporary popular culture which frames, glamorises and hetero-sexualises black female bodies. Drawing on the work of Judith Butler and Michel Foucault, I will suggest that girls who perform a Black British, working-class femininity play a central role in their own construction as hetero-sexualised and consequently passive bodies, through an internalisation of and performance for a heterosexual ‘gaze’ within various spaces of the urban, post-16 college. This article ultimately focuses, however, on the potential for resistance. Based on research conducted into the experiences of four dance students at an inner London post-16 college, I will explore the dance class as a potential space for resisting the debilitating heterosexual gaze enacted within the public spaces of the college. I will argue that the dance class can be a space where the student can reconstruct and reproduce her own body in a way that grants it agency, rather than objectifying it within a metaphorical frame.

Keywords: Body; Teenage; Femininity; Black; Working Class; Glamour; Hetero-Sexualisation; Gaze; Dance; Agency (search for similar items in EconPapers)
Date: 2013
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Persistent link: https://EconPapers.repec.org/RePEc:sae:socres:v:18:y:2013:i:2:p:204-213

DOI: 10.5153/sro.3041

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