Some examples of idealized strong black women in today's society include Michelle Obama, Oprah, Beyonce, and Serena Williams.
She describes the Mammy as "the ultimate symbol of maternal devotion" and recognizes how this image helped define "the nature of slavery, gender relations, motherhood, and memory in the American South.
She could be seen as the first example of the strong black woman schema due to her endless responsibilities and expectation to provide and care without complaint.
This stereotype outlived slavery and can be seen across popular media forms such as the movie Gone with the Wind where Hattie McDaniel portrays a Mammy in a nostalgic old South plantation home.
The first record in the media is DW Griffith's 1915 film The Birth of a Nation where the Mammy figure defends her masters' plantation during the Civil War.
[3] The misrepresentation of these Mammy figures in the media try to show these women as happy house slaves that enjoyed serving their Master and Mistress.
One of these women is Joan Morgan, who wrote her book, When Chickenheads Come Home To Roost, to discuss her experiences as a Black woman and her relationship with hip-hop feminism.
Intersectional oppression and white supremacy allow these images to persist without regard for the mental and physical consequences this lifestyle creates.
These issues have been studied and show many links between the strong black woman schema and mental as well as physical health problems.
This also means that Black women are facing greater risks specifically when it comes to childbirth as they are assumed to feel less pain than white mothers.
[7] The journal article by Sandra P. Thomas argues that Black Americans were disproportionately negatively affected by the COVID-19 pandemic and the racial injustices of 2020 causing a massive mental health crisis in the Black community, but that this crisis cannot be adequately addressed until psychiatric professionals learn the psychological effects of racism and address their own racism.
In January 2022, LaTonya M. Summers and Pam S. Lassiter argued that the Black community is one of the most evident minority groups in the U.S. yet their psychological issues are one of the least effectively treated.
Incorporating knowledge of transgenerational grief and trauma, whether from slavery, racism, abuse, family-specific situations, and more, is essential to effective treatment.
[9] The absence of contextual cultural knowledge in psychological care usually produces a wide gap of unaddressed stress and grief which undermines the integrity of treatment and inadvertently reaffirms harmful stereotypes like the strong black woman.
Instead of setting standardized goals which are traditionally Eurocentric in nature, Ashley found that "culturally competent" approaches work exponentially better for Black patients yet many are neglected of this need.
Patricia Hill Collins, explores the control of the pop culture on confining Black womanhood to Negative Stereotypes.
To combat those words, Black female rappers have formed categories that portray different personality traits in rap music: "Queen Mother", Fly Girl", "Sista with Attitude" and "Lesbian".
[15] The artists City Girls and Cardi B are known to apply this concept in their work as evident in the lyrics: "Bad bitch, cute face, yeah you like that/Don't be surprised if I ask where the bag at.
[15] Racist and sexist stereotypes in America that claimed African Americans as hypersexual and animalistic created a lot of the discourses around Black women's sexuality.
The rapper Megan Thee Stallion applies the politics of articulation through her musical persona and sexually-explicit lyrics in her single "Savage".
The positive narrative of the independent woman is that she's financially secure, a college graduate, beautiful, can cook, clean, and is a good supporter.
The angry black woman serves as a base due to the underlying portrayal of being aggressive in nature, and often used as comedic relief.
This stereotype dates back to the era of slavery, when black women were objectified and treated as sexual objects for the pleasure of their white masters.