1. A Taste For Brown Sugar
Black Women in
Pornography
Siena Del Ponte
2. Definitions
❏ Respectability Politics - seeks to counter the racist
stereotype of the deviant black woman by embodying an
image of gender and sexual normativity evocative of a
patriarchal ideal of feminine virtue / policing each other (ix).
❏ Illicit Eroticism - framework to understand the ways in which
Black women put hypersexuality to use / re-represents
racialized sexuality / asserts the value of erotic capital to
those whose sexualities have been been marked illicit (10).
❏ Stags or Blue Movies - Moving-image pornography from
1908-late 1960s / produced for and distributed to male
audiences / space for homosocialization (49).
3. Definitions
❏ Soul Porn - Assertive aspect of black sexuality that appears
in pornography’s representational economy during this civil
right and black power era (67).
❏ Classy - In the context in which Miller-Young uses it, “classy”
is meant to reflect a value important to marginalized people -
to resist alienation and disenfranchisement (137).
❏ Video Vixen - Erotically framed woman whose performance
intends to sell the rapper, the products of his supposed
lifestyle and the song (144).
4. Points of Embodiment
❏ Racial fetishism and White supremacy
❏ Commodification of black performance and sexual
economies
❏ Politics of strategic sexual labor
❏ Queer political potential in deviant acts
❏ Collective racial trauma
❏ Agency in visibility
❏ Performed resistance
5. Driving Themes
❏ As I understand, ATFBS is about providing information
about and historicizing, in a sense, the experiences of
Black women in pornography, a taboo topic on which
little academic research has been done.
❏ ATFBS is also about exposing the controversies
surrounding adult film, and providing a counter to the
mainstream view of pornography as inherently
oppressive and degrading towards women.
6. Theory
❏ Intersectionality Theory - Deborah King “multiple
oppressions” (xi)
❏ Standpoint Theory (entire text)
❏ Queer Theory - “politics of perversion” (x)
❏ Angela Davis - Erotic Sovereignty (64)
❏ Cynthia Blair - Strategic Negotiations for Survival (64)
❏ Ho Theory (144)
7. Women of Colour
❏ ATFBS specifically addresses WOC by
centralizing adult film actresses who identify
as and are perceived as Black in the adult
film industry
❏ ATFBS also contextualizes Black women’s
experiences within a broader patriarchal,
white supremacist society.
8. Three Examples
❏ Race and Gender: “...Black women are always ‘already assumed
to be’ whores” (10).
❏ Agency: “She becomes a disruptive force who manipulates her
construction as an illicit erotic object in the imagination of the
viewer” (56). (Darkie Rhythm and KKK Night Riders) (Also see
Sinnamon love slide image on 171, Sahara’s representational labor
on 129, and Angel’s self-fashioning on 137)
❏ Institutional Power: “The image of violent men and victimized
women in hip hop porn is instilled with a mimetic and voyeuristic
quality...These productions not only benefit white producers but
also present desirable fantasies for white consumers” (154).
9. Questions
1. How are Gopinath’s notions of queer diaspora applicable to
Miller-Young’s portrayal of adult film actresses finding a
sense of home in the adult film industry?
2. How are Hobson’s notions of spectacle and visibility of
underrepresented bodies understood further in the context of
Miller-Young’s portrayal of adult film actresses?
3. Who do you understand to be Miller-Young’s intended
audience? Compare and contrast Miller-Young’s intended
audience and style of writing to those of Hobson and
Gopinath.
