Gabriel, D., & Tate, S.A. (eds), (2017). Inside the Ivory Tower: Narratives of Women of Colour
Surviving and Thriving in British Academia. London: Trentham Books
1
Overcoming objectification and dehumanisation in academia
Deborah Gabriel
‘Domination always involves the objectification of the dominated’.
(Maynard cited in Collins, 1986: S18)
Introduction
This chapter is a critical reflection and analysis of being objectified and
dehumanised as a Black female academic. Objectification and dehumanisation as
the ‘other’ is a typical component of Black women’s raced and gendered experiences
(Collins, 1986, 1989). Through critical reflective analysis I aim to highlight the role
that objectification and dehumanisation play in maintaining our status as ‘others’ and
keeping us on the periphery of academic life. Using Black feminist theory as a critical
lens helps me make sense of my experiences through a unique standpoint of and for
Black women that involves self-definition and self-valuation as tools of resistance
(Collins, 1989). In this chapter I also highlight the role that community networking
and sister relationships has played in supporting my survival and progress within
academia.
Objectification and dehumanisation
Objectification is defined as treating people like objects, while dehumanisation
refers to seeing and treating people as if they are not human (Gervais et al., 2013).
Dehumanisation can involve the denial of human attributes to groups or individuals
(ibid.,) as is the case with people of African descent, or those of us racialised as
Black. Throughout history Black people have been subjected to objectification and
dehumanisation, with many of the ideologies that underpinned our systemised
dehumanisation during European slavery being espoused during the Enlightenment
by celebrated White philosophers. For example, in his Lectures on the Philosophy of
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Gabriel, D., & Tate, S.A. (eds), (2017). Inside the Ivory Tower: Narratives of Women of Colour
Surviving and Thriving in British Academia. London: Trentham Books
2
World History (1822-8) Georg Hegel, proposed that Africans remain in a perpetual
child-like state of being where they have no consciousness of their existence as
human beings (Eze, 1997). In 1775, in his essay On National Characteristics, So Far
as They Depend Upon the Distinct Feeling of the Sublime, Immanuel Kant
suggested that Africans are incapable of moral and aesthetic feeling (ibid.,). Kant
regarded objectification as the denial of humanity which results in objectified people
being perceived as existing purely to serve the ends of others (Loughnan et al.,
2010). The sexual objectification of Black women was most pronounced during
European slavery when the rape of Black female slaves was legitimised through their
interlinked status as chattel and concubines (Jordan, 1962) and through their
construction and representation as hypersexual, amoral beings —the antithesis of
White female virtue (Craig, 2006). The present-day dehumanisation and
objectification of Black people should therefore be regarded as legacies of White
European slavery and colonization which are rooted in White supremacy.
When I was undertaking my PhD from 2010-2014 in media and cultural studies,
I taught on undergraduate degrees in journalism and during my first year became the
object of racist and sexist discourse exchanged between a group of White students
on Facebook, three of whom were females. Their online conversation, during which
they referred to me by my race and gender in animalistic and graphic sexual terms,
took place during my class where they laughed openly, though at the time I was
unaware I was the brunt of their jokes. While their actions enraged me, I also felt a
profound sense of disappointment — not least because I had gone to great lengths
to support some of those very students who had come to me for additional
assistance with their work, which I had happily provided. Their behaviour
demonstrated not just a deep lack of respect for me as their tutor, but also spoke to
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Gabriel, D., & Tate, S.A. (eds), (2017). Inside the Ivory Tower: Narratives of Women of Colour
Surviving and Thriving in British Academia. London: Trentham Books
3
their rejection of me as a human being worthy of respect. Racist and sexist
ideologies are often expressed in animalistic terms (Collins, 1986) whereby
controlling images of Black women help to normalise racism and emphasise our
outsider status. It is a way of signifying our un-belonging (Collins, 1990).
A key reason why as Black women we are frequently objectified as the ‘other’ is
because we do not conform to the dominant, normative conception of an academic,
which is a status reserved for White men, primarily, but also for White women. The
term ‘space invaders’ describes the status of Black women as outsiders in British
academia occupying a White, male-dominated space Puwar (2004), where
marginalisation, over-scrutinizing and the absence of a sense of belonging
characterise our experience (Wright et al., 2004). Space invaders is an apt definition,
given it is argued that we do not embody that which is deemed as ‘normal’ or
‘natural’ and in this regard, are perceived as alien others, since ‘the White male body
is taken as the norm’ (ibid.,149). The experience of being over-scrutinized in
academia is not limited to staff, since there is also a tendency among students to
question the credibility of Black academics. Discrimination is sometimes projected
through negative comments on course feedback that are often personalised (Bhopal
and Jackson, 2013). During my academic life, students have made personalised
comments in course feedback at different universities I have taught. On one
occasion, I was compared unfavourably to a White, female colleague who I taught
with on the same course and whose style of teaching is similar to my own. But of
course, I was not evaluated in the same way since ‘Black bodies entering spaces not
traditionally reserved for them are in a tenuous position’ (Wright et al., 2007:149). I
have come to believe that just as during European slavery Black women were
constructed as the antithesis of White females, so as women of colour academics we
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Gabriel, D., & Tate, S.A. (eds), (2017). Inside the Ivory Tower: Narratives of Women of Colour
Surviving and Thriving in British Academia. London: Trentham Books
4
are perceived as the opposites of our White female colleagues and are therefore
perceived as being ‘out of place’ (ibid.,). Dominant, western ideologies racialise
Black people in oppositional terms, not merely as different, and objectification is a
key part of this process (Collins, 1990). Being objectified means being defined,
labelled and positioned by others, and thereby subordinated.
My PhD thesis focused on Black bloggers in the UK, examining their
motivation, gratification and use of blogs as discursive activism. Most of the
participants were women, many of whom shared their experiences of raced and
gendered discrimination:
There was that whole thing about the lecturer who said that Black women weren’t
attractive. I was pissed off about that and …it really got me thinking, you know,
how we are seen. We are either demonised or fantasied, it’s one extreme to the
other.
Chioma, cited in Gabriel, 2014: 129.
My doctoral thesis drew theoretically and conceptually on Black feminism and critical
race theory. I found that analysing the experiences of the participants, that bore
similarities to my own biography, helped me to better understand my raced and
gendered experiences in academia. It highlighted how Black women speak up and
speak out as a response to being objectified and dehumanised in the media and
popular culture and the importance of creating spaces to enhance our voice and
visibility and to counter marginalisation and exclusion.
Ironically, while invisibility is a key dimension of our experiences as Black
women in higher education, hypervisibility is equally problematic. We may not fit the
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Gabriel, D., & Tate, S.A. (eds), (2017). Inside the Ivory Tower: Narratives of Women of Colour
Surviving and Thrivin
