Livin’ Large: Black Women Speak Out on Culture, Consciousness and Comparisons on Weight
By: Esther Iverem
January 7, 2008
In the United States, where the media often fawns over celebrities so thin that their ribs are showing or with known eating disorders, many Black men go crazy over voluptuous stars, such as tennis champion Serena Williams, singer Jill Scott or comedians like Monique.
Clearly the story of body weight and Black women is one of complexity, mixed messages, culture and environment. In the U.S., where 65 percent of the population is at least overweight, Black women form the leading edge of a population of expanding girth, with 78 percent of us overweight and more than half of us obese, according to a survey conducted by the Centers for Disease Control and Prevention. But perhaps precisely because of our shield against our historical denigration in this society, and because our community reinforces that "real women have curves," many of us don't automatically equate extra pounds with an image or health emergency.
"I have issues all the time with my weight," says Adell Treadwell, a 29-year-old elementary school teacher who lives in Charlotte, N.C. "But a lot of men do like women who do have some thickness to them. I don't mean big and sloppy but some kind of back and thickness to their legs. They don't want a too-skinny woman."
On July 7, 2007, Adell was a glowing bride in a wedding that she fussed over for months, most especially her appearance. "I didn't want to look for a wedding dress for the longest time," she says. "I wanted to make sure I went down to a 16. I'm small up top but I didn't want my bottom to be an 18 to 20."
Her new husband James, 30, who works as a manager at a local performance venue, says that despite a culture of music video vixens and plastic surgery enhancement, a woman with ample and real curves is what he prefers. "All of my friends are pretty much the same," he says. "They like the kind of woman that is not so skinny."
Two psychologists, Mikki Hebl and Julie M. Turchin, confirmed in a study published in 2005 in the journal Basic and Applied Social Psychology what many us of already know: that Black men like women with a little more meat on their bones. "Black men don't seem to have the same craze for thinness as White men do," says Mikki Hebl, who works at Rice University.
Yet, how do Black women feel about their weight in spite of the conflicting messages from our men and the media. Jokes from the likes of Redd Foxx, to Robin Harris to Eddie Murphy in the hideous movie "Norbit" tend to stereotype Black women. And, most women don't find it humorous.
Leah, 49, who lives in the state-California-that seems to invent all fitness trends, is acutely aware of the stigma of fat. She knows all the right things she needs to do to lose weight-eat healthier and get more exercise-but that knowledge has not kept her from, over the course of 20 years, gaining about 150 pounds. "The last time I weighed myself, I weighed 302," she says with a tone of resignation at her suburban home. Holding down a 10-hour-day job as an attorney and commuting 90 minutes each way into San Francisco, Leah has found no time for exercise, winds up eating dinner late each night and has carried the stress as primary breadwinner for her family. Recently separated from an abusive husband and with her children now in college, she now hopes to focus more time on herself.
"I have to try and make an effort at this point-I just have to," says Leah. "I was reading this article in Jet about Star Jones and Oprah. They have someone who makes them exercise. But if you're on your own, you can think of all kinds of excuses about why not to go workout. I wish I did have a personal trainer but who can afford that? I have to force myself to just leave work earlier or go to the gym before I go to work."
Leah also believes that years of cooking to please a husband and growing boy, rather than for her health, took their toll. She is now looking forward to cooking and eating healthier with her daughter, who is a commuter college student. "My son liked ribs," Leah jokes. "But now that he's gone we'll probably eat more salads and lighter meals."
"I think Black women, in general, are less freakish about their weight than White women," she adds. "I don't think that size 2 is a goal for Black women. Even a size 12 for me would be great but a size 12 for White women-they would think they were fat. My son says his ideal woman is like Serena Williams or Laylah Ali and they're not skinny. My husband used to say, 'don't nobody want a bone but a dog.'"
Like Adell and Leah, Makani Themba-Nixon of Washington, D.C., married a man who loves her just as she is-not skinny-and she has recently resolved to lose the extra pounds that she has picked up since her wedding 10 years ago.
Even though the 46-year-old, nonprofit executive is looking forward to fitting more of her clothes, she is especially motivated by the health benefits of carrying around less weight. Taking a page from her teen-age daughter Laura, who is a vegan, she recently eliminated meat and poultry from her diet, as well as wheat products and potatoes. She also forces herself to leave her demanding job to attend a regular belly dancing class. "It feels so good to have more energy," she says. "I just feel so much better."
Dr. Shiriki Kumanyika, a leading researcher in the field of obesity and minority health, says that any obesity education program that targets African American women must stress weight loss for better health, rather than for thinness.
"Some obese Black women may have a strong self-image that transcends weight," she wrote in a 2005 study. "Populations with a history of oppression have, of necessity, honed their ability to be self-accepting to a fine art in order to survive, to buffer mistreatment and derogatory images from outside the community (e.g., the idea that maybe society does not love us, but we can love ourselves)."
Like Themba-Nixon and Leah, Adell Treadwell knows that her guilty pleasures- chocolate, cakes, pies, fried chicken and cheese streaks when she goes home to Philly-must be eaten in moderation.
The newlywed also knows that carving out time for exercise will be beneficial for her health. "I don't have any health issues right now but I know if I get to a certain weight I could get high blood pressure. My mom has that."
"I'm my biggest critic," she adds. "We all try to encourage each other," she says of her young circle of friends. A lot of them are into going to the gym so it's good to have them as a support network. If we go out together and do get dessert, we all share it."
Esther Iverem is founder and editor of www.SeeingBlack.com. Her most recent book is "We Gotta Have It: Twenty Years of Seeing Black at the Movies, 1986-2006."
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