A few years ago I did a research on how society views black Women and there were three main views of black women - The Mammy = a mum like figure who has no sex appeal, The Jezebel- a sexual woman who uses sex to draw in men and The Sapphire - commonly known as the angry black woman. So in my research I realized that most of these terms related to Americans where the Mammy was a servant they had as a child, the Jezebel is that girl you see in hip hop videos and the Sapphire was an independent woman like Condoleeza Rice. I really disconnected that idea to how people see African women because it related more to American concepts and history rather than African culture and tradition.

So I was Googling "African Women" the other day and this photo showed up.

This brought up a few concerns with me - This image of the mother breastfeeding is obviously a traditional view of African women and many movies portray this idea of the African woman so seeing as the image above looks modern does this mean that this is the modern view of how we are viewed? My other concern, where is the Sapphire, the independent woman? Are we either the "mother" figure or the "sexual" figure? Are we not seen as the strong black women and why is that? Should we take this as a compliment or an insult?

I guess because we are black women, we will always be judged by society one way or another, tell me what you think about this?