Remnants of Venus: Signifying Black Beauty and Sexuality
by Janell Hobson
WSQ: Women's Studies Quarterly
The Feminist Press
Volume 46, Numbers 1 & 2, Spring/Summer 2018
p. pp. 105-120
10.1353/wsq.2018.0015
"Remnants of Venus" examines popular representations of the "big booty", often associated with and serving as a stand-in for black women's sexualities. This essay calls into question whether such representations, embodied through racial appropriations by non-black women or satirized by black women like Kara Walker and Nicki Minaj, can exist beyond "signs" of sexual excess or whether they can be mobilized toward black sexual freedom and an aesthetic of black beauty, as other artists have attempted, from Janelle Monáe to Beyoncé to young women "twerk" dancing.