Follow the Leader

The other side of African American masculinity is the encouragement to embody and live within the “experienced” body.  Even men who go to prison are glorified on being able to survive the system. These men are embraced as the “real man” stereotype.  Their experience is held as “ideal” and incomparable to the “other” black man without this, so-called, experience. The experienced man is seen as conquering the world and defying all possible authority. Furthermore, their ability to sustain themselves within an institution (prison) is held as heroic.  We can see this glorification held high in the gangsta-rap world with rappers having wars across boundaries. These boundaries are based on claims of “fake” experience versus “real-life” experience.  This concept is frightening because it calls on the narrations of glorified violence based on real-life accounts. It thus encourages young men to go out and seek for these "experiences".

Lyrics from Hail Mary (50 Cent)

 Hell, I done been to jail, I ain't scared

Mama checkin' in my bedroom, I ain't there

I got a head with no screws in it.

In addition, I remember once in an interview when 50 Cent (rival to rapper Ja Rule) was asked about his relation to his nemesis: He proceeded to call out Ja rule's Jehovah witness experience: claiming that when he was out in the tough street life, Ja Rule was selling Bibles door to door.

As we can see, there is a visible call towards an "ideal" masculinity even within the black community itself. We can therefore not claim to say that influence is purely permeable from outside sources. The task is to mediate an image we come to know about ourselves and the image others come to perceive about us. In "Subjects of Subjection", Annika Thiem talks about how one comes to be what one is and can be. Thiem sees the subject as "non-transparent to itself". In other words, black masculinity is formed through relations of power and in subjection to norms and social practices.