And to me that was just another way to think about 'Thick.' And then I wanted to write essays that would expose these different ideas and these different ways of thinking about the world to people who may not experience them themselves. And that history of thought, when I reflected on the things that had been most instructive in my own learning over the course of becoming a girl and a woman in this society, this thing kept resonating with me of nuance, of depth, of complexity in the history of that thinking. 'I have an understanding that black women, like any other group of people, any other subculture, has a political philosophy and a ideology.

There's this category out there that we think of as 'thick.' But there's also, one of the plays on the title essay is that idea that I also wanted to connect how we move through the world physically as women, with black women's bodies in this world, and connect that to our political thought and the way that we think and approach the world.

But, it does usually suggest a certain presentation of femininity, of being somewhere between thin and what we would probably call fat. And this is where everybody usually starts Googling a picture of me, and I would just really suggest no one do that. They think it's a bit of an inside joke, because it is often used, especially in culture and African-American culture, to mean a certain type of physical presence. Young readers, people who spend a lot of time on social media, maybe in popular culture absolutely see it and start laughing. 'If they're wondering where I'm going with that, it says a lot about the reader, first of all. Author of ' Thick: And Other Essays,' a collection exploring the identity and experience that defines black womanhood in America. Tressie McMillan Cottom, writer, columnist, and professor of sociology at Virginia Commonwealth University. In her new collection of essays, Cottom says her work is animated by what’s still seen as a 'radical idea … black women are rational and human.' From that assumption, she works her way analytically through politics, economics, history, sociology and culture.

But are we hearing every essential voice? Rhetorical question, because the answer is obviously no.įor example, not enough of us have heard the searing analysis from sociology professor and black feminist thinker Tressie McMillan Cottom. (Robin Lubbock/WBUR) This article is more than 3 years old.īeauty. 'Thick And Other Essays,' by Tressie McMillan Cottom.

Thick essays