Object Record
Images
Metadata
Object |
Bell |
Date |
1960 |
Description |
"Mammy Belle" a gift to Grandma Moses for her 100th birthday in 1960 from Mrs. Dwight Marvin. Metal bell with a black painted wooden handle. Face painted on handle. The bell is dressed in a blue and red stripd dress with a sheer white apron over it. The arms are pieces of felt. |
Height (inches) |
4.500 |
Information |
"Mammy" imagery, such as this doll, was a racist caricature of Black women. During slavery, smiling mammy was used as propaganda to claim that Black women were contented, even happy, being enslaved. Desexualized mammy imagery was also used to refute the abolitionist claim that enslavers sexually exploited their female slaves, especially light-skinned ones who approximated the mainstream definition of female beauty. The mammy caricature (very dark skinned, overweight, older, using poor grammar) was deliberately constructed to suggest ugliness. The imagery endured through the Jim Crow era and beyond as a justification for the economic oppression of Black women, depicting them as only fit for domestic labor. |
Related People |
Moses, Anna Mary Robertson (Grandma) |
Credit line |
Museum Purchase |
Catalog Number |
2005.169 |