From Phenomenal Woman to Stereotypical

*Article first pub­lished as From Phenomenal Woman to Stereotypical on Blogcritics.*

Maya Angelou’s poem Phenomenal Woman ele­vated even the most inse­cure woman to a level in which they could hold their heads high. Her words drew imagery of a proud woman who car­ries her­self with the grace of a regal and rare crea­ture.

Confidence emit­ting through her every action, this woman was the essence of unques­tion­able beauty and charm catch­ing the eye of even the most dis­tin­guished men, even though her fea­tures were noth­ing extra­or­di­nary. What shone through her fem­i­nine façade was beauty that did not need to be classed by the shape of her body or any­thing phys­i­cal at all. Just her being and know­ing who she was in her own skin in the pres­ence of onlook­ers and alone. What has hap­pened to this woman that Maya Angelou penned these words so effort­lessly on paper?

Much debate has been made about sta­tis­tics sur­round­ing the sin­gle sta­tus of black women in par­tic­u­lar. Although this state can­not be con­fined to just one group of women, there is a cer­tain uni­ver­sal­ity that crosses eth­nic bound­aries. There has been cre­ated no longer this image of a phe­nom­e­nal woman, but a stereo­typ­i­cal one. Who is she and is she in you?

Television and movies have per­ma­nently cap­tured women as they once were: so wor­thy of honor that men rose to their feet out of respect in their pres­ence. Today we have seen that this tra­di­tion has com­pletely fallen away in this part of the world. Is it because men have lost their respect for women? Probably. Is it because women have lost respect for them­selves? Definitely.

Many women bris­tle at the idea that they may fall into the stereo­typ­i­cal cat­e­gory, but we see these stereo­types per­pe­trated all around us. Women who are just as rude and brash as any man and women who lack the basic tenets of respect for the men in their lives, whether they be their roman­tic inter­ests, employ­ers or employ­ees. Let’s look at wom­ankind today as if we are look­ing at our­selves in a mir­ror. What would our reflec­tion be?

We live in a soci­ety where inde­pen­dence among women defines us. Women, regard­less of back­ground, unequiv­o­cally state on a reg­u­lar basis that we don’t need any­one to do any­thing for us. And it’s true. Sometimes we don’t. We also have a laun­dry list of qual­i­fi­ca­tions that any poten­tial love must meet before they can come into our lives, and rightly so because our choice in whom we attach our­selves to deter­mines our future.

However, unlike Miss Angelou’s Phenomenal Woman the stereo­typ­i­cal woman defines her­self by her abil­ity to have her own life and to depend on no one, even to the point of emas­cu­lat­ing the very men she wants to attract.

The stereo­typ­i­cal woman refuses to carry her­self with dig­nity and grace as she chooses to embody the bravado of a man within the con­fines of her fem­i­nin­ity. The stereo­typ­i­cal woman regards beauty as the prime thing, but inside her heart is shal­low and lacks depth nat­ural to her gen­der. Determined never to suc­cumb to the charm of any man, the stereo­typ­i­cal woman aims to take any and all author­ity over her emo­tions to the point of cold cal­cu­la­tion.

Unlike Maya Angelou’s Phenomenal Woman, who was the poetic inven­tion of the writer’s real­ity, the stereo­typ­i­cal woman has become the real­ity of many. She too is a woman though, stereo­typ­i­cally. Stereotypical woman, is that you?

Thanks for read­ing,