As they became the top two players in the world, media accounts increasingly invoked a vocabulary that portrayed them as figures of aggression (Mott, 2001). Venus’s and Serena’s strong black female bodies were described as ‘pummeling’, ‘overwhelming’ and ‘overpowering’ (apparently frail and powerless) white female opponents. These images of unyielding power and threat resonate with a particular kind of racial imagery, one that always sees black bodies as dangerous bodies. The language that is used to depict Venus’s and Serena’s physicality is revealing because it signals a whole set of contradictory meanings and expectations regarding their abilities. These characterizations of power and aggression create figures that are “so loaded with mythical prepossession that there is no easy way for the agents buried beneath them to come clean to emerge unscathed” (Spillers, 1987, p. 65). The cultural significance of these portrayals rests in the fact that media accounts establish identities and shape stories that explain athletes and events to audiences (Tudor, 1998). These narratives reinforce the notion that the sisters are trespassers whose presence undermines the cultural integrity of women’s tennis.--Timothy Benston (2013)
Posted on: Mon, 20 Oct 2014 23:59:48 +0000
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