Sacred Sisterhoods

“Sacred Sisterhoods shatters the stereotypes that have plagued Black women in historical and cultural spaces. It speaks to material that has long been deserving of examination and sits nicely alongside seminal works such as Watching While Black and Revolution Televised, as well as more current cinematic discussions.” —Mark Cunningham, Professor and Department Chair of Radio-Television-Film at Austin Community College

The dramatic expansion of Black women into creative positions in television and film production since the 1990s has introduced a previously invisible range of themes in Black women’s lives to wide audiences. In Imani M. Cheers’s richly interdisciplinary Sacred Sisterhoods, contributors offer an overdue analysis and elevation of Black women’s creative authority in popular culture: its history, successes, influence, and future possibilities. Focusing on the theme of Black women’s friendship, star voices from across academia, journalism, the arts, and activism offer critical-cultural commentary and personal reflections on the evolution of Black women directors, writers, producers, and showrunners from the 1930s through 2023.

Creative visionaries from Debbie Allen to Quinta Brunson, along with shows and films from Living Single to Hidden Figures—and many others—receive their due in these rigorous, lively, and accessible essays. Spotlighting the nuances and normalcy of Black women’s sacred sisterhoods, contributors reveal the indelible mark modern Black consciousness and creative control leave on our popular culture every day in an anthology that will be essential to scholars and students of contemporary media, race, and gender, as well as to general readers.

Contributors: Imani M. Cheers, Monique A. Gamble, Marquita Gammage, Kandice Harris, Crystal L. Holmes, Makeba Lavan, Rondrea Danielle Mathis, Miriam J. Petty-Adams, DeAnna Reese, Randi Richardson, Beretta E. Smith-Shomade, Andrene M. Taylor, Kristen Warner, and Shauntae Brown White

Imani M. Cheers is a cultural curator, filmmaker, and academic. She is Associate Professor of Digital Storytelling in the School of Media and Public Affairs at the George Washington University. She is the author of The Evolution of Black Women in Television: Mammies, Matriarchs and Mistresses and curator of Framing Fatherhood: A Celebration of Black Fathers.

Contents

Editor’s Introduction

Episode 1 Sisterhoods on Screen
Chapter 1         Best Friends Forever: Representations of Sisterhood among Black Women in Television Series
Chapter 2        Divine Secrets of the Purple Sisterhood: How Friendship Lays the Foundation for Faith in Blitz Bazawule’s Adaptation of Alice Walker’s The Color Purple
Chapter 3        All My Sisters with Me: Black Aunts and Familial Friendship on Primetime Television

Episode 2 Reclaiming Our Time
Chapter 4         Rupture and Repair: A Girlfriends Guide to Being Girls
Chapter 5         Beyond the Confines: Moments
Chapter 6         Emergency Bonds: The Evolution of Athena and Hen’s Friendship in 9-1-1
Chapter 7         Down in the Valley: Stories of Strippers, Survival, and Sisterhood on P-Valley

Episode 3 Creative Content Creators
Chapter 8         Framing Feminism: The Magnitude of Media Ownership
Chapter 9         Total Boss: Yvette Lee Bowser’s “Brand of Friendship” as Sisterhood on American Sitcom Television
Chapter 10         Sacred [Queer] Sisterhoods
Chapter 11         Directors, Writers, and Showrunners: The Meaning of Black Women On-Screen

Postscript         Girl, If You Don’t Keep Going: How Harlem Shows Sisterhood as a Resistance Model

Acknowledgments
List of Contributors
Index