Why+Women+Always+Take+Advantage+of+Men

//"Why Women Always Take Advantage of Men"//
//**Aaron Douglas, An Idyll of the Deep South, 1934**//

This picture's central image is of black people the way that white people imagine them: Happy, dancing, singing, carefree- no worries or troubles on their minds, despite their continuous oppression. Outside of the “light” in the middle of the picture, however, the artists depicts life as it really was for the African Americans. On the right side, you can see black people hard at work, using their stereotypical black strength to get work done. On the left, you can see people gathered around a rope falling from a tree, presumably brought to their knees due to the terror of another lynching. One common element that carries throughout the picture is the light from a star, to which one man near the lynching focuses his attention. The light shines over this man's face, carrying through the “happy” scene in the middle, and falls short at the worker's feet. When carrying through the singing and dancing, however, the light changes the scene and you can see one man's face which otherwise would have been gray-ed out. Perhaps this light, whatever the source, will be their saving grace, illuminating the horrific situation of lynchings, while allowing them to actually experience real and true joy without it being but a mockery for the benefit of the white man. The light falling short of the workers could, perhaps, indicate an elimination of this type of life, once the star's light stretches its influence that far.

When referring back to Mules and Men, there seemed to be a lot of places where this type of deceptive focus, or “double level acting for double audiences” as we named it in class, takes place. If I had to stick it into the book in one particular place, however, I think it would have to go with the story, “Why Women Always Take Advantage of Men”. On the surface, this story seems to be about women getting intellectual strength over men (who are left with physical strength) but this is the plot just as the picture above seems to be depicting black people as happy, cheerful people. Partially true to both, however, is the stereotype of black males being strong; in the story, they get physical strength from God, and in the picture they use this strength to preform difficult tasks with their tools. Beneath the surface, however, this story is actually attributing the characteristics of feminine power to the black people and masculine power to the white people. Contrary to thinking of themselves as the delicate flower that is often connected with women, this view is instead giving them an intellectual power over the white people, leaving them only with the illusion of power- just as the woman in this story holds the keys, but let's the man look and pretend like he is the strong one with all the power. At the end of this story, he must “ mortgage his strength to her to live”; in other words, his investment in superiority led to an image of power without really having any. Just as the black people allow the white people to believe that their investments in demonstrating superiority over the black people was worth something, when really the black people hold the power; they are the ones who are ALLOWING the white people to view them in stereotypical ways. In the picture above, they are letting themselves be seen as the banjo playing, dancing, singing people in the middle of the picture, but are not so absent of brains in their brawn that they do not see the reality of what is happening around them.

Overall, the definitions I found for term Idyll (as in “An Idyll of the Deep South”) were reserved for poetry, but the definition seemed to fit this picture and story nonetheless. Idyll is defined as, “presenting an idealized story of happy innocence”. This is exactly what this picture not only portrays, but what the story “Why Women Always Take Advantage of Men” demonstrates, as well. The key word here is “presenting”: The artist of the picture, as well as the narrator of the story, are fully aware of the image they are presenting when they are sharing their art. They also know that others (white people) will view their picture with that projected image in mind, not worrying about the side story, or images in the painting's case. This is key in understanding the art and stories, as well as well as the way the black people lived during this time. They put off the image that they had no power but physical strength, which is exactly what the white people wanted to see, while secretly knowing they had ALL the power because they were the very ones that allowed the white people to have the illusion of holding the power that they did. Perhaps this is what the light in the picture represents- the knowledge that there is a different way of life and always LOOKING towards it, but instead of actively trying to capture it, just letting it wash over their lives and keep them working and surviving day after day- and maybe even singing and dancing, too.

The story "Why Women Always Take Advantage of Men" can be found starting on page 31 of the book, or can also be read here: [|Why Women Always Take Advantage of Men]