Most people think a mammy is an obese, middle-aged enslaved Black woman who happily spends her time fussing over white people and their children. She neglects her family’s needs and her own to endear herself to the white people she works for. But that’s not who Mammy was originally.
Historians suggest such a woman didn’t even exist. The women we most associate with mammies would have been fieldhands who were kept away from white families. However there were enslaved women who were forced to serve white families and care for white children.
The real “Mammy” was likely biracial and thin with soft textured hair. Harriet Beecher Stowe, a liberal white abolitionist, and author of Uncle Tom’s Cabin is responsible for creating the image of Mammy in “Gone With The Wind,” “Tom and Jerry”, and even Aunt Jemima.
Stowe’s recreation of Mammy was powerful. It shamed Black women, and it was profitable. The Black Mammy image solidified the narrative that it’s Black women’s role to obediently and eagerly serve white society even if it’s against their best interest.
The idea that Black women owe society their time, labor, talents, care, or allegiance is nasty work. It denies Black women the rest and personhood that is their birthright.