This chapter is dedicated to the black actress Evelyn Preer, who appeared in many of Micheaux’s silent films. Her starring roles were often integral to narratives of victimization in relation to sexual violence, racial violence, abuse, and . In this chapter, her performances are likened to the silent film archetype of the suffering woman, or “embodiment of suffering onscreen”. While white actresses were also primarily used as vehicles of suffering in order to progress a plot, Micheaux wrote characters for Evelyn that revealed the overwhelming influence that white patriarchy had over both black and white female bodies.
For example, many silent movies of the era often integrated elements of “the displacement of male lack onto women” through the physical and sexual abuse of the female characters on screen. In this way, males would “reclaim” some of their masculinity by inflicting pain onto female bodies. However, Micheaux would reveal this gendered oppression through the black female body in addition to addressing racial oppression through the depiction of different narrative elements, including but not limited to : cross racial white lust, the “return of the oppressed” through the awakening of a character to stand up to an oppressor, and explicitly defending oneself against white on black violence.
Micheaux also would employ some common techniques in regard to the depiction of women in silent film, such as playing with the virgin / witch archetype (or the innocent who becomes the villain) for the purpose of questioning how black female bodies are able to embody more than one dimension of suffering in their characters.
However, these thoughtful and daring narratives were often challenged, and there is evidence that some have been cut out altogether. There is a particular instance in the film, Within Our Gates where an entire scene of a black man standing up to a white assailant was cut out. The only evidence we have that it even existed was found in Evelyn’s personal accounts. The scene is not in the surviving copy of the film. This is just one of many scenes that were probably cut from a number of films so that white supremacy could perpetuate its power through the distortion and censorship of media.
Learning that subversive scenes were cut from silent race films makes me wonder more about the censorship process. Who worked as censors? Where did their guidelines come from? How many films were censored? Are there any records that remain from the censorship offices? I found a censor record in the George P. Johnson collection but, for that particular film (title wasn’t noted), nothing was redacted.
Through my work in the curation team, I’ve come across this theme of women characters being written to suffer in some way; whether that’s sexual violence or lost romance. I’ve noticed that in films produced by the Lincoln Motion Picture Co., they actually seem to elevate to black women to stronger characters. They indeed suffer as all the characters tend to, but are elevated to a higher status of heroine instead of damsel. As women, I always find it painful to look back and see how women were oppressed. Especially representations of sexual violence in films- such a hard topic to face as a woman.
This summary really brought to light a lot of concepts of Micheaux’s work that had not been touched upon in my readings surrounding him. It is so interesting to see how he attempted to challenge two very large issues, race and gender relations, within his film. It makes me wonder if his contemporaries at the time knew that what he was doing was so impressive a feat to tackle, or whether this perspective has come in more modern times with retrospection.
Gendered and racial violence is definitely very complicated; I always have questions about whether portraying a problem is enough- or of how to meaningfully address a problem without retraumatizing people or without worsening it. How do we avoid letting the image of the suffering black woman cause more suffering black women?