The concept of an African American princess has evolved significantly over time, reflecting changing societal attitudes and the growing importance of representation. From fictional characters in animated films to real-life royal figures, these women have challenged conventions, inspired generations, and left an indelible mark on history.
Princess Tiana: A Disney Milestone
It may be another fairy tale, but The Princess and the Frog-the much-buzzed-about, hotly scrutinized Disney film set in 1920s New Orleans-is hardly superficial. For the first time in the storied studio's animated history, an African-American princess takes the title role (Jasmine from 1992's Aladdin was the first ethnic princess), reinforcing the message en masse that black is beautiful. And to get it right-Princess Tiana's rounder features, her Southern inflection, and even her hairstyles (it's not your basic Barbie skin-color swap)-Disney smartly called up the experts, from Oprah to members of the NAACP. They even asked Brooklyn-based beauty line Carol's Daughter (with devotees-cum-investors like Jada Pinkett Smith and Jay-Z) to whip up the official grooming goods, upping ethnic authenticity and appeal-for black women and beyond.
Of course, Tiana isn't the first girl to challenge the conventions of American beauty-think of songbird Josephine Baker who ruled the roaring '20s with her then-"exotic" looks and styling; the gutsy Pat Evans, who shunned the modeling world's requisite black perm (chemical straightening) and buzzed her hair; the striking ebony curves of Naomi Sims, Grace Jones, Alek Wek-and Michelle Obama-who inspired artists and designers alike. Instead, Tiana is an homage to the many empowering black beauties before her. And that, in itself, makes for a happy ending.
Disney and Representation
After auditioning for a singing contract at Walt Disney World (WDW) Entertainment, I received a phone call asking me to audition for the role of Tiana, the first African American Disney princess. Four days later they offered me the role. I didn’t always see myself as pretty or someone to look up to, but being Tiana showed me I was all this and more. Throughout my WDW experience I got to meet families from all over the world. For the first time I felt seen by all without just being seen by the color of my skin….it was “magical”.
During my time in the parks, I traveled as Princess Tiana, opening and closing parades, attending special events such as the Philadelphia parade, and making special appearances on major TV networks like the Disney Channel and ABC. I got to travel as the media face of Walt Disney World, meaning my face represented Princess Tiana’s face. In the film “The Princess and the Frog” ,Tiana was a waitress with the hopes of running her own restaurant and thereby fulfilling her and her fathers dream.
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Within my Disney career, I eventually became a trainer, which was a huge accomplishment. I got to train girls, teach them the legacy of Princess Tiana’s story and the importance of us as Black girls coming together to represent for our Princess. I was honored to see young Black and biracial girls feel the same acceptance of being seen as this beautiful lead. I remember the excitement my younger sister Tianna had when she learned that Disney would be creating a movie with a Black princess named Tiana. She went prancing around the house requesting that everyone now call her “Princess Tianna”.
One of the most memorable moments I can share was when an older black woman came to meet Princess Tiana. Her eyes were filled with tears as she said, “Thank you so much for being a beautiful, chocolate black, young lady of representation and a role model for these kids. That meant the world to me and told me that I was doing something right… and that this role wasn’t just for kids, it was for all generations. Portraying Tiana is something I am really proud of and I love that I still get to be that for children here in the Tristate area. What does representation mean to you? They can see the possibilities without feeling that they have to change who they are. I love what I get to do for all children.
The Making Of Disney's The Princess and the Frog (2009) Behind The Scenes Featurette - Voice Cast
The Hair Debate
However, the natural hair movement has led me as well as other naturalistas to look at Princess Tiana, from Disney’s Princess and the Frog with a critical eye. Particularly, Princess Tiana’s outward appearance has recently come under scrutiny in a recent Buzzfeed article published on June 4th of this year. This Buzzfeed article reimagines what Princess Tiana would look like with a head full of naturally curly/coily hair. It is true that in 2009, natural hair wasn’t as big of a phenomenon amongst black women as it is today. Given this, can it be perceived that Disney was simply abiding by the perspective time in regards to Princess Tiana’s hair?
In Hope in a Jar, Kathy Peiss introduces the history of beauty culture in which “the other” (minority races) originally did not fit into the guidelines of what was considered beautiful as the “‘American face” was still seen as the white face” (Peiss, 149). All others were left to conform to the standard of white beauty in efforts to be considered beautiful. Could Disney be playing into this idea by depicting Princess Tiana’s hair different from her ethnicity? Bell hooks, in “Eating the Other” also helps us understand what can be at work with Disney’s decision to deracialize Princess Tiana’s hair. Although I do not know the logistics behind Disney’s decision to depict Princess Tiana in the manner in which they did, I believe that hook’s theory of commodification of difference is the most accurate. Perhaps, Disney felt that America wasn’t entirely ready for a black princess.
Real-Life Black Princesses Throughout History
L. B. “Dream with ambition, lead with conviction, and see yourself in a way that others might not see you, simply because they’ve never seen it before”, said Vice President-elect, Kamala Harris, who made history as the first Black and South Indian-American woman to hold the office. In the afterglow of that landmark moment, we’re celebrating with an introduction to Black princesses throughout history whose stories celebrate the dynamism of what it means to be a Black woman in some of the oldest political seats in the game: the royal throne.
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- Princess Ademola of Nigeria: Princess of Nigeria! Princess of nursing! There’s so much to love about Ademola, but her achievements as a healthcare worker especially resonate in 2020. She was the daughter of Alake of Abeokuta, a king of southern Nigeria, which meant that she had to juggle her role as princess abroad -and nursing school student - when she moved to London at 22-years-old. She became a significant figure in nursing at at St Saviour’s ward at Guy’s Hospital in London and “a glowing role model for the empire”. The British government commissioned a documentary film on her entitled ‘Nurse Ademola’ in the 1940s, but the footage is now considered as a lost film.
- Princess Elizabeth of Toro: Meet Princess Elizabeth of Toro, the Ugandan Princess, lawyer, actor, top model, Minister of Foreign Affairs and Ambassador to the US, Germany and the Vatican in the 1960s. We’ve dedicated an entire Muse du Jour post to this powerhouse princess, who was also the first East African woman to be admitted to the English Bar, escaped the regime of Ugandan dictator Idi Amin, and cultivated a sense of celebration and love for her country on the world stage that lives on today. “You see, if you look at Uganda, nothing is lacking,” she once told The Chicago Tribune, “We have the resources, the climate is wonderful. It’s like a garden. Her life story reads like one of those tales you just don’t get anymore - a flurry of retro adventures in high fashion, rubbing shoulders with Jackie Kennedy Onassis, all while championing Ugandan autonomy abroad.
- Princess Sara Gizaw of Ethiopia: Renowned as “one of the most beautiful women of the Ethiopian Court,” Princess Sara Gizaw was not only a vintage style maven, but a woman of fierce character and endurance who participated in countless goodwill works, but again, her historical records are patchy at best. She lost her husband in a fatal 1957 car crash, and following the Marxist revolution that sent her father in law, Ethiopia’s then Emperor, Haile Selassie, into exile, she was imprisoned without trial alongside six fellow women of the Imperial Family in 1974. After almost 15 years of imprisonment, she was released - and lived to 90-years-old, passing away just last year.
- Princess Esther Kamatari of Burundi: “Abahuza” means “bringing people together” - a beautiful sentiment for the political party spearheaded by our next princess, Esther Kamatari. She grew up as a member of the Burdunian royal family, but fled to Paris when her kingdom was violently overthrown in the 1960s. She was only 13 when her father was assassinated. “At that time I was hungry, I was supposed to work,” she told Insider in the spring of 2020, “When you arrive from very far in a society that you are going to live, you have to work.” So she hit the ground modelling, and became the first Black model on the French high fashion scene, as a face for Pucci, Paco Rabanne, and Jean-Paul Gaultier. Kamatari saw fashion as a platform to celebrate inclusivity, training models for an annual fashion show, “Culture and Creation,” that continues to bring together design talent from 40 nations. She also ventured into politics as the head of the new monarchist political party, Abahuza, which seeks to unite the country under democratic governance. Through Kamatari’s vision, monarchical reinstitution becomes a symbolic gesture - a reclaiming of her country’s history, and a way to pave the road for democratic processes in the future. Now 68, she currently lives in Paris and you can follow her on Instagram.
- Maharani Bamba Müller: Known as the “African Princess of India” and a “real life Cinderella,” Müller was born to a German banker and his Ethiopian mistress, an enslaved Coptic Christian woman. Hence, Müller’s upbringing by Christian missionaries in Cairo, where she also began a correspondence with the “Black Prince of Perthshire,” Maharaja Duleep Singh, who was on the lookout for a potential bride at the missionary. They married in Egypt in 1864, then sailed to England where Bamba was well-received at Queen Victoria’s court. Bamba had gone from illegitimate child to being a Maharani. She raised six children in England - one of which was Sophia Alexandria, who would become a prominent suffragette and one of the earliest women of Indian descent to champion for women’s rights in the UK.
- Princess Fatima Massaquoi of Liberia: Because we love a bookish princess. Fatima Massaquoi was born into Liberian royalty in the Garwula Fistrict of Grand Cape Mount County (her paternal grandfather was King Lahai Massaquoi of the Gallinas). She completed her schooling in the Germany and the United States, studying medicine, anthropology, sociology and more, so that upon her return to Liberia she could make real change in education. When she came back to Liberia in the 1940s, she helped establish what would become the University of Liberia, where she served as the director and dean. She also founded the Institute of African Studies and co-founded the Society of Liberian Authors, helping abolish the practice of usurping African names for Western academia. Massaquoi knew that language matters within matters of academic representation, and was a tireless student of, and champion for, the “Vai” language of Liberia, for which she produced a dictionary. She is owed a huge debt for standardizing the Vai language, and her commitment to national cultural preservation and expansion.
- Princess Omoba Aina (Sara Forbes Bonetta): You may know her as Queen Victoria’s Black goddaughter, Sara Forbes Bonetta. But before she was kidnapped, enslaved, renamed, and corseted-up in England, she lived as Egbado Princess Omoba Aini in West Africa. Of course, you can’t be an ally for someone you enslave. We understand the context and antiquated brand of allyship that Aina and the Queen’s relationship must have been in the period of its unfolding, and retrace it while centering Aina’s autonomy within it; we see the Queen’s actions as an expression of kindness by Victorian standards, without accepting it as kindness. “Where do you start?” says English Heritage historian Anna Eavis on the many (many) layers of her story, “Her story is an extraordinary one.” Extraordinary but not impossible, as there were certainly other Black and brown folks living in colonialist England, mitigating various social strati - but not having their stories put to paper. Simply put: we are lucky to have Aina’s recorded.
- Princess Ariana Austin Makonnen of Ethiopia: Talk about a real-life “Coming to America” love story. Let’s jump forward in history to 2005, when American woman Ariana Austin was just another whip-smart, Ivy League-slated young woman on her way to let off some steam at a club in Washington, DC. She found love at the bar in Ethiopian prince, Joel Dawit Makonnen, who initially didn’t tell her about his royal status - in fact, he used a pretty fantastically cheesy pickup line, saying Austin and her pal looked like “an ad for Bombay Sapphire.” Gotta love it. After about a decade of dating, they tied the knot in 2017. “My heart felt so full of pride,” Austin, who identifies as African American and Guyanese, told Vogue, “I was carried away to my home country and into the millenary tradition of my ancestors.” Ariana has a bachelor’s degree in English literature from the historically Black, Fisk University as well as a master’s degree in arts education and creative writing from Harvard University. She founded and directed Art All Night, an evening arts festival in Washington, D.C and serves as the Goodwill Ambassador of Friends of Guyana. With her husband, she also produces documentaries and films focused on the African diaspora.
- Queen Sophie Charlotte of England: Princess Sophie Charlotte was born on this date in 1744. She was the second Black British Queen of England. Charlotte was the eighth child of the Prince of Mirow, Germany, Charles Louis Frederick, and his wife, Elisabeth Albertina of Saxe-Hildburghausen. As princess of Mecklenburg-Strelitz, Sophie Charlotte was descended directly from an African branch of the Portuguese Royal House, Margarita de Castro y Sousa. George I of Great Britain’s grandmother was Elizabeth Stuart, the Winter Queen of Bohemia, daughter of James VI of Scotland and James I of England and Great Britain. George I was the grandfather of Charlotte's eventual husband (George III). As a Protestant and a descendant of the Stuart Kings, he was chosen to become king. She married George III of England on September 8, 1761, at the Chapel Royal in St James’s Palace, London, at 17, becoming the Queen of England and Ireland.
Queen Charlotte: Contributions and Legacy
The marriage contract conditions were, ‘The young princess, join the Anglican church and be married according to Anglican rites, and never involve herself in politics.’ Although the Queen was interested in what was happening in the world, especially the war in America, she fulfilled her marital agreement. The Royal couple had fifteen children, thirteen of whom survived to adulthood. Queen Charlotte made many contributions to Britain as it is today, though the evidence is not obvious or well publicized. Her African bloodline in the British royal family is not common knowledge.
In Queen Charlotte’s era, slavery was prevalent, and the anti-slavery campaign was growing. Portrait painters of the royal family were expected to play down or soften Queen Charlotte's African features. Painters such as Sir Thomas Lawrence, who painted Queen Charlotte in the autumn of 1789, had their paintings rejected by the royal couple, who were not happy with the representations of the likeness of the Queen. Sir Allan Ramsey produced the most African representations of the Queen and was responsible for the majority of the paintings of the Queen. Ramsey’s inclination to paint truer versions of the Queen could have come from his being an anti-slavery intellectual of his day. Ramsey's Coronation painting of the Queen was sent out to the colonies/commonwealth and played a subtle political role in the anti-slavery movement.
Queen Charlotte was a learned woman; her letters indicate she was well-read and interested in the fine arts. The Queen is known to have been supported by and taught music by Johann Christian Bach. She was extremely generous to Bach’s wife after Bach’s death. Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart, at age eight, dedicated his Opus 3 piece to the Queen at her request. Also an amateur botanist, Queen Charlotte helped to establish Kew Gardens, bringing, amongst others, the Strelitzia Reginae, a flowering plant from South Africa. The Queen, who had the first one in her house in 1800, introduced the Christmas tree to England. It was said to be decorated with ‘sweetmeats, almonds, and raisins in papers, fruit, and toys. Also, the Queen Charlotte Maternity Hospital was established in London.
Queen Charlotte died on November 17, 1818, at Dutch House in Surrey, now Kew Palace, in the presence of her eldest son, the Prince Regent. She is buried at St George’s Chapel, Windsor. The only private writings that have survived are Queen Charlotte's 444 letters to her closest confidant, her older brother, Charles II, Grand Duke of Mecklenburg-Strelitz. In a letter on May 23, 1773, the Queen felt she was privileged, yet had a task. Her Christian faith was a protection and a method of endurance, as she quotes from the Bible and recognizes her role as a royal of God beyond her royal role on earth.
Queen Charlotte was the four-time great-grandmother of the present Queen Elizabeth II, who still lives in the expanded Buckingham House, now Buckingham Palace.
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Beauty Standards and Representation
My idol growing up was Whitney Houston. She was the first African American woman to cross over to the mainstream as the Voice of America at her time. Seeing her admired for just being as beautiful and talented as she was, captivated me. There was something about her music that made me feel free. I was also a huge fan of the one and only Janet Jackson. Even though she was not part of the famous Jackson 5, Janet stood out most to me. She was adored internationally and created her work purposely based around different cultural backgrounds. The whole world knew who she was; she was unstoppable. Being a kid at that time I had no idea I could ever do anything like that, “see the world” and do what I love to do.
We’ve always known about the monumental figures of black history such as MLK, Malcolm X, and Rosa Parks, to name only a few. The only differences between Rosa and Claudette was their skin tone and their connections. Of course Rosa Parks taking a stand was so important because it drew national attention to the fact that African Americans should be treated equally and were not inferior to whites. I chose this story because it highlights the colorism issue that exists for Black women and other women of color. Now that I have traveled the world, I’ve learned that it exists everywhere.
BEAUTY TIMELINE
| Year | Event |
|---|---|
| 1920s | Josephine Baker puts black beauty in the spotlight with her Paris debut. |
| 1940s | Lena Horne, the first woman of color to ink a major Hollywood contract, signs with MGM. |
| 1960s | The statement-making stylings of The Supremes; model and Andy Warhol muse Donyale Luna. |
| 1968 | Paco Rabanne casts color on the catwalk; the bald and the beautiful Pat Evans. |
| 1969 | With model Naomi Sims on its cover, Life commemorates the influence of the African- American aesthetic. |
| 1974 | Pam Grier as Foxy Brown works her 'fro - a look made famous by Sly and the Family Stone in the late '60s. |
| 1983 | Vanessa Williams wins Miss America, only to have her title revoked after nude photos turn up in Penthouse. First runner-up Suzette Charles takes over and becomes the second black woman to carry the coveted crown. |
| 2000s | Cosmetic companies break beauty archetypes to sell makeup: MAC signs Mary J. |
The "Black American Princess" Stereotype
Black American princess (BAP) is a (sometimes) pejorative term for African-American women of upper- and upper-middle-class background, who possess (or are perceived to possess) a spoiled or materialistic demeanor. The term can be rooted back to the end of segregation. After segregation ended, black children were put into predominantly white schools, and were able to take advantage of the opportunities they were given. Stereotypically, younger BAPs are often members of Jack and Jill, a social and civic organization for upper-middle-class African-American youth. or The Links, Incorporated,[3] and pass in black enclaves of Sag Harbor, New York, or Oak Bluffs, Massachusetts.
The BAP Handbook: The Official Guide to the Black American Princess, written by Kalyn Johnson, Tracey Lewis, Karla Lightfoot, and Ginger Wilson, is a 2001 humor book written by self-described BAPs.[6] According to the guide, a black American princess is a pampered female of African-American descent born to upper-middle- or upper-class families.
