The perception of beauty, particularly concerning the female form, varies significantly across cultures. In Africa, breasts have diverse meanings and are viewed through a complex lens of tradition, societal values, and historical context. This article delves into African beauty standards related to breasts, examining cultural contexts, historical objectification, and the impact of Western ideals.
Cultural Significance of Breasts in Africa
In many African cultures, breasts are not primarily viewed as erotic. Indeed, in a culture where breastfeeding in public is not seen as scandalous as it is at times in the West, breasts are not primarily viewed as erotic. The woman holds her breasts to stress her indispensable nurturing power as “alma mater,” the nourishing and bountiful mother, the educator in the mysteries of life and power. It is the woman who has a special connection with the ancestral spirits and the source of life. It is her that brings into the world kings and emperors, nourishes them, teaches them how to walk, talk or behave, and remain, in the exercise of power, their confident advisor.
As one traverses many parts of Africa, especially the rural areas, the sight of bare-chested women going about their business is quite common. Breast-feeding mothers do so at their convenience, and the people around them are unbothered. Here, the shape and size of one’s breasts are not issues that concern many of these women. Breasts take on a different picture altogether. In some cultures, full breasts, along with a big belly, rounded hips, and a large butt, are considered the feminine ideal.
Luba artist, Figure, 19th century, Democratic Republic of Congo. Wood, metal, and fiber, 10 1/4 x 2 x 1 7/8 in. (26 x 5.1 x 4.8 cm). This possibly unique female figure in the corpus of Luba sculpture offers significant insights into the culture and worldview of the Congolese communities from whence it came. It is also the reflection of local aesthetic values in a world where the notion of “Buya” means both “beauty” and “goodness,” and where art is intimately intertwined with the enhancement of life and human flourishing.
Awoulaba is a Baoulé-language term from Ivory Coast meaning "queen of beauty", which refers to women who have plump and curvaceous bodies featuring large buttocks, prominent breasts and wide hips.
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The White Gaze and Objectification
Black women’s bodies have been scrutinized for centuries, often through the eyes of white men. To create a new conversation around Black women’s bodies, we must also profoundly examine the specific impacts of the white gaze. The white gaze can be summarized as the viewpoints and judgments involved in the perspective of white people. In attempting to make the world ‘stable’ and ‘predictable,’ this gaze produces a multitude of stereotypes, attaching them to Black bodies.
This idea of ‘bestiality’ is fundamental when regarding the myths around the form of the African woman. A specific explorer Richard Ligon wrote an account that included a detailed description of the bodies of African women he saw on his voyage. He wrote about a Black woman he saw in Barbados as being a ‘Negro of the greatest beauty and majesty…that ever I saw in one woman. Ligon’s descriptions reveal the reality that Black women’s bodies provoked desire in the eyes of those who viewed them. However, this desire was often quickly replaced with racial dehumanization.
Ligon represents this contradiction of the white gaze as he swings between admiration and disgust for the Black women he encounters. This exaggerated description was typical of colonial white men describing Black bodies. This post is published as part of Minority Africa’s Breast Series, a collection of reports, analysis, and opinions aimed towards demystifying and decolonizing the discourse around breasts for African women.
Saartjie Baartman: A Case Study
The African pear body shape can be connected to Saartjie Baartman who travelled across Europe in the early 19th century and was said to represent the body shapes of most African women. She left South Africa in 1808 to accompany her boss Hendrick Caesar who assured her that she will find fame and fortune as soon as she arrives in London. She was a full-figured woman, with full breasts, extra large hips and steatopygia, that is, a large amount of fat in the buttocks, which drew attention of many Europeans who had never seen such a figure with unique features. She was depicted as the black version of feminine beauty, the Hottentot Venus. She was said to represent the body shapes of most African women and was the shape considered most appealing by fellow black men and women. Ironically, the Europeans labelled her body as ugly perhaps as a consolation to the European women who did not posses such body features.
Saartjie Baartman’s body shape was displayed in London stage for public show between 1810 and 1811, and in 1815 she was further displayed against her will for 10 hours a day in Paris after Taylor (her master in England) sold her to Reaux who later became her master in Paris. She had to mimic savagery and exposed her body, first in carnivals, then in the aristocratic salons of Paris, later on among the libertines and finally in brothels where she ended up being a prostitute. In the meantime, French anatomists took an interest in her unusual anatomy (enormous buttocks and labia) only to declare her the missing link from ape to man.
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Saartjie’s sexual body determined character, which compelled politicians and bureaucrats to devise laws throughout Europe to control the biological deviance of prostitutes and their Hottentot sexuality that was viewed to have preyed on men. Ironically, a person viewed as half ape was also seen as sexually provoking to Europeans. In the same context, African American women for example have a long history of sexual victimization. Figure 1. were raped to provide sexual pleasure and babies for White slaveholders. Even after slavery was banned, African American women continued to be subjects of sexual exploitation because they served as domestic workers for the White families.
The Victorian Bustle Dress and Saartjie Baartman
The aim of this paper is therefore to interrogate relationship between historical Victorian bustle dress and the African slave Saartjie Baartman who was paraded and displayed in Europe due to her unique body features. The paper presents African view of the ideal female figure and compares it with western view of the ideal figure. It points out that Saartjie Baartman’s presence in Europe precedes the time of Victorian dress. The paper examines close similarities of the bustle dress silhouette structure with Saartjie Baartman’s body shape and argues that since Saartjie Baartman had been displayed prior to the development of the Victorian dress coupled with very close similarities in features, it is possible that the body inspired the creation of the dress.
Although the western society branded Saartjie Baartman as ugly with highly unusual bodily features, the bustle dress silhouette, which became fashionable is Europe, was is no doubt inspired by Saartjie Baartman’s body. After Saartjie’s death, her body continued to be displayed in a museum. What was so special about a dead body? ugly person? The answer of course is that only treasures are preserved, and indeed Saartjie’s body was a treasure not only to her people who gave her a dignified burial in her South African home after many years of slavery in Europe, but also a source of inspiration for the famous Victorian dress of the 19th Century that was named after the royal queen Victoria of England.
It is worth noting that in Africa and South Africa to be precise, large buttocks and hipline region is considered an attractive feature of a woman. Critically looking at the dresses displayed in Figure 2 and comparing them with Saartjie Baartman (Figure 1 & Figure 2), it is striking to the note the close resemblance between the dress and Saartjie Baartman’s body. Although Saartjie wore no braziers, her breasts were large and rounded that would appear as if they were pushed forward if she wore a bra. The bust line of the Victorian bustle dress has a well shaped corset designed to give an illusion of exaggerated breasts, narrow waistline and exaggerated hip line with protruding and jutted out buttocks depicted in Saartjie’s body shape.
Charles Mathews a popular actor of the time (1888) in his memoirs writes “... in those days, when bustles were not, she was a curiosity, for English ladies wore no shape but what nature gave and insisted upon” [35] . Saartjie Baartman’s body filled ambiguous position of what was naturally unnatural. This clearly demonstrates that bustle dresses were not in existence before Saartjie Baartman’s body had been displayed. It also clearly shows that English women’s body were considered unshaped as pointed out in the following phrase “… English ladies wore no shape but what nature gave and insisted upon”. Having not seen such kind of a unique body shape before, the Europeans were curious about it as confirmed by the phrase “… Saartjie Baartman’s body filled ambiguous position of what was naturally unnatural”. It is important to understand that a garment design process is a creative process of coming up with a unique product. The process utilises design elements such as colour, texture pattern, silhouette and shape to create a garment.
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The Impact of Western Ideals
African communities that are exposed to Western media are experiencing a shift in their perception of feminine beauty. Studies reveal that non-Western women exposed to Western beauty ideals are more concerned with their body shapes just like Western women, indicating that a number of non- Western societies are accepting Western standards of beauty. This is evident in African fashion shows that feature thin African models as well as the dress styles of African women. While it is clear that African societies have considered a full-figured woman as beautiful, the presence of Western media has caused conflict between the African and Western ideal. The thin fashion model has affected how full-figured African women view and dress their bodies. This is evident in the increase in the number of African women engaging in weight-loss activities.
Full-figured African women go to gyms so that they can lose weight and look like the thin fashion model and not necessarily for health reasons. Engaging in weight-loss programmes and dressing like the thin model indicates that they endorse the thin body as being ideal and that their own bodies are not attractive.
On the contrary, African countries including South Africa have always considered a full-figured body to be ideal. However the full-figured woman is over shadowed by the thin ideal. The changing perception of feminine beauty in African countries particularly those living in urban areas is largely influenced by Western media. Worldwide, advertising is held accountable for spreading and influencing customer culture and values all around the globe. The African ideal is very different from the Western ideal; hence full-figured women find themselves in a predicament―on one hand, the tradition that being full-figured is attractive and on the other hand, that the thin figure ideal is. These thoughts can be troubling, especially to a full-figured woman who is constantly surrounded by images of thin fashion models.
Eating disorders caused by women’s desires to resemble the thin fashion model are on the increase in developing countries and are therefore not restricted to Western societies. South Africa is more industrially developed than most of the other sub-Saharan African countries. Therefore Western images of thin fashion models tend to be more prevalent in South Africa than in other African countries. South Africa, like other African countries, developed its own standard of feminine beauty prior to the entry of the Western media. As already seen in the introductory part of this paper, the earliest recollection of the ideal standard of feminine beauty in South Africa can be linked to Saartjie Baartman (Figure 1) from as early as the 19th century.
As observed in Figure 1, Saartjie Baartman’s body is characterised by distinctively exaggerated buttocks that jut outwards, while her breasts are full and rounded. Her waistline is narrower than her shoulders, bust line and the hipline. Saartjie Baartman’s body cannot qualify as an hourglass body because her hips are exaggeratedly larger than the waist, the bust and the shoulders. Her body would therefore be best described as Hourglass-Pear shaped (Hourg-Pear), which combines large fleshy breasts with over exaggerated hipline.
More interestingly, Western women in the 21st century desire to have large protruding buttocks. It is currently fashionable for women to possess large protruding bottoms as seen in Figure 4. Bootylicious has become fashionable to the point that some Western women undergo cosmetic surgery to attain the large protruding bottom. It seems yet again that the African female body is influencing the fashion trends to some degree. Women who cannot afford buttock augmentation surgery can engage in Butt enhancing exercises or can wear a buttock bra which lifts the buttock and creates an illusion of a bigger protruding buttock.
Although protruding buttocks may have influenced fashion in one way or the other, African women continue to experience difficulties accepting their protruding buttocks because society tells them that what they have is ugly ). This is because for many years dating to back to Saartjie Baartman'...
