AN ANALYTICAL HISTORY OF BLACK FEMALE LYNCHINGS IN THE UNITED STATES, 1838-1969

Authors

David V. Baker, Riverside City College, Emeritus
Gilbert Garcia, California State University

Abstract

"Narratives on the lynching of black females in the United States have rarely commanded much more than minor postscripts in the lynching scholarship, thus leaving the historical picture of lynching violence incomplete and distorted. To correct for this unfinished portrait of American lynchings, the present work provides a contextual history on black females victimized largely by white male terrorists. To distinguish black female lynchings and bring into sharper focus the wretched horror suffered by black women and young black girls, this work constructs an inventory of 188 confirmed cases of black females lynched mostly by white mobsters from 1838 to 1969. A contextual history of black female lynchings supports the notion that vigilante violence against black women and girls was a means of gendered racial oppression in American society; black female lynchings were symbolic and cautioned marginalized black women and girls to maintain their inferior place in society to white male supremacy. One objective of this paper is to bring voice to this population of black females wronged by the interlocking systems of gender, race, and class oppression in United States society. Regrettably, black female oppression as an artifact of gendered racism remains a formidable characteristic of today’s society."

Creative Commons License

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-NonCommercial-No Derivative Works 4.0 International License.

Recommended Citation

Baker, David V. and Garcia, Gilbert (2019) "AN ANALYTICAL HISTORY OF BLACK FEMALE LYNCHINGS IN THE UNITED STATES, 1838-1969," Qualitative Criminology (QC): Vol. 8: No. 1, Article 5.
Available at: https://dc.swosu.edu/qc/vol8/iss1/5