Michelle Obama Watch

Not every MOW reader was enraptured with some of the concepts in the book “Go Tell Michelle”  by Barbara Seals Nevergold and Peggy Brooks-Bertram, who are co-founders of the Uncrowned Queens Institute for Research and Education on Women at the University at Buffalo in New York.which Bridget posted about on Monday in a post called “Letters to Michelle“. At first I didn’t understand one of the comments about colorism, now that I have listened to the interview on National Public Radio, I understand.

Brooks-Bertram says that the themes that emerged in the book were twofold — sweet and gentle — but also those that “resonate and rise up” in a way they didn’t expect.

“One of those themes has to do with the issue of the intraracial color line — and women who very clearly point out that it was very important for them that Michelle Obama was a recognizably black woman for example,” Brooks-Bertram says. “That she wasn’t light-skinned with blue eyes and still classified as black, but rather she was a black woman and that it gave them a whole new feeling about their own lives. I really thought that it was powerful, because that tends to be a subject that we don’t go towards so readily because it has such deep pain associated with it.”

Also, through the letters, many of the women seemed to be saying that the world might see them through a new lens because of Michelle Obama.

“This is particularly for women who are dark-skinned women who thought, ‘Oh my goodness.’ Like one woman who said: ‘I now believe I can bring my black babies into this world,’ ” Brooks-Bertram says. National Public Radio.

Hmm lots of projection going on.  You needed Michelle Obama to believe you can bring  “Black babies” into the world? Maybe this is an unfair analysis since they only picked out a few letters. I’m sorry, but this book seems a bit creepy. Is it just me? It’s more about US than it is about Michelle Obama.

If I could tell Michelle Obama anything I would say “DO YOU!” Everybody, including myself, is projecting right now and there is no way Michelle Obama can be what everyone wants her to be. We need to be the people we want to be and see ourselves the way we want to see ourselves. We need to do some work on ourselves. Yes we can…fix our own “issues” without Michelle Obama.

Posted by Gina.