Scarline Martinez

Alyssa Yankwitt

ENGL 21002

May 11, 2021

The Oversexualization of Latina Women

Latina Femininity

    Living in a patriarchal society where you’re taught to think for men can be challenging—especially being a woman of color where you’re constantly oversexualized from infancy to adulthood because of gendered racist stereotypes. Latina women and girls have experienced their childhood being stolen as the contrast between childhood and adulthood has been erased because of sexualization. The adultification and oversexualization of Latina girls and women promote destructive stereotypes that result in far-reaching consequences. 

Latina Tropicalism

     The promiscuous Latina is one of the many tropes pushed by men’s sexual fantasies that fetishize their identity. According to, The Exotic other: representations of Latina tropicalism in U.S. popular culture, critic Malgorzata Martynuska (2015) stated, “One of the most enduring tropes surrounding Latina women in U.S. culture is that of tropicalism, which by erasing ethnic specificity helps construct homogeneous stereotypes such as bright colours, rhythmic music, and brown skin.”Tropicalism alters how Latina bodies are perceived; it assigns them sexual scripts where they’re hypersexualized and judged to be of easy virtue. Martynuska(2015) affirms the media coded the Latina tropicalized body with a particular image: provoking clothing, curvy figure, long dark hair, and extravagant jewelry. This portrayal creates a lasting impression of Latina women being nothing more than sexual beings who are readily available for sexual encounters. They’re objectified to the point where they’re perceived as less human, reducing their identity to their body. According to Mattynuk (2015), “Latina is othered to ‘the extent that her body will always be a source of curiosity and fascination as an exotic object.’ ” In other words, the tropicalization of Latina women appends their worth to their bodies by erasing their identity and sexuality. 

Adultification: From the Classroom to the Courtroom 

     Adults have scrutinized girls of color because of the harmful narratives promoted by gendered racism that targets them for their identity. The notion of girls of color being less innocent than their white peers has been pushed, thus labeling them as undeserving of childhood. In The school-to-prison pipeline is getting worse for black and brown girls, Jaquira Diaz (2019) examined how black and brown girls are “suspended, expelled or arrested for infractions such as falling asleep in class, talking to school officials or simply for showing what are considered acceptable emotions when it comes to their white classmates.” We have constantly been the target of neglect; our innocence has been erased by adults, resulting in having to carry the burden of being a pseudo-adult child. Youth of color are forced to shoulder the responsibilities of adults while still thinking in the concrete way of a child.  look forward to the day we don’t receive punitive punishment for simply being a person of color. 

    On January 15, 2019, a school performed a strip search on four black, and Latinx 12-year-olds girls at East middle school in New York without consent as school officials watched simply because the principal suspected they were carrying drugs (Diaz, 2019). The principal reason for such accusations was that the girls were too “hyper and giddy” after lunch; they found no drugs (Diaz, 2019). Youth of color can’t even display emotions as adults demonize them for acting their age. The constant criminalization of  minorities creates a punitive environment that hurts them, particularly in the classroom and the judicial system. Diaz (2019) stated, “black and brown girls are typically marginalized at schools in these ways because officials judge that they aren’t feminine enough, or the right kind of feminine.” Girls of color are barred from the protection that being labeled innocent as their white peers bring.

Selling Sexy: Media Portrayal 

                       

 

 

   

 

( Schuinski, 2021)

    The media has played an active role in the depiction of Latina womanhood. Living in the age of technology where social media is at its height has facilitated the spread of both great or harmful content to a broad audience. Unfortunately, for Latina women, the surge in social media usage has only catalyzed the hypersexualization of their bodies. Television has played a role in this when observing the ethnic stereotypes shown in Hispanic and Anglo television (Martynuska, 2015, p. 74). They group our women into three categories: cantina girl, señorita, and a vamp (Martynuska, 2015, p. 74). These categories all consist of labeling Latina women as sexual objects, promiscuous, and manipulative. The constant portrayal of Latina women’s bodies as commodities open for consumption is detrimental to their identity. When you’re constantly exposed to images like the one displayed and stereotypes dictating how you should behave, you lose your sense of self. For Latina women, this results in self-objectification, causing them to have no control over their sexuality as they believe they have to conform to their stereotypes.

Latina Women’s Bodies

    The marginalization of Latina women and girls has seemed to become part of the American culture. My gender and being a person of color have allowed me to realize women of color have been denied individual experiences and emotions that are part of their lives due to over-sexualization. Acknowledging the objectification of Latina women’s bodies is crucial to mobilize society to relieve Latina women from the discrimination they endured because of misconceptions. It is essential for the next generation of Latina girls to not fall into the cycle of hypersexualization. Latina girls deserve to be kids, and Latina women deserve to have control over their sexuality.

 

References

Díaz, J. (2019, March 14). The school-to-prison pipeline is getting worse for black and brown girls . The Guardian. https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/mar/14/black-brown-girls-school-prison-crime-jaquira-diaz. 

Martynuska,M.(2016).The Exotic Other: Representations of Latina tropicalism in U.S. popular culture. Journal of Language and Cultural Education,4(2) 73-81. https://doi.org/10.1515/jolace-2016-0017

Schuinski, R. S. (2021, March 8). Google image search cements national stereotypes of ‘racy’ women. DW.COM. https://www.dw.com/en/google-image-search-cements-national-stereotypes-of-racy-women/a-56767605.