Status foe: a psychobiographical investigation of Ida B. Wells

Abstract

Ida B. Wells (1862-1931) led an extraordinary life as a journalist, educator, and activist while navigating the intersecting social realities of race, gender, and class. She embodied courage, advocating for the civil rights of Black Americans in an uncompromising fashion.

Building on decades of research in social psychology, sociologist Cecilia L. Ridgeway presents (2019) a cultural schema theory of status. She contends that issues of status in interpersonal contexts are an unavoidable aspect of the human condition. Despite the ubiquity of status as a sociocultural force, Ridgeway believes that status hierarchies may be undermined.

The present study is a psychobiographical exploration of Wells through the lens of Ridgeway’s status theory. It explores: the development of Wells’ cultural schemas; how Wells navigated her own status; the inter-relationship between Wells and her sociocultural context; and how Wells undermined and overcame status hierarchies.

Keywords:

• Black Americans
• Black women
• civil rights
• cultural schema theory of status
• Ida B. Wells
• journalists
• Cecilia Ridgeway
  
• psychobiography

Acknowledgements

I would like to thank Kathryn Wegner for editing the manuscript prior to publication.

Disclosure of interest

The author reports no conflicts of interest. The author alone is responsible for the content and writing of the paper.

Recommended citation

Wegner, B.R. (2023). Status foe: A psychobiographical investigation of Ida B. Wells.

Notes

1 It is not clear from the historical record if their relationship was consensual, and even if it was, one could argue that the power imbalance made a consensual relationship impossible.

2 From the Civil War until about the 1970s, when President Richard Nixon implemented his “Southern Strategy,” it was the Republican party that traditionally supported African-American rights, not the Democrats

3 One could make a deeper criticism of separate cars in general; in a classless society, even “professionalism” would not grant someone the right to sit in the first car. Additionally, there is room for analysis of the relationship between African-Americans such as Wells who possessed more status than many immigrants, but whose descendants in turn could benefit from anti-Blackness to gain status.