Is Art Imitating Life?: Communicating Gender and Racial Identity in Imitation of Life

Abstract

This essay addresses the tension between standpoint theory and Black feminist thought by exploring the significance of a cultural artifact and the differences and similarities in its reception by racially diverse women (two African Americans and two European Americans). The cultural artifact chosen for critical interpretation is the film Imitation of Life (1959), which was promoted as a depiction of interracial friendship between an African American woman and a European American woman raising their teenage daughters together. The study concludes that the participants’ employed multiple standpoints and lived experiences as they interpreted the significance of race, gender, and gendered racial stereotypes communicated by the film.