Two Venuses: Historicizing the anatomical female body

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Notes

¹The sources on Sartjee Baartman are too numerous to offer a complete bibliography here, but Craig Clifton and Pamela Scully's Sarah Baartman and the Hottentot Venus: A ghost story and a biography (2009) is excellent. Sander Gilman's (1985) landmark article, which is cited in the references, was critical for understanding Baartman (although it has since been critiqued). For an excellent reading on the historiography of Baartman see Yvette Abrahams's book chapter ‘Images of Sara Baartman: Sexuality, race and gender in early nineteenth century Britain’ (1998). A more recent study written by women of African descent is the excellent book Representation and Black Womanhood; the Legacy of Sarah Baartman, edited by Natasha Gordon-Chipembere (2011). Also of critical importance for theatre scholars is Suzan-Lori Parks's landmark play Venus (1990).