In Search of Black Maids’ Subjectivity in The Help Movie

Saragih, Mike Wijaya (2018) In Search of Black Maids’ Subjectivity in The Help Movie. In: Proceedings International Conference on English Literary Studies and Cultural Studies (ICELSCS 2018). English Department, Faculty of Cultural Sciences, Universitas Sebelas Maret, Surakarta, Surakarta, pp. 127-134. ISBN 978 602 53189 0 0

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Abstract

This article aims to show the journey of two black maids in the film The Help (2011) in finding their own subjectivity as independent black women. The film portrays the hardness of many black maids’ lives in the middle of patriarchal and interracial issues happened in Jackson, Mississipi, in 1963. This research will use race and class concepts to show the multiple layers of discrimination occurred to the black maids, Aibeleen Clark and Minny Jackson, as well as the subjectivity theories to show the process of finding their subjectivity and the forms of the subjectivity itself. The results show both of the black maids reach their self-consciousness before being able to state their subjectivity. In addition, the forms of subjectivity portrayed in the film can be found in both women’s verbal and non-verbal languages.

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