Identity?

One of the most popular and most damaging representation of African American women is in rap music videos. While many studies have been done on how media effects white women, or American women as a whole, this study looks particularly at African American women. "Rap Music Videos and African American Women's Body Image: The Moderating Role of Ethnic Identity" evaluates colored women's reactions to representation in music videos. They found that women who had an identity solidly grounded in their ethnicity were less prone to desire the thin body type, less likely to be bulimic, and overall more satisfied than black women with weake ethnic identity. This surprised me, since I figured that all women would be equally effected by such objectifying and limiting stereotypes. It was great to see that some women were defying these cultural norms and turning to other sources of identity outside of the dangerous ones presented by the media. The link below is to the documentary "Dreamworlds 3: Desire, Sex & Power in Music Videos" gives more corroborative evidence to this harmful but familiar stereotype.
http://youtu.be/JDMo5cIJN3A