|
Getting your Trinity Audio player ready...
|
Summary
In Every Mirror She is Black, Lola Akinmade exposes the silent struggles of Black immigrant women. Her poignant novel detailed the lives of three women: Kemi, Brittany, and Muna.
In an interview, Lola Akinmade, the author of In Every Woman She Is Black, explained that she wanted to show the unspoken struggles of Black women in Sweden. Thus, her debut novel originated not from research or imagination, but from the experiences of living in Sweden as a Black woman. Instead of retelling the normal narrative about Black women living in the United States or United Kingdom, Lola chose Sweden, a Nordic country which presents itself as a feminist utopia. The characters go beyond fictional names, they are lived experiences of Black immigrant women who constantly faced tokenism, racial stereotypes, and complexities of living in a white-dominated country.
The story follows the lives of three women; Kemi Adeyemi, Brittany-Rae Johnson, and Muna Saheed. Their intertwined lives are connected by a single thread; Jonny Von Lundin, a Swedish CEO who symbolically represents the white society. The novel exposes the hypocrisy of a county that celebrates reproductive rights and equal pay, yet promotes systematic racism, and commodification of black bodies. Despite these women taking different paths, they shared the same overlapping experiences – racial bias, invisibility, and the feeling of not being seen or accepted fully. Lola skillfully exemplifies these themes in the lives of these women.
As a successful Black woman marketing executive, Kemi was deceived and used as a ploy for cultural diversity. Her job’s offer carries a creativity, control, and authority with it, but Jonny used her for his benefits. This reflects the deep behaviour of men to use women for their gains. Despite her intelligent prowess, Kemi was objectified to show others that coloured people are represented in the company. She was also reduced to a marketing strategy where her authority and control was limited and questioned. Kemi faced a battle with tokenism and professionalism under racial gaze.
Jonny’s love for Brittany is more of possession than affection. On the surface, he showers her with wealth, gifts, and security, creating an illusion of love. But when his love is deeply examined, it is an obsession rooted in patriarchy. Jonny’s desire to keep Brittany for himself is essentially about ownership. He did not see her as a person with ambitions, but an accessory who enhances his status. This kind of possession is subtle but a powerful oppression of women. Their relationship is a microcosm of how women are forced to sacrifice their identity and ambition in exchange for comfort or perceived safety. While Kemi is objectified, tokenized in the workplace for her Blackness as a corporate image, Brittany is objectified and valued only for her beauty. Through this, Lola critiques the tenet of patriarchy where women are denied the right to be fully human, whether in an intimate relationship or in the workplace.
Among three women, Muna Saheed’s story is the most heart-wreaching and tragic. As an 18-year-old refugee from Somalia, her life is plagued by systematic racism, invisibility, and displacement. As a Black immigrant woman in Sweden, Muna is burdened by the stigma of being a refugee, she is stripped of stability, security, and identity. Unlike Kemi and Brittany who are at least noticed, Muna suffers the cruelty of being unseen. Her constant struggles for survival in a white-dominated society mirrors the dehumanization of the most vulnerable. Her death is not just a personal loss, but a symbolic one that illustrates the harsh reality of the Black immigrant women. It is a haunting truth of how white-dominated countries allow women like her to die without being noticed.
In Every Mirror She is Black is more than a novel, it is a mirror that ask us to confront who should be allowed to talk about gender equality
