“Am I…?”: A Photo Series and Documentary Film Explore the Complexities of Black Woman’s Identities.
It makes sense that a question about self-identity begins with “Am I…?” This is the starting point for both photographer Endia Beal, in her newest photo series, “Am I What You’re Looking For?” and for Nadia Sasso, filmmaker of “Am I: Too African to be American or Too American to be African?”
Endia Beal captures the anxiousness of young African American female undergraduate students who are preparing for their first job interviews. The reservations the women express come from uncertainties they feel on how to best present themselves in the workplace. For many, if not most, black women, occupying professional settings and navigating through these very white spaces often means sacrificing facets of not only their physical identifies, but their characters too. These attempts at ‘fitting in’ and camouflaging oneself often come from the need to not be categorized as any of the negative stereotypes associated with black womanhood, as a form of survival. Both countering and addressing this, Beal instructed the women she photographed to wear outfits they felt comfortable in, resulting in photographs that show candidates in fitted dresses paired with stilettos, natural hair, and even some with exposed tattoos – features that are true to themselves but typically not deemed appropriate in the workplace, often predominantly white male environments.

(Endia Beal)
Beal’s inspiration for the series stems from her own experience in Yale University’s IT Department, where she worked while a graduate student at the school. For that interview she straightened her red afro and wore conservative attire because “it was what I was told,” she recalled in an interview with the New York Times. She continued, “Wearing my hair in an afro, I would never get the job because that’s not professional. You almost have to mute yourself in order to fit into this space. And sadly, the girls have been told that they have to do the same thing.”
Beal photographed the women in their own homes in front a backdrop of a corridor from her workplace at Yale. Of the times she walked down the actual hallway, standing out with her hair (that led to the regurgitating of the phrase, “Can I touch it?”, by her co-workers) and complexion, she said, “I was probably the only minority on the floor. I often felt like a spectacle.” She decided that in order to overcome the ‘otherness’ she had to take control, and thus began this photo series.








(All photography by Endia Beal)
Nadia Sasso, a current doctoral student at Cornell University, also explores the experiences of young black women in her documentary film, “Am I: Too African to be American or Too American to be African?” Much like Beal’s series, Intersectionalism is at the heart of this series as it highlights the intricacies related not only to being a woman, and not only to being black, but to being both – and more, in this case. The film explores the complex identity formations of young African women living in America and West Africa who identify bi-culturally. This a personal exploration for Sasso, who was born in the United States to Sierra Leonean parents. The film specifically looks at how these women wrestle with concepts of race, complexion, gender, and heritage among other issues.
Similar to Beal, Sasso became conscious of her identity while a student. She participated in a social experiment that was “designed to provide participants with an opportunity to understand the intricacies of privilege, and to explore the ways that we enjoy privileges based on being members of social identity groups in the United States”, she explained in an email interview with Dynamic Africa. After a series of commands designed to segregate the students, such as “If your parents were not born in the US take a step back,” she ended up in the last row.
Confronting identity in the workplace is an issue explored by Sasso, too. In her first post-collegiate job interview Sasso recalls being asked the question, “Where are you from?” a seemingly easy interview-opener but a question that’s actually quite loaded, she admits.
Both Beal and Sasso take the process of exploration of self-identity literally, by turning the lens on themselves. Sasso recently completed a series of self-portraits and is working on another film project.
Beal’s exhibit, “The Performance Review,” is currently on display at the Turchin Center for Visual Arts in North Carolina and will be until Dec. 19th.
Sasso’s film “Am I?” has limited public screenings around the country but is available for viewing online.
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