Art Imitating Real Life: Black Girl Saviors

For as anxious as I have been over the past 18 months to FINALLY be able to delve into the mystically advanced and antecedent world of Wakanda via Marvel Studios’ Blockbuster release of Black Panther, I could not help but to draw parallels between the many visible, but ancillary characters known as the Dora Milaje (The Adored Ones) and contemporary Black Girls/Women at-large. Serving in a patriarchal monarchy as a highly superior fighting force, the roles of these women are to provide a protective function for and around the heir to the throne of Wakanda.

In a less literal, but wholly practiced manner, Black Girls and Women have, since the very inception of this great nation, been called upon to protect, rally for and serve those around them in such a selfless way that their tolerance, fortitude and long-suffering capacities have long been touted as storied and super-human; magical even. From mammies to single-mothers; the most highly degreed population group to the single most consistently high (Democratic) voter turn-out demography in these United States, black women have routinely pulled their own weight while effectively hefting everyone else right along after them into the ever-changing landscape of potential, purpose and “get-right”.

So just know that while I still do intend to swoon heavily over Chadwick Boseman’s acclaim worthy T’Challa this Friday, my unapologetically self-serving interests will primarily surround my acknowledgment of the kindred magnetism and strength emitted across the screen from the daughters of Wakanda; women any black girl would be happy to distinguish as role models.