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A white author’s book based on Black feminism faced extensive criticism from several critics, theologists, and social media users after they recently discovered the book’s content online. Jennifer M. Buck, a professor at Azusa Pacific University, penned “Bad and Boujee: Toward a Trap Feminist Theology” to allegedly learn more about Black women living as trap queens within the culture.
At the front of the book, Buck introduced the content to her readers by saying that it “engages with the overlap of Black experience, hip-hop music, ethics and feminism to focus on a subsection known as ‘trap feminism.'”
However, there are several problems with Buck’s failed attempt to tell stories from a place she has never experienced.
She discussed identity politics by admitting that she is a “straight, privileged, white woman” that has never lived nor experienced the life of a trap queen. Her viewpoint of what a trap queen truly embodies is problematic since it describes Black women engaging in criminal activity. However, Buck insisted that her love for hip-hop music inspired her to research trap culture and the women who grew up in it.
The project also faced criticism following Buck’s failure to use Black women as sources for her material. Theologian Candice Marie Benbow, author of “Red Lip Theology,” told The New York Times she was “livid” after finding out that Buck wrote a book about the theology of trap feminism without using stories from actual Black women.
“It matters that you have an academic text that would situate Black women’s lived experiences and Black women’s spirituality, and it’s not written by a Black woman,” Benbow explained.
Though Buck had taken an interest in trap feminism, her content was blatantly racist after she repeatedly used the word “ghetto” to reference Black women and trap culture in general. However, she mentioned that her “love and appreciation for hip-hop music and the trap subgenre” emerged after becoming a hip-hop dance teacher during her teenage years. Buck also credited her adulthood experiences and a college scholarship to understanding “the depths and complexity” of trap music and “the lives and systems behind it.”
Aside from Benbow’s take on the project, trap feminism pioneer Sesali Bowen, the author of “Bad Fat Black Girl: Notes From a Trap Feminist,” also took issue with Buck’s dereliction by not including Black women who are experts in the field.
“Even if another Black woman did this, the issues around citation would still exist,” she said. “The fact that this is also a white woman, who has no business writing about this because nothing about the trap or Black feminism is her lived experience, is adding another layer to this.”
The book’s title was named after rap group Migos’ 2016 chart-topping single “Bad and Boujee” featuring Lil Uzi Vert, leaving many denouncing Buck’s reasoning for the subject.
Bowen appeared speechless after reading the first chapter of Buck’s book as she described the definition of a trap queen.
“A trap queen is a woman who is down for the cause. She was born in the ghetto, raised in the ghetto, but she ain’t that ghetto,” the passage read.
She said the author’s choice of words to describe the group of Black women was “weird and cringey,” given the “trap queen’s” position in the culture.
“That is not what Black women from the hood call themselves,” Bowen said. “The fact that she has latched onto that specific terminology is weird, and it speaks to a surface-level relationship that she has with this particular community.”
While the project was initially published back in February, the ongoing criticism caused the book’s publisher, Wipf and Stock Publishers, to pull “Bad and Boujee” from circulation. The company decided on Wednesday and reported the following day by Sojourners, the website of a Christian publication.
Wipf and Stock Publishers issued a statement saying their critics had “serious and valid” objections.
“We humbly acknowledge that we failed Black women in particular, and we take full responsibility for the numerous failures of judgment that led to this moment,” Wipf and Stock said. “Our critics are right.”
Buck’s response to critics had prompted Bowen to send a private message to the author through social media, asking what inspired her to write “Bad and Boujee.”Buck replied that she credited her work in a footnote after her research assistant found it.
“She only thought that it was worth a footnote and not even any critical engagement,” she said.
After the publisher decided to pull the book, Clarisse Rosaz Shariyf, the senior director of Literary Programs for PEN America, provided a contrasting answer to those who had an issue with its content.
“There must be no hard and fast rules about who is entitled to tell certain stories or engage particular topics,” Rosaz Shariyf said in an email. “Such redlines constrain creative and intellectual freedom and impair the role of literature and scholarship as catalysts to understanding across differences.”
Since the book went viral on social media, Twitter users have voiced their opinions regarding a white woman writing on subjects she has never experienced.