Let Nicki Minaj Be Angry
Power of Smart Talk in Media
Last summer, the summer of 2015, MTV’s Video Music Awards (VMA) released the nominations for the Video of the Year award, revealing that Nicki Minaj’s Vevo record breaking “Anaconda” was not one of them. Upset with the white washing in American art, Nicki took to Twitter stating hard truths that black women have to face everyday.
“When the ‘other’ girls drop a video that breaks records and impacts culture they get that nomination”
Nicki Minaj, referring to her record breaking video, draws on the use of “other” to set her apart from the white nature of nominees in the VMAs. Often there is an erasure of black work, as Toni Morrison states in “Unspeakable Things Unspoken” (1988), one of the beliefs surrounding black art is that it is nonexistent or it exists and needs to be refined (by white people) (Morrison 29). These notions do not allow Nicki Minaj and other black artists to own their own work, which is only reaffirmed when her clearly ground-breaking video does not get nominated.
After having multiple people, including Taylor Swift, take her tweets personally, Nicki Minaj illuminates this very struggle.
“I’m not always confident. Just tired. Black women influence pop culture so much but are rarely rewarded for it”
Her pain and exhaustion for having to face more challenges than her white artist counterparts, leaves her “just tired.” This feeling and her upset is seen as a untempered rage because of her black female standpoint. Miley Cyrus, from her white feminist standpoint, takes this rage and criticizes Nicki Minaj, similar to how Serena Williams was criticized for her angry outbursts toward racist white umpires. Miley told a New York Times reporter, “If you do things with an open heart and you come at things with love, you would be heard and I would respect your statement. But I don’t respect your statement because of the anger that came with it.” Not respecting Nicki Minaj for expressing emotional injury, which was done by an oppressing white, patriarchal society, completely devalues Nicki Minaj’s argument by taking away her right to feel pain. This is all a part of a cycle of oppressing rage in black women by attributing it to unacceptable emotional and mental states, such as “crazy.”
Nicki Minaj uses her acceptance speech for Best Hip Hop Video to take back her power from Miley Cyrus, who dismissed her claims on the basis of uncalled-for rage. After thanking her pastor, Nicki Minaj finishes her speech:
“And now back to this bitch that had a lot to say about me the other day in the press (.) Miley what’s good?”
Nicki Minaj utilizes the African American discourse smart talk to put down Miley Cyrus. Smart talk, as defined by Denise Troutman in “African American women: Talking that talk” (2001), is “a put-down, reflecting a combative style of language” (Troutman 222). Nicki Minaj using “now back” reflects the back and forth nature of these combative dialogues. She is ready to linguistically fight, which is seen after Miley Cyrus takes up the space of speech and Nicki Minaj can be seen mouthing, “don’t play with me, bitch …don’t play with me.” Calling for her not to play means that this battle is not one that belongs in a realm of play. There is not that much of a fight, however, because Nicki Minaj does not just signify Miley Cyrus, meaning she does not just put her down as a criticism (Smitherman 1994: 206), she reads Miley Cyrus.
Reading is a broad form of signifying in which, according to Marcyliena Morgan in “Conversational signifying: grammar and indirectness among African American Women” (1996), “a speaker denigrates another… in an unsubtle and unambiguous manner” and this needs to be done with witnesses (Morgan 410). With the present audience at the VMA and the indirect audience of the United States population as witness, Nicki Minaj unsubtly criticizes Miley Cyrus by calling her a “bitch” for talking to the press about her. By using the language that society expects her to perform with, Nicki Minaj puts down Miley Cyrus, finishing her off with a triumphant “what’s good” and regaining some of the narrative that she lost when Miley discounted her feelings based on the rage she felt at the system.
Typically, when black women express outrage, they are labelled with many of the negative stereotypes that center around black women’s dominance, but in this case, Nicki Minaj uses her anger to read Miley Cyrus and win this “game” that was set up by Miley Cyrus’s back talking. By winning, Nicki Minaj is able to recover some of what Miley Cyrus took from her.
