The exhibition of Sara Baartman provides a useful example. Baartman, a
Khobi woman from what is now known as South Africa was taken to Europe and put on display in England and France as a “phenomenon of nature”. 4 Unfortunately, no record of her real name exists, instead she is often referred to by her epithet ‘Hottentot Venus’. 5 Her body was hyper-sexualised and displayed to audiences,
particularly for her large buttocks, or steatopygia that was deemed evidence of racial
and sexual difference between Europeans and non- European peoples. Baartman’s
body was objectified and fetishised, and her genitalia and buttocks were seen as
evidence of her exoticism and sexual availability. For example, in an advertisement
for her ‘exhibition’ she was frequently dehumanised and objectified, with the subtitle ‘the only one ever exhibited in Europe’ and referred to as a ‘specimen’. 6 Additionally,
her exhibition in itself reinforced ideas of racial superiorities, as Baartman was taken
and displayed against her will, for the pleasure of European audiences, this
ultimately reinforced the developing idea that European bodies and desires were
superior to non-Europeans.
4 ‘Just arrived from London, and, by permission, will be exhibited here for a few days at Mr. James's Sale Rooms, corner of Lord-street: that most wonderful phenomenom of nature, the Hottentot Venus: the only one ever exhibited in Europe’, Wellcome Collection [online] < https://wellcomecollection.org/works/pg5nsuur > 5 Sadiah Qureshi, ‘Displaying Sarah Baartman, The ‘Hottentot Venus’, History of Science, 42.2 (2004), 233-257, pp. 234. 6 Wellcome Collection [online] < https://wellcomecollection.org/works/pg5nsuur >
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