Chickenhead (sexual slang)
Chickenhead is an American English slang term that is typically used in a derogatory manner toward women.[1] The term mocks the motion of the head while performing oral sex on a man, but contains social characteristics and cultural relevance as well, and is frequently heard in popular hip hop music.[2][3] More recent uses of the term have seen it used by hip hop feminists and entertainers as a symbol of sexuality.[2] "Chickenhead" is also a term used in overseas sex trafficking for individuals that facilitate and monitor a person's transition into prostitution.[4]
Etymology
[edit]The word, a chiefly American colloquial term, is usually written "chicken head" or "chicken-head", according to the Oxford English Dictionary, which has 1903 for a first recorded use meaning "foolish or stupid person". It cites John Steinbeck's East of Eden (1952) for its earliest use as a "refer[ence] to prostitutes". A secondary meaning, first recorded in 1988, is "U.S. derogatory slang (esp. in African American usage)", used to refer to "a sexually promiscuous woman" or a woman in general.[5]
Dr. R. Flowers Rivera used the term "chickenhead" more recently, in a poem that identifies it as a woman who is impoverished and an alcoholic lacking empathy.[6]
A chickenhead in the transnational sex trade is typically responsible for facilitating transportation, acquiring temporary lodging, and monitoring activities of the new prostitute, similar to the activities of a "pimp".[4]
Disempowering or empowering
[edit]Ronald Weitzer and Charis Kubrin note that "A favorite rap term is 'chickenhead,' which reduces a woman to a bobbing head giving oral sex."[7] Bakari Kitwana argues that many rappers refer to women, black women in particular, with demeaning terms names such as "bitches, gold diggers, hoes, hoodrats, chickenheads, pigeons, and so on."[8] Johnnetta B. Cole argues that hip hop's tradition to refer to black women in such terms disrespects and vilifies them.[9]
In Joan Morgan's When Chickenheads Come Home to Roost, she notes the derogatory tendency of the term "chickenhead", and further defines it as a woman who uses sex to get the things she wants.[10] As a black, hip-hop feminist, Morgan offers that chickenheads simply use the tools afforded to them when other means are not efficient, and that all women may have something to learn from the use of sex as manipulation.[11]
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ^ Richardson, Elaine B. Hiphop literacies. London; New York: Routledge, 2006, ISBN 978-0-415-32928-6, p. 42.
- ^ a b Morgan, Joan (1999). When chickenheads come home to roost : my life as a hip-hop feminist. New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN 978-0684822624. OCLC 40359361.
- ^ Hunter, Margaret; Soto, Kathleen (2009). "Women of Color in Hip Hop: The Pornographic Gaze". Race, Gender & Class. 16 (1/2): 170–191. JSTOR 41658866.
- ^ a b Chin, K; Finckenauer, J (2009). "Chickenheads, Agents, Mommies and Jockies: The Social Organization of Transnational Commercial Sex". Crime, Law and Social Change. 56 (5): 463–484. doi:10.1007/s10611-011-9329-y. S2CID 143344140.
- ^ "Chickenhead, n.". Oxford English Dictionary. Oxford University Press. 2019. Retrieved April 24, 2025.
- ^ Rivera, R. Flowers (2000). "Legacy to Our Daughters". Obsidian III. 2 (1): 84–93. JSTOR 44511599.
- ^ Weitzer, Ronald; Kubrin, Charis E. (October 2009). "Misogyny in rap music: a content analysis of prevalence and meanings". Men and Masculinities. 12 (1): 3–29. doi:10.1177/1097184X08327696. S2CID 145060286. SSRN 2028129. Pdf.
- ^ Kitwana, Bakari. The Hip Hop Generation: Young Blacks and the Crisis in African American Culture. New York: Basic Civitas Books, 2002, ISBN 978-0-465-02978-5, p. 87.
- ^ Cole, Johnnetta B. "What hip-hop has done to Black women". Ebony, March 2007.
- ^ Morgan, Joan (2000-02-02). When chickenheads come home to roost : a hip-hop feminist breaks it down. New York: Touchstone. ISBN 9780684868615. OCLC 1018087707.
- ^ Ards, Angela; Morgan, Joan (October 1999). "Down with Feminism". The Women's Review of Books. 17 (1): 17. doi:10.2307/4023366. ISSN 0738-1433. JSTOR 4023366.
Bibliography
[edit]- Morgan, Joan (1999). When chickenheads come home to roost: my life as a hip-hop feminist. New York: Simon & Schuster. ISBN 9780684822624.
- Bulbeck, Chilla (2000). "Young feminist voices on the future of feminism". Sociological Sites/Sights, TASA 2000 Conference, (6-8 December). Adelaide: Flinders University.
- Springer, Kimberly (Summer 2002). "Third wave Black feminism?". Signs. 27 (4): 1059–1082. doi:10.1086/339636. JSTOR 10.1086/339636. S2CID 143519056.
- Massey, Carla (1996). "Body-smarts: an adolescent girl thinking, talking, and mattering". Gender and Psychoanalysis. 1. Psychoanalytic Electronic Publishing (PEP): 75–102.
- Stephens, Dionne P.; Phillips, Layli D. (March 2003). "Freaks, gold diggers, divas, and dykes: The sociohistorical development of adolescent African American women's sexual scripts". Sexuality & Culture. 7 (1): 3–49. doi:10.1007/BF03159848. S2CID 143036176.