Acknowledgments  vii

Introduction. Reading Race, Reading Pornography  1

1. Archives of Pain: Reading the Black Feminist Theoretical Archive  27

2. Speaking Sex / Speaking Race: Lialeh and the Blax-porn-tation Aesthetic  59

3. Race-Pleasures: Sexworld and the Ecstatic Black Female Body  83

4. Laughing Matters: Race-Humor on the Pornographic Screen  107

5. On Refusal: Racial Promises and the Silver Age Screen  128

Conclusion. Reading Ecstasy  146

Notes  153

Bibliography  181

Index  213

"In The Black Body in Ecstasy, Jennifer C. Nash abandons a long-standing framework in black feminist criticism: that pornography is bad to and for black women. She boldly reads pornography for black women's ecstasy. Through careful analysis of key films from porn's golden era, Nash develops an argument that is innovative, fearless, and, ultimately, affirming of possibilities for black women's bodies, fantasies, and sexual lives."—Nicole Fleetwood, author of Troubling Vision: Performance, Visuality and Blackness

"This is an important book and its readers will know it. The first chapter on black feminist theories of representation brilliantly contextualizes the political stakes of the book's commitment to black women's pleasure. I predict that The Black Body in Ecstasy will be considered the most definitive statement to date on black feminist theory's engagement with visual representation."—Robyn Wiegman, author of Object Lessons

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