Assignment 4: Figureheads and Icons

The power and effectiveness of a social movement relies, in part, on the figurehead that movement chooses to champion its cause. These figureheads embody the movement: they symbolize the collective struggles, animus, and hope of a movement’s members. Moreover, these figures often do not emerge spontaneously. A movement’s leaders carefully select an individual that can both strengthen the movement and avoid damaging it with any undesirable characteristics.

Such was the case in the civil rights movement’s selection of the Montgomery Bus Boycott figurehead, Rosa Parks. In fact, dozens of women had chosen to resist Montgomery’s bus segregation policy before Parks’ famous case; however, none of these made the history books. The answer to why movement leader declined to pick one of Parks’ predecessors probably lies in a combination of timing and individual characteristics. According to Paul Hendrickson’s “The Ladies Before Rosa,” (first published in the Washington Post on April 12, 1998) the others simply came “too early “ in the movement’s development or just “weren’t ‘right.’” These women came from the lower-middle class and tended to be out-spoken about their support for civil rights. For one reason or another, movement leaders didn’t think they were appropriate to lead the burgeoning bus boycott. In the case of one such women, Claudette Colvin, her low social status made her an unsuitable figurehead. Had she spearheaded the boycott, her status might have detracted from the impetus for change or provided opponent with emotional recourse. However, Parks exhibited the “face” movement leaders wanted to put forward — soft-spoken, dignified, ladylike, and strong-willed. These qualities, they strategized, would do much to rally others through empathy and outrage.

By carefully selecting a figurehead, civil rights leaders ensured a public reaction favorable to their cause, and indeed, this strategy has been employed elsewhere in social movements. However, the characteristics a figurehead displays seem to vary from movement to movement in accordance with the message that movement seeks to promote. The women’s movement has seen many icons, but all tend to display similar sentiments and ideals. Jane Fonda, for a more contemporary example, used her position as a prominent feminist actress to promote feminist causes. She displayed many typically feminist characteristics — activist, outspoken, independent and sexually secure. In addition, Fonda espoused feminist ideals, including the harmful nature of patriarchy, an early anti-male attitude, and the importance of women’s liberation.

Fonda’s case, however, opposes the Parks example. Fonda became a feminist icon in large part because of her social position as an actress. Undoubtedly, the leaders and organizers of the feminist movement gained much benefit from her public support; however, her prominent public position allowed her to remain in the spotlight and probably afforded her much greater autonomy from the movement.

Contemporary movement figureheads tend to earn publicity through means other than activism in the movement itself, as in the case of Fonda’s acting. These “stars” tend to adopt causes and raise awareness through public outlets afforded them by their social position. However, in some cases, figureheads can emerge as champions for the movement they support, such as Rosa Parks or Cesar Chavez. Movement leaders may select these figureheads based on some aspect of the movement they represent or something that happened to them that provides opportune empathy for the cause. Of course, movement organizers themselves may also become icons, brought to prominence by their actions in promoting their cause.

Choosing a figurehead for an existing movement requires a balancing of the symbolic importance that person represents and the potential characteristics or behaviors that may harm the movement. The women’s rights movement, for example, suffered greatly from the failure of the ERA in the 70s due to a backlash from movement opposition that supported more traditional gender roles and family values. As a result — and as a factor of synthesis and reframing — the movement gradually rescinded its more radical features. However, contemporary proponents of women’s rights benefit from a much wider acceptance of the “equal pay for equal work” sub-movement. A contemporary spokeswoman — and it should be a women — to champion that cause would ideally suffer from an event (such as a traumatic or unjust work experience that typifies a endemic problem) that focuses attention on the injustice of a practice. While this event might not be necessary for a person’s place as a figurehead, it will help to propel her to prominence. Such a figurehead should not have existing popularity in order to minimize feelings of pretention or “fakeness” that come from an existing star’s adoption of a cause. The physical/demographic characteristics of the spokesperson should also, ideally, represent an empathetic yet righteous sensibility, straddling the line between radical and moderate women. In the case of social feminism, the figurehead might come from a particular minority group or social class that suffers from wide-spread injustice. This figurehead would give a body to the collective consciousness of the women’s rights movement, reflecting its followers own feelings and beliefs.