THE AQUASAPIENOLOGY LIBRARY
Aquasapien (n.)
From Latin aqua (water) + sapiens (wise, human).
- Taxonomic Definition: A proposed classification of aquatic human beings, existing in the liminal space between mythology and anthropology. Aquasapiens are theorized to be humanoid entities adapted to aquatic environments originating from centuries past.
- Cultural Definition: A conceptual framework through which historical, political, and artistic depictions of water-bound or sexually-charged feminine figures, such as sirens, mermaids, and archetypes like Jezebel, imposed upon Black women, can be studied as manifestations of societal anxieties and desires.
- Contemporary Usage (in aquasapienology): Refers to individuals examined not only as mythical beings but as symbolic constructs, used to critique the intersections of sexuality, race, and power.
AQUASAPIENS AND AQUASAPIENOLOGY: THE STUDY OF AQUATIC HUMANS
I will articulate, to the best of my ability, accurate depictions of how Aquasapiens and Aquasapienology exist in the world, as well as how I’ve chosen to observe the many life forms that embody these basic principles. In doing so, I identify and define the benchmarks that create a deeper understanding of Aquasapienology as a whole, not only as an imagined taxonomy of aquatic humans but also as a framework for interpreting The cultural imaginary of Aquasapiens that extends beyond mythology and into the lived histories of Black women whose sexuality has been imposed, controlled, and contested across centuries. I consider figures who offer distinct variations of the Aquasapien archetype, reflecting, and autonomy have historically converged with the Black female body.
Ex. 1 Sara Baartman (1789–1815): Within Aquasapienology, Sara Baartman emerges as one of the earliest recorded “exoticized sirens.” (Howard) Displayed across Europe as the “Hottentot Venus,” her body was treated as both spectacle and specimen, a site of scientific and erotic obsession. Like the siren whose form is at once desired and feared, Baartman’s physicality was deemed monstrous by the very gaze that readily consumed it. She embodies the archetype of the “captured Aquasapien”—studied not to understand her humanity, but to confirm her otherness from what was and is recognized as the ideal European form.
Ex. 2 Josephine Baker (1906–1975): Josephine Baker can be read as a twentieth-century “performative Aquasapien.” Her stage persona leaned into the exoticizing gaze of European audiences, including being the first Black woman to enter France’s Pantheon stated Bradley, the Paris correspondent for National Public Radio (Beardsley). She used that very performance to establish herself as a beloved star globally and regain her independence. Much like the siren whose song enchants sailors, Baker’s performances disarmed and enthralled, transforming the stereotype of the hypersexual black woman into a platform for her own agency (similar to that of Nina Simone, being invited into white spaces in a time when Black people were still not treated fairly nor admired beyond obvious talent or skill). Yet the double bind remained… that to thrive, she had to inhabit the role of the siren even as it risked reinforcing the myth (Gibson). How can onedismantle the erotic expectations of their existence when the audiences are full of people who grant recognition only on those terms?
Ex. 3 Pam Grier (1949– ): Pam Grier exemplifies the “cinematic Aquasapien.” In the 1970s blaxploitation era, she was framed as hypersexual, with her roles often hinging on seduction and vengeance: Coffy, airing in 1973 and Foxy Brown airing in 1974. Yet within these confines, she subverted expectation. Her characters were never passive as she wielded sexuality as a weapon and a shield. Aquasapienology reads Grier as the formidable siren of popular culture, reconfiguring the objectified gaze into agency by making allure a loaded gun aimed at those who would obstruct justice.
Ex. 4 Janet Jackson (1966– ): Janet Jackson manifests as the “scrutinized Aquasapien.” Her career navigates the tension between erotic performance and the surveillance of respectability politics. From the choreography of Rhythm Nation (1989) to the 2004 Super Bowl half-time show, when she was violated and penalized. Even as the victim, she demonstrateshow Black women’s sexuality is both celebrated and punished when it becomes unmanageable. Within Aquasapienology, Jackson embodies the siren scrutinized—her allure meticulously staged, yet always vulnerable to public censure, reminding us of the fragility of autonomy in the face of mass media. These characteristics will follow as more Aquasapiens take their seats in the limelight of popular culture and become investigated by those who would seek to control and redirect their power.
Ex. 5 Megan Thee Stallion (1995– ): In contemporary Aquasapienology, Megan Thee Stallion exemplifies the “reclamatory Aquasapien.” Her unapologetic ownership of sexuality transforms what was historically wielded as a weapon against Black women into a tool of empowerment and cultural capital. Facing similar roadblocks to Jackson, she shows what is becoming a belovedapproach to the scrutiny, especially in a digital age where everything can be commented on, reshared, and repopularized as a meme. Her very stage name echoes the siren’s liminal body and her blatant acknowledgement of how the world views her: part woman, part beast, and fully commanding of desire… a stallion. Megan demonstrates how modern aquasapiens not only survive the gaze but redirect it, asserting erotic autonomy as a form of resistance.
Together, these figures map a lineage of Aquasapiens across history from captured to performative, dangerous to reclamatory. Aquasapienology thus positions Black women’s sexuality not merely as a site of oppression but also as a landscape where agency, creativity, and power emerge in defiance of the currents that would otherwise drown them. Aquasapienology treats these figures not as curiosities but as critical markers and foremothers of disrupting and maneuvering the barricades societies will construct to clearly define the boundaries of where a woman’s femininity, sexuality, and power should start and stop.
I coined the term Aquasapien, to refer to the aquatic human, but more importantly, to seek to unify siren mythos across geographic and generational margins. Drawing from folklore spanning the early Greek Sirens as well as the African diaspora with entities like Mami Wata, my research into these overlapping fables weaves a tapestry of how these themes overlay one another to create what I’ve identified as the modern-day siren, or the Aquasapien.
In Homer’s Odyssey, sirens are described as dangerous mythical creatures that Odysseus and his crew encounter; they can only make their escape by plugging their ears with beeswax to avoid falling victim to the siren songs. And even so, because he was so keen to listen to these melodies, against his own warnings, Odysseus had the crew tie him to the mast of their ship so that he could indulge in their sweet songs (Homer). In this passage, the effects are only temporary, as once the songs have faded a safe distance away, the men could return to their voyage. In all of the historical illustrations of this fable, the sirens are white women (Homer). Birds, bats––doesn’t matter, as long as they are white. Never so dreadful or monstrous that they would be presented as women of color. This tracks all the way up to 1974, with Weeki Wachee Springs, a town in Florida notorious for their mermaid shows.
Lake Weeki Wachee was home to the Weeki Wachee mermaids, a pretty consistent group of recurring mermaid performers who made a living as professional mermaids in the show. This was said to be a place of magic, shock, and awe for visitors with their families. According to Jessica Glenza, author of an article written ten years ago on the attraction, “...mermaids carry with them our society’s own ills, especially in the setting of water, a scene of historical race-strife.” The article goes on to detail personal accounts of visitors who either did or didn’t recall Black mermaid performers at Lake Weeki Wachee (Glenza). Seeing as I’ve lived in Florida my entire life not knowing what Lake Weeki Wachee even was, the fact that it was or wasn’t exclusively showing white mermaids didn’t surprise me. In fact, the first time I had heard of Weeki Wachee was a Netflix documentary showcasing the uphill battle of being a professional mermaid. And even in that, race was not a separate thing that could be escaped through the water. The show segmented a portion at the end that highlighted the struggles of Black mermaids specifically. As long as art forms like “mermaiding” depend on the use of real bodies with real complexions, race will always be a factor and the exclusion of some will always be a statement. Black bodies do, however, have a place in siren mythology, and that place is found in Mami Wata.
Mami Wata is revered as the mother of the water and of mermaid mythology across the African diaspora. Usually depicted as either half human, half fish/serpent, or as a beautiful, fully human woman adorned with decadent jewels and metals, Mami Wata is known to be not only a mermaid but a spiritual deity whose presence echoes both the life-giving and destructive properties of water itself (Smithsonian). She is the protector of water and the life it can hold, and with that power, has amassed quite the following. Due to the transatlantic slave trade, the tales of her power went farther than most.In Indigenous West African belief systems, when slavery began, those who were forced to board “death ships” chose to carry her in their hearts for their journey. Even still, in the stories little Black children are told about their African ancestors who rejected a life of servitude and jumped from the ships, there are some who believe they never truly died, but that their spirits became one with the water and they transformed into a new people: aquatic humans.
These beliefs are what fuel my work. Siren mythology and ancestry come together to form the undertow of what my work is today. Being a Black woman living in America, a country my ancestors didn’t choose, there’s a part of me that never feels whole. According to Ancestry.com, my DNA reads 72 percent West African. That’s 72 percent of me that calls to someplace that isn’t a country who, more today than yesterday, encounters, yet again, a double bind (Gibson) of wishing my people were never here while simultaneously relishing the amenities of structures they built. African spirituality and the many practices that fall beneath that umbrella have guided me on a path to oneness and identifying the many facets of my being. Mami Wata is said to have many children, and it is not an unfamiliar tale that a child strays too far from home and gets lost. Through my work, I venture to identify not only as a child of the water but also to identify other lost children and be a lighthouse for those without a place where they belong. It is in the water that I found a voice, my siren song.
By identifying these black women who historically have staked their claims as the powerful, the bold, the alluring, and the objectified, I hope to highlight them as vessels of beauty and reject connotations of inferiority and imbalance. The jezebel, an archetype born out of jealousy for the Black woman’s sexual autonomy, draws out this dynamic:
...seductive, alluring, worldly, beguiling, tempting, and lewd. Historically, white women, as a category, were portrayed as models of self-respect, self-control, and modesty - even sexual purity, but black women were often portrayed as innately promiscuous, even predatory. This depiction of black women is signified by the name Jezebel.
- Dr. David Pilgrim
(Pilgrim) These are the words of Dr. David Pilgrim, a professor of Sociology at Ferris State University and a writer for the Jim Crow Museum. Both in the Western and sadly, non-Western canon, beauty has been defined by its proximity to whiteness. That is the reality of the Black woman and more importantly, the Black girl. Where Black men are paraded and sought after for their “ferocity and sexual know-how,” Black women are victimized and brutalized repeatedly for the way their bodies form naturally. When I reference Baartman, I need it to be known that she is more than words on a page to me. Her story, an adage funded by the lengths the white supremacy will go to exhibit and parade things that do not belong to them, was not one she got to write herself. It was written for her. Her sexuality was created by white men in a room who saw her as a case study, a statistic, a scientific anomaly (Howard). To think of her as anything beyond animalistic was treason to their preconceived notions. It is these notions I aim to combat.
With my approach to art being more research based, a certain indexical language was identified that lent well to the idea of building out a codex. A place to actually create my art language and refine the associations made with my work. In my research, I found the Codex Seraphinianus, written by Luigi Serafini, an illustrated encyclopedia of an imaginary world (Serafini). The illustrations included diagrammed images of fish and plants that would seem to exist in this world as well as a language that was invented by the artist. This approach to storytelling and for lack of better words, world building, felt like a necessary step in my own process. Using the pages of old mismatched sketchbooks and the denim fabric of an old skirt project that I hand-dyed myself, I bound the pages together to create the Aquasapien Codex. This book would be the first step I took to fully bastardize these practices of naming and identifying specimens and investigating so-called “case studies”.
Half-fish, half-human, 100 percent authentically powerful and beautiful and just. Their existence, our existence, is not something to be feared for the sake of it but to be recognized for the gifts put out into the world. Jasmine Crockett, the United States Representative for Texas’s 30th congressional district, a Black woman (who sits amongst those that would love to see her anywhere else but a place of power) who fights every day for equality and all things working class, receives critiques not on her political stances but on her eyelashes. Her makeup. The way she styles her hair. An educated Black woman who stands proudly in her beauty and her wisdom will always be a threat to those who would rather look down at her on her knees. It is these systems that I’m no longer interested in bargaining with; instead, I am taking advantage of them. How far can allure shove hatred back down the throats of those who would spit on my mother’s face? I guess I’ll find out. I hope that you understand me now. I’m an Aquasapien, I always have been, and as long as the night is long, my ballads will spark discomfort and unease for those who would wish me silent.
RESOURCES
Serafini, Luigi. Codex Seraphinianus. Rizzoli, 2013.
Jalondra Davis, “Crossing Merfolk: Mermaids and the Middle Passage in African Diasporic Culture,” in The Routledge Handbook of Co-Futurisms Ed. Grace Dillon, Isiah Lavender III, Taryne Jade Taylor, & Bodhisattva Chattopadhyay. Routledge 2023.
Homer. The Odyssey. Translated by Emily Wilson, W.W. Norton, 2018.
Glenza, Jessica. “Rise of the mermaids: Weeki Wachee’s biggest attraction makes quite a splash.” The Guardian, 14 June 2015, https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2015/jun/14/rise-of-the-mermaids-weeki-wachee-florida.
Buratovich, Michael A. “Linnaeus Creates the Binomial System of Classification: Research Starters: EBSCO Research.” EBSCO, 2023, www.ebsco.com/research-starters/history/linnaeus-creates-binomial-system-classification
Yasuka. “The Folklore of Japanese Mermaids: KCP Japanese Language School.” KCP International, 6 Apr. 2017, www.kcpinternational.com/2017/04/the-folklore-of-japanese-mermaids/.
Howard, Mikelle. “Saartjie (Sara) Baartman (1789-1815).” Black Past, 22 Sept. 2018, blackpast.org/global-african-history/baartman-sara-saartjie-1789-1815/.
Jim Crow Museum. “The Jezebel Stereotype.” Jim Crow Museum of Racist Memorabilia, Ferris State University, https://jimcrowmuseum.ferris.edu/jezebel/index.htm