'I ain't a Belle': Vitiating the Fallacy of (Un)usual Black Female Body through the Poetry of Grace Nichols

Un(usual) is a fundamental aspect of being black in a white-dominated society, especially for a woman. Due to this, black women have experienced a sense of rejection and invisibility. They weren't given the attention they deserved or provided for. The rejection and misrepresentation proceed further in the realm of body as mentioned in the title. The physical body has through the ages been a place - a recurrent space for violence and resistance simultaneously - especially for African and Caribbean women. This paper encapsulates this notion with a special reference to the poetry of Grace Nichols coupled with Black Feminism. The initiative centres on Black women's experiences and challenges with overlapping racial and gender identities, as well as with intersecting sexism and racist oppressions.