Angry Black femmes and the affective economy of digital blackface

Abstract This article explores how digital blackface functions as a contemporary form of gendered and racialized appropriation, targeting Black femme affect and expression as cultural and emotional resources within platform economies. Using two case studies—the Twitter counter-campaign #YourSlipIsShowing (2014) and the Black TikTok Strike (2021)—I examine how Black femmes respond not only through critique but also through practices of strategic withdrawal, misdirection, and play. Using Black feminist theory, affect theory, and critical technocultural discourse analysis (CTDA), I theorize “affective refusal” and “strategic misrecognition” as tactics through which Black femmes undermine the surveillant and extractive logics of digital platforms. These performances do not always take the form of visible protest; rather, they move through silence, satire, and deliberate misdirection. Situating digital blackface within the afterlives of slavery and the erotic life of racism, this article contributes to critical debates in Communication Studies on race, gender, affect, and the politics of digital labor.