Whether it is Marlon Brando playing a Japanese translator in 1956 or Sigourney Weaver as an Egyptian pharaoh’s mother in 2014, white people have been taking the roles of non-white characters for almost one hundred years. No matter how progressive we may think we are as a society, many movies are made each year in which non-white characters are played by white actors. Either the original race of that character is erased or the actor is made to look the race of that character. These poor substitutions have become known in the industry and among moviegoers as whitewashing.
One particular group of people, fans of a relatively racially and culturally accurate animated television series called Avatar: The Last Airbender, were enraged when they learned
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Articles are posted sporadically, with greater infrequency as of the last year or two. Most of the organization’s posts discuss the effects of whitewashing on the consumers of media. Some posts laud certain productions for casting racially representative actors while others censure those that do not. A majority of their posts have to do with the casting of Asian roles, which does agree with their large Asian readership, as mentioned later, and the Asian-centric origin of their organization. They also have a section titled “Campaigns” in which they post active and past movies and TV shows that they are protesting. The campaigns explain the reasoning behind their protestation and give ways that readers can take action to help protest this specific movie or TV show’s …show more content…
For instance, while going through the campaigns section, I learned about whitewashing in the popular 2012 novel adaptation The Hunger Games that I had not noticed. Apparently the story’s protagonist’s race is never explicitly defined by the book. She is only said to have dark hair and olive skin; however, Lionsgate Entertainment refused to revise their casting call to include non-white actors. Additionally, the campaign mentioned how many secondary characters were to be played by white actors despite never having their race declared, pointing out how society defaults to white as the normative race. The website also contains commentary on and many analyses of historical whitewashing in film.
The intended audience of this group is most likely youth in the United States. Due to the origin of the group, the content is also geared toward Asian individuals. Interestingly, racebending.com performed a demographic survey in August, 2009. The average age of respondents was 22 years old, 75% of whom live in the United States and 30% are of Asian descent. Asian people are very overrepresented in this survey, with the Asian population of the US in 2010 being just 4.8% (Humes). Unfortunately, there is no information available on the gender distribution of their
Over the past decades, Hollywood movies have brought out the representations of racial inequality through out various themes of racism and stereotypical ways. One frequent type of racial inequality is that there is a culture or race that is belittled, under-privilege and inferior while the other is superior and high in order. In “The Offensive Movie Cliché That Won’t Die” by Matt Zoller Seitz, He identifies the term “magical negro” as: “a saintly African American character who acts as a mentor to a questing white hero, who seems to be disconnected from the community that he adores so much, and who often seems to have an uncanny ability to say and do exactly what needs to be said or done in order to keep the story chugging along in the hero’s favor” (408) and in Mitu Sengupta “ Race Relations Light Years from the Earth” the author examines the movie Avatar as a racist film, and focuses on how it resembles the “white messiah” stereotype. The term “white messiah” is known as a white individual who hold superior power, according to David Brooks of the New York Times, “a stereotype that white people are rationalistic and technocratic while colonial victims are spiritual and athletic, and that nonwhites need the White Messiah to lead their crusades” (Sengupta 213). Both articles dwell and explain the two terms and how it portrays the themes of racism and stereotypes through two elements, known as author’s purpose and main idea. These elements effectively convey the theme because it prevents our thoughts from being scattered by a broad spectrum of ideas and instead, it tells you exactly what is going to be discussed throughout the article.
Omi claims that media and popular culture are two of the main culprits for the dissemination of a segregation ideology through music, movies and TV shows (Omi 114). According to Omi, media has the “ability to reflect the dominant racial ideology” and to “shape that ideology in first place” (Omi 115). These two sentences imply that Omi is not just blaming on media, but also on white people, who dominate communications and provide a better image of themselves in order to maintain the status of dominant culture. Moreover, Omi uses the concept of “representation” to claim that even the popular culture, which was supposed to be created by the people, brings segregating ideology on itself and do not contribute to the celebration of cultural diversity (Omi 120). Omi explains this belief of “representation” as a tool of segregation when stating that jokes and songs “reinforce stereotypes and rationalize the existing relations of social inequality” (Omi 121). Media and popular culture are outsiders, meaning that are not racist themselves, but according to Omi they are the main incentive to
African American representation in the film industry has always been a topic for discussion. Whether talking about character types and roles, the actors being cast or not cast, and the lack of diversity in front of and behind the camera. ‘The contemporary status of race in mainstream American culture is intimately bound to the process of representation within and through the mass media.’ (Rocchio, 2000, p. 4). Any role that was to be played by an African American kept in with the dominant stereotypes of the time of production; incompetent, child like, hyper-sexualised or criminal.
"Race and Ethnicity in Entertainment." Issues & Controversies On File: n. pag. Issues & Controversies.
Over past decades, Hollywood movies have brought out the representations of racial inequality through out various themes of racism and stereotypical ways. One frequent type of racial inequality is that there is a culture or race that is belittled, under-privilege and inferior while the other is superior and high in order. In “The Offensive Movie Cliché That Won’t Die” by Matt Zoller Seitz, He identifies the term “magical negro” as: “a saintly African American character who acts as a mentor to a questing white hero, who seems to be disconnected from the community that he adores so much, and who often seems to have an uncanny ability to say and do exactly what needs to be said or done in order to keep the story chugging along in the hero’s favor” (408) and in Mitu Sengupta “ Race Relations Light Years from the Earth” the author examines the movie Avatar as a racist film, and focuses on how it resembles the “white messiah” stereotype. The term “white messiah” is known as a white individual who hold superior power, according to David Brooks of the New York Times, “a stereotype that white people are rationalistic and technocratic while colonial victims are spiritual and athletic, and that nonwhites need the White Messiah to lead their crusades” (Sengupta 213). Both articles dwell and explain the two terms and how it portrays the themes of racism and stereotypes through two elements, known as author’s purpose and main idea. These elements effectively convey the theme because it prevents our thoughts from being scattered by a broad spectrum of ideas and instead, it tells you exactly what is going to be discussed throughout the article.
Martin Luther King Jr. was casted to a white actor but in Hamilton’s case Miranda reversed the problem and casted actors of color to white characters such as the founding fathers, but as some saw his decision to be genius and game changing others were offended by his plan. Randolph Mclaughlin from CBS News said “what if they put an ad out that said, ‘whites only need apply?”, he was one of many offended by this saying that he thinks it violated some of New York city’s human rights but the producers of Hamilton did get approval by Actors Equity.
To begin, racial or ethnic stereotypes on certain television programs provide false information about groups of people. The characters illustrated in these programs are formed by what writers believe. When a show is created, the writers take the basic features of a character and expand based on what they think viewers will enjoy. Yet these creations can be biased due to how hard the writer is willing to work.
I also researched instances of counter actions taken by Asian Americans to protest against these negative images. My research also has examples of Asians that have succeeded in breaking through the racial barriers in the media. The results show that even though racial stereotyping still exists in various forms of mass media, there are signs that show noticeable improvement in allowing a more balanced image of Asian Americans. Statement of the Problem There are close to 12 million Asian Americans living in the United States (U.S. Asian, 2000). Asian Americans are considered one of the fastest growing minorities (Pimentel, 2001).
There has been a pressing issue of the lack of diversity in mainstream media in front and behind the camera. For many years the face of Hollywood was white, occupying roles as actors, directors, screenwriters and other prominent positions in the industry.
One type of character saturates the American media. He acts as the hero in a majority of movies, TV shows, and books. Foreigners must think that Americans believe the character superior to others. He or she has one trait that sets him apart from the rest: white skin. The media tends to idolize this character. If a character is not white, then common stereotypes prey him or her; they become sidekick, comic relief, or even the token minority. One commonality stretches through this minority though: they all need a white male savoir.
Many demanded better roles, many spoke out against the legacy of racism in Hollywood saying they are still being treated unfairly and want unbiased roles, that are not stereotypes of Hollywood’s yester year. Treated
...stereotype of Arab violence. This trait is only found in the Egyptian characters as highlighted through comparison to the Germans within the film. While Dr. Jones often uses their violent behavior to defeat his Middle Eastern enemies we find that it is not a necessary element of the plot. Through brute force and quick thinking Jones is still able to defeat his Western opponents in the film. Thus we can assert that these distorted stereotypical portrayals of Arabs are due to Western Orientalist attitudes. This supports Said’s claim that common stereotypes can be found within all Western representations of the Middle East and proves that Orientalism is a pervasive issue within popular media.
Racial and ethnic diversity on television is not something that I have ever really noticed as a problem, but sitting down, and paying very close attention to the people, their roles in the show, I was able to see that there was a lack of diversity on TV. I chose a random TV channel, one that I probably would not watch, and studied the characters in the show and in the commercials for over two hours, I realized that I had never paid that much attention to the people in the show. I noticed after I was done that the largest group of people in the show and on the commercials, were white people, although there was some diversity, maybe one or two people of a different nationality, gender, or race, that overall the lack of diversity was minimal compared
Ethnicity and appearance has become a tremendous problem in the media due to the fact that they try to use it as a power to control creativity of abstaining the truth in media. According to journalist Nishijima, A, she refers to the Oscars and explains that it is very absurd how the media is slowly progression in lacking diversity. This was recognized when watching the Oscars and seeing that based off predominantly white nominees. Nishijima quotes “Boone Isaacs decl...
The White Savior Complex is a damaging subconscious underlay of the Hollywood system, and more broadly all of western society. It is used to further separate the notions of “us” and “other” by creating a firm separation fueled by self-righteousness, and a sense of entitlement. Hollywood attempts to address race relations, but fails because of this trope. Kingsle, from the article “Does My Hero Look White In This?” described that both racism and colonialism are acknowledged, but not without reassuring that not only were white people against the system of racist power dynamics, but also were actively fighting against it in leadership roles (2013). In the remainder of my essay I will be commenting on many modern films and their use on this trope, and why subscribing to this filmmaking strategy is problematic.