Despite the film Daughters of the Dust coming out in 1991, its influence in Hollywood is still felt today. Most recently, it was restored at the Film Forum in 2016, as well as featured in Beyoncé’s 2015 music video Lemonade. This film not only influenced Hollywood, but also African American women's representation in Hollywood’s narratives. This is due to the exploration of an African American family, through the African American female’s perspective. The film’s female-centric narration is revolutionary due to its distance from the Hollywood clichés that often follow African American women. By having these marginalized voices hold the dominant position in a motion picture, it assisted in challenging Hollywood’s norms, as well as lead to the …show more content…
Nana is the silence that you cannot understand, like the many complexities of African American women that cannot be understood by many in the film industry, as well as in society. Nana, as well as the other female characters in the narrative, are more than stereotypical archetypes; they are multidimensional characters that represent the importance of intersectionality. Therefore, Nana and the Unborn Child, free from outside oppression, such as Hollywood’s clichés, are able to control the narration of their family’s journey freely. Through their point of view, the realities of the African American struggle is accurately shown and represented in an authentic way. As Jennifer Machiorlatti notes in Revisiting Julie Dash's "Daughters of the Dust": Black Feminist Narrative and Diasporic Recollection, Nana and the Unborn Child’s allow for “those who have been neglected to marginality in cinematic history to move to the center to claim and own their representation, story, and myth. ” Daughters of the Dust representation of African American women in narrations is different from anything in Hollywood’s past. This unique perspective of dominant African American woman voices weakens the control of dominant and inaccurate viewpoints from men, and moves it to black women, who are less willing to follow the hurtful clichés of standard storytelling in
Daughters of the Dust, was a movie about traditions, and the history of the women in a black family carrying these traditions. The movie starts in 1902, in an island where a family has lived for generations, since the slavery times. Part of this family, wants to leave the Island, but another part wants to preserve the traditions staying in the island. So the whole movie is about the struggle of the members of this family, in relation to leaving or not leaving the Island. The oldest women of this family, is the wisest of that family; she carries the traditions deep in her heart. Another woman, she is in her forty or so, and has two daughters, she is the other side of the coin. She wants to leave the island and break with the traditions...
The Blind Side is a heartwarming and compelling story of the NFL player Michael Oher, who is adopted into a family that is a significantly higher social class than he. The story is a true account of a boy that went from rags to riches and depicts eloquently the social stratification in the United States.
Not many classes have topics of which students can relate to easily and can find something to help them understand the ideas better. In our class we watch the show Freaks and Geeks to help us better understand sociology. At first, I wasn’t quite sure how this show set back in the 1980s would help me understand what we were discussing in class, but it turned out to really be a valuable asset in helping the class. The show perfectly displays the themes of the self, the looking-glass self, and in and out groups which we confered about.
The audience is able to gather hints and references made in the film that slavery in one way or another affected these people living on the island. By watching Daughters of the Dust, I was able to gather new knowledge that I did not previously have of this secluded community. The filmmakers definitely evoked a response from the audience in the way they demonstrated particular aspects of this community. Although, I do not have any ties to the African American community, it was easy to understand the hardships of the Gullah community from this film.
The movie Blind Side begins with the author, Michel Lewis explaining the incident of Joe Thiemann in which he broke his leg into two parts. He then explains the importance of a left tackle in the game of football. After a brief description author introduce Michael Oher; tall, beefy, quiet and athletic guy who is being interviewed by what it seems like a government officer. Michel who was abandoned at very young age and didn’t knew much about his father nor his mother, although he wanted to stay with his mother who was an alcoholic and struggles to find an orphan house or a good family that can take care of Michel. Despite not having much a family nor someone who takes care of him, Michel never gave up on the situation and lived most of his
This essay will be explaining the definition of sociology, the sociological factors of obesity using Symbolic Interactionism Theory and the Functionalism Theory and a description of the medical condition obesity and how it may affect individuals suffering from it.
Despite the fact that the character of Phyllis as the “tough as nails” perpetual, intentional aggressor is a valid attempt to obliterate the image of women as the oppressed, one interpretation of this role is that she ultimately seems to misrepresent herself, and females in cinema, anyway. Janet Todd, author of Women and Film, states that, “Women do not exist in American film. Instead we find another creation, made by men, growing out of their ideological imperatives”(130). Though these “power girl”characters are strong examples of anything but submissive and sexual females,the...
One of the sociological theories is conflict theory. The conflict theory deals with people's level on wealth, or class. The conflict theory says that social change is beneficial, contrary to focuses on social order. In the story of the woman and her children, the conflict theory plays a big role on the situation. Police of higher class are threatening the homeless woman. The conflict theory is a constant struggle of people of higher class over powering people of lower class, or the weaker. The police are trying to over power the woman by telling her to leave. Even though the woman and her children were doing nothing wrong, the police used their power to tell her to leave. Also the people of the area showed their conflict theory by telling the police officers to come. They must have felt embarrassed to have a woman of such lower class to be around them. They used their power of class to have the woman removed from their community. The woman wants to be there because she has no home and it is a good community to be in, but the people look at it as an embarrassment to them because it makes their area look bad for someone of such lower class to be around them. The conflict theory is unique to all other theories because it separates people into categories determined by their wealth and standards. Their status is the element that categorizes them, weather it is class, race, or gender. The conflict theory do not always use class, race, and gender all at once. In this situation race and gender is not a main issue, although gender could be a reason, but it would fall under the feminist theory. This story is mainly dealing with class. Through all this conflict the woman feels over powered and domina...
Talcott Parsons and Robert Bales, two of the leading figures in sociology, may be considered the founding fathers for the ideas of the “modern family” and the “male-breadwinner family.” Collectively, their work has influenced how Americans analyze families and has sparked new ideas regarding the American family from sociologists such as Stephanie Coontz and Arlie Hochschild. However, when studying the American family, Parsons and Bales fail to understand that the “ideal” family may not be so ideal for everyone. They neglect to consider societal influences and economic changes when discussing patriarchal social norms as the most optimal family structure. Their description of the male-breadwinner family consists of the father being the “instrumental leader” within the home, providing economically for his family based on his occupational earnings. Meanwhile, the mother is considered the manager of the household, providing for her husband and children physically, emotionally, and mentally.
Sociology relates to this novel in so many different ways. The family in the story, Flowers in the Attic, written by V.C. Andrews, starts off as a family of procreation, a family established through marriage, which includes the mother (Mrs. Dollanger), the father (Mr. Dollanger), and the four children: Cathy (the oldest daughter), Chris (the second oldest son), Carrie and Corey (the young twins). A conflict begins when the father dies in a car wreck, so the mother and her four children must move in her rich parents estate because they have no money and nowhere to stay. After the father's death, the norms of the children changed. The norms of the children were to stay hidden in the basement by them selves because Mrs. Dollanger may only earn back the right to inherit her father's estate by falsifying that she has no children by her husband who was also her half-uncle. The original agreement was that they can leave the basement when their grandfather dies. The rules of the house were given by the dying grandfather that stated if Mrs. Dollanger was found to have children that she would be disinherited again.
At first I didn’t know what to really expect from taking an online sociology class for class. To be completely honest, I thought I would be reading a lot of boring articles and then writing about them. It turned out that I was wrong. I was able to see what sociology pertains to and how it relates to our lives. It’s funny to think that almost everything in your life is controlled by someone else. Your interests, hobbies, and even clothes aren’t really solely your decision. You may be thinking “no way I am being influenced and I make all of my decisions consciously” but in fact that is not the case.
In 1993, Mrs. Doubfire, was one of the first movies to feature a cross-dressed gay and heterosexual man. During this period of time people were exceptionally homophobic. At this time, there was a scarce amount shows with gay characters and storylines. It has in fact been concluded that the release of Mrs. Doubtfire resulted in the increase in production of films containing gay themes. Americans have been in a constant debate about gender roles, and the effects and reasoning behind these roles. While differing gender roles have noteworthy outcomes on many things, the family unit is directly affected by gender roles. The movie, Mrs. Doubtfire depicts this perfectly. The themes shown in this movie can be explained by multiple sociological concepts including female gender roles, male gender roles, and theories on families.
To most, it’s very easy to imagine how it would feel to grow up without much of anything in life. Hell...I can tell you first hand what it feels like to not have a decent pair of shoes or pants without holes in them, or old “hand-me-down” toys while most of the kids you know have “state-of-the-art” toys. To many children in this kind of situation, it seems like a very bleak world to live in. No child should ever have to experience this kind of life. However, due to ignorant parents and an even more jacked-up government, there are many children that will always be in this predicament.
In Peter Berger's "Invitation to Sociology", the sociological perspective was introduced. Berger asserts that it is important to examine new or emotionally or morally challenging situations from a sociological perspective in order to gain a clearer understanding of their true meanings. This perspective requires a person to observe a situation through objective eyes. It is important to "look beyond" the stereotypical establishments of a society and focus on their true, hidden meanings. Consideration of all the hidden meanings of social customs, norms, deviations and taboos, allow one to establish an objective image about the truth behind it. This method can also be applied to understanding people. This questioning, Berger says, is the root influence of social change and personal understanding of others. To do this well, it involves much intellectual prowess and ability to reason.
The film Modern Times directed by Charlie Chaplin is a silent era film filled with sound effects that shows the struggles and challenges of living in a modern industrial society. The Director Charlie Chaplin happens to be the central character referred to as Little Tramp along with his friend Ellen also known as Gamine, an orphan and homeless young lady. The technical code of the film is black and white but very humorous. The film portrays social issues such as slavery, poverty, unemployment, strikes, and economic imbalances just to name a few. These issues occurred during the period of the great depression in America.