Unit III - Places and Spaces: Platforms as Sites of Resistance

Who would think of "space" as a site of resistance?  And, I don't just mean physical locality, I also mean our bodies, music, cinema, or anything else.  Would you think of words in the same manner?  Maybe so, but for black folks, defying the odds has always represented resistance.  I just heard on the radio about Ray Charles being banned from the State of Georgia for over twenty years because he refused to play in segregated venues.  Yet, he initially thought, "I can't do anything about it. I'm just an entertainer."  Which act of resistance resonated the most with you in this unit, and has it inspired more resistance in your current space or place?  Please explain.

On a radical view or perspective, identifying the spaces where we start a process of revision is a crucial choice demanded by all, where the acts of resistance critically commands changes in our society. The questions presented above instructed me to think in a greater analytical depth. Involving "space" as a site of resistance shapes and determines the responses to the cultural practices and actions we engage in globally. If this is not carefully accomplished, we will continue to stand in the space with the oppressed and oppressors. For many individuals, the movement of resistance requires pushing against oppressive barriers set by race, sex, and class domination. During this unit, I enjoyed and learned so much that I am unable to choose a top act that resonated with me the most. However, I do have three top acts which include Ava Duvernay, Assata Shakur, and Luke Cage's signature Hoodie episode.

DuVernay is the first woman of color and the fifth woman ever to be nominated for best director of a feature film in the Golden Globes. Her nomination displays at this point and time that the struggle for women and people of colors' acceptance in the film industry is not in vain. The visibility of Ava DuVernay’s work displays her accessibility to a variety of stages worldwide. This is shown through The Middle of Nowhere which cost $200,000 and won her best director award at Sundance, whereas Selma is on a totally different realm and cost $20 million. Ava DuVernay opens the minds of young women of color, all people of color, and just humans periods who have stories to tell. African Americans can look at DuVernay as a successful person who looks like them and tells the reality of the positives and negatives we encounter daily. She motivates people to dream and defines the validity of their aspirations.

Assata Shakur's 1977 conviction and later escape from prison made her an icon of black power. Her involvement in the resistance act was much deeper than marches, boycotts, protest, and sit-ins we are often shown. The inhuman acts of abuse and violence she endured by police and health professionals displayed and proved her reasoning for fighting in the race war we continue to encounter today. Shakur's advocacy for revolutionary changes reinforces how we must push through the oppressive walls that have been placed against us.

Mike Colter who stars as Luke Cage, the first black superhero in a Netflix series has become a huge success around the world. Evolving from a yellow hoodie to a dark hoodie pays a major tribute to Trayvon Martin as well as many black males in our society today. This show presents a double standard we are presented with daily. Being a black man in a hoodie or covering your head when it is cold or raining all of a sudden makes you a criminal in our world and puts your life in danger due to you being looked at as a danger to others. This show displays Luke Cage as a kind, loving, thick-skinned, and bulletproof black man in a positive manner. He permits black males everywhere to know that the clothes they wear does not define them. Mike Colter presents his success in a means where black males can accomplish all things and be the head of their households in a great way.    

      All three of these individuals have pressed forward and broke barriers down for people of color and the individuals our society claims to be minorities. They have exhibited the highs, lows, negatives, and positives of our culture and communities. The reality of our lives living as individuals of color is engaged through their films and works of art. I applaud and salute them all.

2nd part of Get Up Stand Up

Five years ago, a young African American male was shot by a neighborhood watchmen for no reason at all. Trayvon Martin to be exact, was an innocent individual who is constantly displayed today as racialized stereotypes and racialized fears. However, we have discovered or better yet reopened the door of proving the racial inequalities of America that started years ago with the colonization of Africa and continues to operate daily in the 21st century. George Zimmerman, who was the shooter was found not guilty by in my opinion an ignorant jury. This not guilty judgement displays that Trayvon Martin's life is viewed inferior due to the color of his skin. Is Trayvon Martin guilty for walking home in the dark? Is George Zimmerman guilty of shooting a young African American male who was walking too close to his house? Is American guilty for not diminishing this problem years ago and taking responsibility for their uncivilized actions regarding "race"? This case must be acknowledged and understood in a critical manner everyday. I salute Trayvon Martin for his innocence. I know it was not in his intentions or even in his thoughts that his death would come so quickly or even produce him to be hero before even generating a diploma. May his soul rest in peace along with so many other individuals of various races that have died because of the cause of equality and freedom.

http://wlrn.org/post/black-lives-matter-finds-renewed-focus-5-years-after-trayvon-martin
http://www.usatoday.com/story/life/entertainthis/2017/02/26/celebrities-honor-trayvon-martin-five-years-after-his-death/98452544/

Get Up Stand Up

   

The critical race theory (CRT) movement is a group of activists and scholars passionate about  studying and changing the relationship among race, racism, and power. The movement engages in many of the issues and conflicts that conventional civil rights or ethnic studies take on. However the CRT and the individuals involved puts these same issues in a perspective that utilizes economics, history, self-interest, education, context, and so much more. The movement began in the works of the law, but speedily spread to a variety of disciplines other than law. This is displayed by many such as Martin Luther King Jr., Malcolm X, and the Black Panther Party. I was very fascinated by another group named “The Freedom Riders.” The Freedom rides were a series of nonviolent direct demonstrations that became a major portion and prosperous act in the Civil Rights Movement in 1961. The volunteers included individuals of all races, whom many were college students, mostly seniors to be precise. They rode interstate buses into southern segregated states to challenge the political leaders and their restriction of integration. These courageous men and women were arrested, abused verbally and physically, and threatened for weeks. The protesters were demanded to look death in the eye the entire time of their trips such as the incident in Birmingham, Alabama where the police sheriff “Bull” Connor worked with the Ku Klux Klan to terrorize them upon their arrival. The heroism each one of the Freedom Riders exhibited and employed daily established a strong foundation for the rights that we have today. They motivated others the stand up and speak out against racism. They were the backbone of many Black leaders while also inspiring subsequent civil rights campaigns, equal schooling rights, and equality in voter registration. The Freedom Riders motivated me to ensure that I continue to never become comfortable with the racial ideology that we are still oppressed with today. I plan to utilize my specialty and future degree in education/special education to guarantee that I keep my future students AWAKE. I will feed them the truth while also extensively explaining the truth of civilization, heritage, and history. Ensuring that they acknowledge and understand the truth, will aid in the development of self efficacy and define their future.

http://www.blackpast.org/aah/freedom-rides-1961
http://www.smithsonianmag.com/history/the-freedom-riders-then-and-now-45351758/

African Americans in Hollywood

Depictions of African American individuals has been confined to various negative stereotypical images of people of color. Because of this, African Americans endured a long difficult struggle in the history of the Hollywood film industry. With consistent demeaning dominant stereotypes, Black characters are portrayed as incompetent, child-like, criminal, foolish, cowardly, and hyper-sexualized. Many people feel the conflict began with the images of the  rebellious South in American film. White supremacy and Black inferiority were at the root of America's socio-cultural atmosphere during the nineteenth and early twentieth century around the time the movie industry made its entertaining debut. With this the stage was sufficiently set for D. W. Griffith's movie. For example, racial vindication is displayed throughout the entire Birth of a Nation film. Birth of a Nation seems exaggerated and impossible for modern audiences to believe. The stretching of the truth was very common in early filming. However, Griffith endured in this practice only for specific purposes that accommodated him and the entertainment of his white audiences. These accommodations for Griffith was deliberately exaggerated to demonstrate Blacks’ essential dissimilarity with Caucasians which involved their lack of sophistication exemplified by enjoying singing and dancing, chicken eating politicians, and politicians who disrespected their duties by drinking and taking off their shoes while discussing the law. The myths further reinforced assumptions, about the primitive or uncivilized natures of African Americans.

The viewing of this racist film has exhibited that individuals have a misconception of thinking Blacks do not have universal experiences or even universal feelings. This false accusation led to the acting of Blacks to be portrayed by White actors in blackface makeup with animalistic features. In the Birth of a Nation, the facial exaggerations included big eyes, white or red lips, and thick eyebrows which were displayed in the characters of Gus and the Black politicians. The polish that was utilized to portray color was always very dark without any variations in skin tones. Although the roles that seemed to show African Americans more positively included character roles of loyal servants and butlers such as “Mammy.” This cemented the conditioning of hegemony that demanded African Americans to stay in their places sustained by white supremacy. Hollywood has set the tone for the images, values, and worth of our culture. Numerous individuals believe that the degrading stereotypes of Blacks that are utilized mostly for their entertainment are based on reality rather than fiction. The lack and inability to go out and research the accurate lives of people of color has proven the insignificance of African Americans in the eyes of the Hollywood film industry. The unimportance of the truth of our Black heritage in my opinion was a strike of fear and ignorance. As we look at various films we find heroes to be white men such as the KKK in which D.W. Griffith’s film glorified the ground they walked on. The Ku Klux Klan is portrayed in a sympathetic light as it defends chaste virtuous Southern white ladies such as Flora from marauding and  being raped by black freemen. The KKK engaged in evil actions such as the burning of Ida B. Wells successful newspaper office because she shared the correct information regarding lynchings of Black people which were carried out by this organization’s immoral, wicked operations.

I have asked myself how did this even come to terms in Hollywood or even why has this been a problem for so many years. As I continued to critically think about this situation I realized this was created from the colonization of human civilization. Misconceptions regarding Africa and its people have swarmed the entire world for years. Generalizations and lies have been produced by the media and the opinions of individuals' own personal beliefs. However, these illusions originated from Europeans and their false impressions. European imperialism had drastic effects on the African way of life which advanced to America and traumatically influenced lives and beliefs here.  With Africa and its people being conditioned to be more like Europeans, the genuine history our the birth of human civilization was lost and regenerated with various myths in order to satisfy the necessities as well the wants of the European culture.

However, The Birth of a Nation  generated riots and created the pathway to more critical thoughts that caused a creation of a new industry in race films. Movies, television, and the media in general are all responsible for a variety of racist beliefs and actions. In recent history progress has been operated in the way minorities are viewed on the big screen. We owe a lot of this to progression to a wonderful filmmaker by the name of Oscar Micheaux. As a black owned independent filmmaker, Micheaux frequently displayed blacks in positions of power, authority, and respectability. He actually showed the truth through controversial subjects such as lynching. He offered fully developed characters both black and white to ensure that we were shown capable of fulfilling the roles needed while examining the society’s true negative actions and stereotypes towards people of color. Oscar Micheaux examined this in the movie Within Our Gates. He displayed how the white man was stealing from Mr. Landry, how Sylvia an African American woman can be educated, how there are some white people who do not consume the negative thoughts of Blacks such as Mrs. Warwick, and even the exhibition of universal thoughts that we all go through in daily life such as relationships or jealousy no matter the skin tone. His deconstruction of the cynical cliche’ of Blacks aided in the reconstruction of our true history and lives. The growing momentum continued with the constant labor of the NAACP. This great organization has brought more changes to Hollywood by demanding that whites and blacks share screen time. In today’s entertainment ranging from inner city drama to comedy, I find that African American characters are unable to tell stories or explore regular human emotional states, but they are defining themselves through servile places in American culture for the reassurance and acceptance of the white audience. For every Fresh Prince of Bel-Air and Cosby Show, there is a Good Times or a Sanford and Son. Although there is significant changes in Hollywood as a whole, we still have obstacles to overcome. We must contain patience without refraining from utilizing or feeding into the same stereotypes we are fighting against. Accomplishing this goal will be the virtue to elevating our status and value as true citizens of this society. It is essential to keep striving.

African American Film & Culture: Spring 2017 - Unit I/Blog I

African American Film & Culture: Spring 2017 - Unit I/Blog I:        (Do you recognize some of these images?) We're off to an impressive start!  As we examine the origins of t...