Blackface, YellowFace, Any Face

Is it ever acceptable to wear black face? This was a question posed by our Intro to Cinema teacher, Ruth before we screened The Jazz Singer, 1927. In the film, Al Jolson plays Jack, the son of a Jewish Cantor, who defies his father to follow his dream of becoming a jazz singer. Years later he has made it to Broadway and we see him during rehearsals and on opening night in black face. This portrayal had nothing to do with the story line. In fact, the only time we see a real African American person was when a servant was assisting Mary, Jack's love interest, backstage. Black face was a popular thing during this era but in this film it seems really out of place. Not to say that it should have a place. Anywhere.

Black face negatively portrays African Americans as lazy, poor, and buffoon like. During the early part of the 1900s, African Americans had no rights and little say in these types of performances happening. Blacks even performed in black face. The most famous and highest paid black actor of his time was Bert Williams. (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bert_Williams).

Black face dates back to 1441 when West Africans were displayed in Portugal, (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blackface) but black minstrels and blackface didn't begin to formally catch on until the 1830s and were popular for 100 years before attitudes about race and racism began to change.

That isn't to say that black face isn't still around. We see it in modern day media all the time. As we briefly discussed in class, examples can be seen in the films Tropic Thunder where Robert Downey, Jr. portrays an African American soldier; Ted Danson performed during a Fryer's Club roast in 1993 to his then girlfriend Whoopi Goldberg; in 1986's Soul Man, C. Thomas Howell poses as a black student in order to receive a full scholarship. I remember watching this film but never really thought about the message it was sending about black stereotypes. I guess that would have made me a passive racist during the viewing. I should have turned it off. This class has certainly taught me to view films in a new light. Which is really the point isn't it?

Advertising has certainly used its fair share of black face illustrations over the last 180 years. Playbills and sheet music commonly used these images in their marketing. The NAACP mounted a campaign in the 1950s to put an end to blackface performances and images which to a large part succeeded. Still modern day companies still use these images. Cloetta Fazer, a Finland candy maker of Lakritsi Liquorice, has used a black face logo since 1927. Only recently in 2007, did the company decide to change the logo of their most popular candy due to pressure from several Finnish agencies as well as other media sources. It's my opinion that black face is extremely racist in nature and should never be used to portray African Americans in film, stage or any arena.

Another common occurrence was the use of yellow face to portray persons of Asian culture in film. Although there were a few actors of Asian decent, they weren't hired to portray their own ethnicity on screen. Actors such as Mary Pickford in Madame Butterfly, 1915; Mickey Rooney in Breakfast at Tiffany's and more recently Rob Schneider in I Now Pronounce you Chuck and Larry were made to look like the stereotypical Asian person with buck teeth, slanted eyes, and heavy accented non-English speaking idiots.

What happens when an African American swaps roles and performs in white face as seen in the SNL skit, White Like Me? In the video, Eddie Murphy puts on white makeup and goes out into society to see what it was like to be a white man. Although the skit is meant to be funny and is, it could be seen as stereotyping white people as racists.


Why is this video more socially acceptable as opposed to the Australian video of the Jackson Jive where performers on a talent show dressed in black face and white face to portray the band The Jackson Five. Harry Connick, Jr. was a judge on the talent show and found it appalling and gave the group zero points. The group later apologized.

This spawned a discussion on the American TV talk show The View. The panel discussed this modern day black face and it's negative effect on African Americans worldwide. Whoopi Goldberg is a panel member. And no.. she didn't bring up the 1993 incident of then boyfriend Ted Danson.

There are countless examples of people in black, yellow, white and even red race in American and internationally. While America seems to have taken a stand on what is socially acceptable in modern times, the rest of the world hasn't caught on. So, I ask again. Is it ever acceptable to wear black face? In my opinion, No.

Photo sources: photobucket, ain't it cool.com, wikipedia, wikimedia commons
Video sources: youtube, hulu.com

Racism still exists? You bet it does...

I'm not a naïve person nor am I blind to the racism that still exists in this country, but it still shocks me on how ignorant a mass majority of Americans are about the amount of racism that goes on daily in our society. There are a lot of different forms of racism and countless examples I could give but in this blog, I'm going to discuss some of the terms we learned in our IDS 101 class along with some personal stories that I feel have relevance.

Merriam-Webster Dictionary: rac·ism \ˈrā-ˌsi-zəm\ : a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race.

In Beverly Tatum's Defining Racism, she gives the analogy of racism as an ongoing cycle like a conveyor belt at an airport. Active racist behavior has identified with the ideology of White supremacy and is moving towards it. Passive racist behavior is the equivalent of standing still as no overt effort is being made to go in the opposite direction. Anti racist behavior is actively walking in the other direction faster than that of the conveyor. Although I am not quite sure that I understand her stance on the differences between her ideas of racism or prejudice as it frankly gave me a headache reading the article, I do like her analogy stated above.

I've always considered myself an anti-racist but after listening to examples in class I realized that I am not entirely innocent when it comes to stereotyping a group of people. I've laughed at “off color” jokes made by both whites and people of color, even told an inappropriate joke and have clammed up when someone made a racist comment. Mostly because I don't like confrontation and the offender was properly a friend or co-worker. Over the last year and a half something changed in my typical non-confrontational ways. I became aware of how I was reacting, or not reacting and started to comment on how I found the offender's statement “inappropriate”. I realized I don't care if I get resistance and I'm no longer afraid of the consequences of me standing up to things I find offensive.

My personal experience with racism wasn't against me, a person with white privileged, but with several family members. Ah.. let me explain. Growing up my parents started doing foster care for specially needy children in South Florida. I would say about 95% of the children we took in were of African American or non-white decent and all of them were from drug addicted mothers. My parents taught their children (all eight of them) to love each other no matter the color of their skin. And we did. Our family adopted three of the more than 100 children we took in over the course of six years. All three siblings are of African American or Haitian decent.

Most people we encountered in daily life thought what my parents were doing was admirable. Taking in children that had no where else to go for various reasons. While others, could only see their skin color and how they couldn't possibly be raised by white people. Some of those comments were made by African Americans. Afraid that we wouldn't teach them their heritage. Over the years the stares became more frequent. My brothers friend wasn't allowed over to our house because his father didn't want him catching AIDS from any of the foster children we took care of. What? Where did this hatred come from? The time was the late 80's during the height of the AIDS epidemic. AIDS discussions were a huge topic in the media and with friends. I remember hearing a lot about how blacks from Africa were spreading the disease. Is this where that stereotype he had came from? Possibly.

Another recent incident happened when I introduced my brother to a man I was dating. I talked about my brother a lot since he does live with me but never mentioned his skin color. After they met, he whispered to me, “you didn't tell me he is black”. My response was “I didn't think it mattered and I don't usually introduce my siblings as my black or white brother or sister. I see them as my siblings. Period. No color difference.

After watching the videos on the race experimentation in class on Thursday, I became outraged again. (I've previously seen these same videos). The man that asked if the lady played the black card... really? I've never personally witnessed the kind of blatant racial profiling that was shown in the department store, but I am positive that I would react as that last female did when she took the wronged woman and walked out with her taking her business elsewhere. I believe that there are more people like this in the world than not, but if you don't take on the role of anti-racist, those passive people won't have any role models to learn from.

Body Image issues.. still

I decided to write my first blog on body image as this is a subject that has been with me since childhood. I'm not exactly sure the exact moment that this became an issue but I can't seem to shake it. I was actually a thin child until about age eight from the childhoold photos I can find. I had bright red hair which everyone including adults teased me for, skinny body and a nice smile. It wasn't until the family was uprooted and moved thousands of miles away did my body start to grow in what I perceived to be in an ugly and bad way. What exactly is body image? In class we learned that it “refers to the way we perceive our own bodies and the way we assume other people perceive us.” [Lightstone, 1999]
If you ask my mom she would tell you that I was a happy child with a great sense of humor and inquestive mind and of course she thinks I'm pretty. But she is my mom and has to say all those nice things. If you had asked my grandmother what kind of child I was she would tell you I was fat. Yep. Fat. Not a nice grandchild that was sweet as pie or smart as a whip. Fat. That is what I grew up with. I can't even begin to tell you the number of times I have heard that I would be so pretty if only I wasn't so fat. I learned to accept that everytime my grandmother would call or come to visit that the first question out of her mouth wouldn't be about my grades or activities but about how much I weighed. The interesting thing was at age fourteen I managed to lose about fifity pounds. I was estatic. I couldn't wait to show my grandmother my new body. Oh she was going to be so proud of me. Or so I thought. After years of constantly putting me down about my weight she had nothing to say to me. Nothing. I was stunned. She didn't comment or notice that I shed fifty pounds. At the time it really bothered me and now at thirty-five I guess all I can do is laugh about it but I won't fool you and say it still doesn't hurt. Isn't family the one place that you are supposed to get support?

I'm not exactly sure if my childhood experiences with my grandmother is how I got such a bad case of body image blues but does effect every part of my life. There are a thousand things I would love to try but my first thought is how someone will perceive me in doing so. As a child I was constantly paranoid that people were staring at me and talking about me. “She can't get on that ride, she's too fat.” . I even feel uncomfortable eating in public. Don't even get me started on how I use to hide food even from my family. I guess when you hear “do you really need to eat that?” a thousand and one times it would have an effect on a person. People assume since I am fat that I am lazy. Maybe. I don't go to the gym like I should or eat the “right” foods but maybe they wouldn't be so harsh if they knew about my medical issues. It's difficult to exercise when your body is screaming in pain. Not the “no pain, no gain” kind either. But that is a different subject all together.

Negative body image has affected me since about age seven. It has torn at family relationships, friends and of course love. I mean, how can anyone want to love this body? Even if I did manage to find a love interest, I spend the whole relationship wondering why they are with me. is that you don't judge me by my physical appearance. I have spent money on counseling and even managed to start to have a positive self image until one day about 2 years ago a co-worker told me I was ugly. What? Did he really have to tell me that? Apparently he felt I needed to know. Oh well. Therapy here I come..