Film Analysis Of Dear White People

Dear White People is a show about black students’ attempt to address and solve racial issues at their predominately white, ivy league institution. Each episode is told from the perspective of the main characters. The point of the film is to communicate a narrative that is not seen enough. The writers rely on stereotypes to certain extents for the purposes of dramatization, but they clearly show how no matter the shade and/or background of the black characters, they are all still directly affected by racism and prejudice around them.

Frantz Fanon was a Martinique-born, Afro-Caribbean psychiatrist, philosopher, revolutionary, and writer whose works are influential in the fields of post colonial studies, Marxism, and critical theory. He was born in 1925 and died in 1961. The quote above is from Fanon’s first book, Black Skin, White Masks (1952), originally titled as “An Essay for the Disalienation of Blacks.” Fanon, in this book is providing a prognosis about the lived experience of the black man. He is concerned with describing the place that is held by blacks in the mid 20th century and illustrates the issues of race and racism and to point the reader toward a better and free future for all men. The quote above shows how oppression gives rise to ways of being. Fanon’s experience and the background of the time period he was living in justifies his hostility when he argues that the black man is constantly trying, but never fully accomplishing, to be white and to integrate into the white man’s world. In this essay I will show the three phases Fanon goes through to reach this conclusion: to escape his blackness,

Tim Wise’s film “White Like Me” is an educational documentary about racism and white privilege. The film begins with Wise’s personal story on how he learned the importance of race at a young age after attending preschool at Tennessee State University, a historically African American college. Being one of the only Caucasian students and being taught by predominantly African American administrators, allowed Wise to gain respect for African American authority figures which ultimately made a huge difference in how he came to see the world. Throughout the film, Wise expands on his personal encounters with race while incorporating interviews with scholars and candid comments from white students discussing their opinions on some heavy questions

Reid covers three genres of African American film types such as comedy, black family film, and black action film whether it be independent and/or commercial films. Under the comedy genre, Reid evaluates three subtypes, which include Blackface Minstrelsy, Hybrid Minstrelsy and Satiric Hybrid Minstrel films. Blackface Minstrelsy was the only film subtype, I was familiar with in African American film history. Hybrid Minstrelsy and Satiric Hybrid Minstrel films were new genres learned from

These stereotypes depicted “drug dealers, prostitutes, single mothers, and complacent drag queens” (Harris, 51). In the 1980s, African American filmmakers began to make a name for themselves. These films are “social commentaries, indictments of racism and depictions of ‘everyday’ American lives” (Harris, 51). Compared to the traditional representations of blacks and blackness, New Black cinema takes on this cultural intervention and the recoding of blackness. Harris describes this as “revising the visual codes surrounding black skin on the screen and in the public

In the "Lived Experience of a Black man" chapter, Fanon asserts his anger towards the white man because a black person 's skin color is the basis for prejudice and thus they are not the ideal human. He is annoyed that when someone mentions a physician or a teacher and they are black, the white society seems surprised that these black scholars are gentle or intelligent. His anger leads him wanting to be accepted by the white man. He writes, "Like all good tacticians I wanted to rationalize the world and show the white man he was mistaken"(Fanon 98). He feels the need to show the white man that they are mistaken about believing all the negative thoughts about black people.

The United States has long been a country that has accepted that change is a necessity for prosperity and growth. However, each change within the nation's history was hard fought against those who resisted such change either through racism, bigotry, and blatant discrimination. African American cinema is enshrouded in history that depicts these themes of racism, struggle, and deprivation. Yet, this same cinema also shows scenes of hope, artistic spirit, intellectual greatness, and joy. Black actresses, actors, directors, producers, and writers have been fighting for recognition and respect since the great Paul Robeson. The civil rights movement of the 1950's and 60's was fueled by black cinema through films like A Raisin in the Sun.

According to Tukachinsky, Mastro, and Yarchi, prior to 1930, the role of Blacks on screen were seen involving mostly in criminality and idleness (540). That role still persists until the present, with Blacks usually have to withstand to “longstanding and unfavorable media stereotypes including sexually provocative females and aggressive male thugs” (Tukachinsky 540). 1970’s movies such as The Mack, Black Caesar and Coffy have reinforced this stereotypic image of the black community. The

Over the course of approximately one-hundred years there has been a discernible metamorphosis within the realm of African-American cinema. African-Americans have overcome the heavy weight of oppression in forms such as of politics, citizenship and most importantly equal human rights. One of the most evident forms that were withheld from African-Americans came in the structure of the performing arts; specifically film. The common population did not allow blacks to drink from the same water fountain let alone share the same television waves or stage. But over time the strength of the expectant black actors and actresses overwhelmed the majority force to stop blacks from appearing on film. For the longest time the performing arts were

In Season 1, Episode 5 of the The Netflix Original Series: Dear White People released on April 28, 2017, Reggie, a black college student and the leader of Winchester University’s Black Student Union is seen at a fraternity party surrounded by mostly white students. All is well until Reggie’s white friend, Addison, repeatedly utters the N-word while singing along to a hip-hop song. Reggie asks him not to say it anymore however, Addison questions him and attempts to justify his use of the word which leads to a debate. The creator of Dear White People uses characterization and setting to convey how non-Black people-especially white people- who use the N-word regardless of whether or not they understand its historical context, reinforce the notion that Black people are inferior which helps to maintain white supremacy.

The Abolitionists shows a long journey of ending the slavery. How they fought for the freedom for slaves and how they scarify what they had in the way of the human being equality. This documentary helps people to think about the long process that some people toke and they put their life in danger everyday by speaking against slavery. They main point of this story is in these people: Frederick Douglass, William Lloyd Garrison, Angelina Grimke, Harriet Beecher Stowe, and John Brown. Angelina Grimke was from a famous family in South Carolina. Each member of her family had their own slave but Angelina broke slave owning from her family. She was thinking that slavery is sin and God will punish the person who has slave. In 1829 she moved to North and she

A Netflix TV show, Dear White People produced by Justin Simien, is about the students of Winchester University. This show tends to target not only the Netflix customers, but the black and white audience as well; the entire first season generally focuses on the media, racial, and gender roles within the community as well as the mainstream problem of the unrecognized white privilege by white skinned people. Looking up who the producer is, it turns out that Simien is a black-skinned man. Therefore, he fully understands the politics and the human behavior towards the black race from the white race (considering racism towards people with his skin color has been around for so long). Being black-skinned is already clear for many people to assume that he probably has dealt with the racism majority of his life, considering the repeating themes throughout the show. Even with the title, the producer is purposefully calling out to the specific audiences in a straightforward way. According to some reviews, many have concluded that Dear White People is extremely offensive to them. While watching the show, there were a few significant and periodic themes that showed throughout the first season and the major themes I chose were important how the roles of media played throughout the show. As a result, the roles of the media within the show reveals that people tend to communicate to the public of who they they really are as a person by showing what they want the public to see them as: in a

"Dear White People" is a satirical film by Justin Simian. The film Takes on Quite a few serious subjects under the veil of comedy. I will be telling of my thoughts, and feeling throughout the movie. As we go along I will also bring up the most impressionable characters, and how they impacted my feelings throughout the movie. The movie takes place in the fall semester at a prestigious university called Winchester University. In the fall spirits I would like to ask, do you believe in racists?

Fanon finds himself suffering from schizophrenia and many disorders as a result of the white man’s harsh treatment. When all he wanted was to be himself. To a white man from France, Fanon was a “Martinican, a native of “our” old colonies” (Fanon, 1986, p.113), which was a perception which deprived the black man of self-pride or confidence in himself.

This is an insightful chapter about finding identity in a white world. Fanon goes through what appears to be a crisis of identity when faced with the “other”. We see this happening at the beginning of the chapter with the first three words being “Look, a Negro”. Fanon thus began to know himself by how he thought the “other” saw/understood him. He stepped outside of himself into, first the third person, but later in a triple person. This caused him to question his own self-image as well as to question what it means to be black and the social structures that exist in a white supremacist society. Fanon wrote about the unreasonable notion of judging and discriminating others based on the colour of their skin- colour prejudice. He felt trapped under the fact that the white person had fixed an identity onto him. As Fanon was creating himself, these stereotypes were both untrue and stuck in time. The fixed identity of the black man was not part of his reality. As the chapter goes on, we see that this objecthood was crushing him. It was reducing him to feeling inferior but also nonexistent (p. 25). As if he is there, as an object, with the mere purpose of elevating the status of the white person. All he wants is to be free to exist in the world without explaining himself; without explaining the truth of his lived experience. He wants