Good Times and The Jeffersons

The black stereotypes in Spike Lee’s film “Bamboozled” are very evident in the main characters in the minstrel show, Mantan and Sleep n’ Eat. For the show, Mantan and Sleep n’ Eat are depicted as lazy, unintelligent, and foolish. Their stereotyping is intentionally obvious to shock and shame the viewers of the show using satire. In addition to the obvious stereotypes in the television show, Lee uses the other character in the film to showcase other stereotypes. Lee uses the characters: Pierre Delacroix, Thomas Dunwitty, Sloan Hopkins, and Big Black Africa and his group as additional, slightly less obvious views of black stereotypes.

Understanding how atrocious and awful African-Americans’ life was during the Reconstruction era, is key to

Released in 2001, Disney Channel’s The Proud Family was a Black cartoon frequently watched by children who grew up during its airplay. Not vulgar or satirical, The Proud Family centered around Penny Proud and her family as she grew up through her years. As a child, I innocently watched this show, but picked up on unintended implications based off of the character’s skin color. The main character Penny was a lighter skinned girl, who appeared to possess “more Eurocentric phenotypic characteristics (Steele),” exhibited more intelligence, wealth, and virtue, as opposed to her darker skinned best friend, Dijonay, who was associated with deviance and sassiness, while speaking with a more Ebonic style of talking and possessed a more “ghetto” name. Although the show attempted to provide an accurate representation of a “traditional African American family,” it still regardlessly instilled these stereotypes of the African American community into my mindset, which were not disproved in my mind until later in my life (Steele).

The time has come again to celebrate the achievements of all black men and women who have chipped in to form the Black society. There are television programs about the African Queens and Kings who never set sail for America, but are acknowledged as the pillars of our identity. In addition, our black school children finally get to hear about the history of their ancestors instead of hearing about Columbus and the founding of America. The great founding of America briefly includes the slavery period and the Antebellum south, but readily excludes both black men and women, such as George Washington Carver, Langston Hughes, and Mary Bethune. These men and women have contributed greatly to American society.

The movie ‘‘Pleasantville’’, written, produced and directed by Gary Ross, approaches a period in America’s history which subsequent generations idealise as a better and more stable society. He portrays this time period of the 1950s as a time when people and life were less complicated; a time when everyone knew their place in society. However, as the film ironically shows, this was a time when people were more ignorant, racist and most certainly sexist. Ross demolishes this illusion of the great 1950s American society by showing how its defects are gradually changed from black and white to colour. Ross shows that ‘change is inevitable’ once a catalyst for change is added to the ordered life of “Pleasantville”. Once David and Mary-Sue begin

Travel back to New York city during the 1920s, a melting pot of culture, a place where new ideas, technology and business mix and mingle into a metropolitan jungle, where dreams are made and stars are born. During this era, in a small neighborhood on the island of Manhattan, an explosion occurs that would forever change the course of history. The explosion would liberate an entire race that had been ignored for centuries into a new era! The explosion was known as the Harlem Renaissance. It was during this time black culture was freely expressed and openly excepted by the mainstream white culture. Today, the culture is still openly expressed but there is a sense of segregation. It affects our culture to this day! Television programs are

‘The idea of The Cosby Show which was rejected by ABC, they felt that America was not ready to accept the concept of an intact, black middle-class family.’

In 1971, New York Times columnist Fred Ferretti wrote an article about a new television series called All in the Family. Ferretti asked, whether or not if racism and bigotry were considered funny and he concluded that it was not and as a result believed that the show was lacking good taste. Apparently, the television viewers of America disagreed. Running from 1971 to 1979, All In The Family wasn’t the first television series to tackle major issues on a major network, but what was innovative about the series, was that is that it hewed its situational comedy from topical issues, and it explored them through characters we got to know and cared about every week. Simply put, All in the Family wasn’t just a great situational comedy; it as was an ongoing national conversation rooted in well-written, well-acted and multifaceted characters.

Over a significant time frame, African Americans have been forced to endure numerous hardships – one of which being the negatives stigmas that unfairly generalize their people, culture and way of life. Therese stereotypes of a whole nationality label Blacks as, “superstitious, lazy, ignorant, dirty, unreliable, (and even) criminal,” (“Stereotypes”). Such generalizations are products of the public’s perception, which has been diluted by rooted historic and current prejudice as well as the media’s conveyance of a well-known African American cultural center: Harlem. Despite negative connotations associated with it, Harlem stands as a community that strives to flourish and maintain its strong cultural status. George Canada, the founder of the

Thomas Jefferson once said, “Every generation needs a new revolution.” Thomas Jefferson indicates that every generation needs a group of motivated people hoping to fix the broken pieces in soceity. E.L Doctorow uses Thomas Jefferson’s imperative thought as an occurring theme in the novel Ragtime. E.L Doctorow does so by using three distinct revolutionaries, each with different qualities; the youngster, Mother’s Younger Brother, the significant anarchist, Emma Goldman, and the infamous menace to society, Coalhouse Walker. Although the revolutionaries of Ragtime, Mother’s Younger Brother, Coalhouse, and Emma Goldman are ultimately killed or deported, they benefit America because they fight for the ideals that America claims to hold.

The movie 'Ethnic Notions' describes different ways in which African-Americans were presented during the 19th and 20th centuries. It traces and presents the evolution of the rooted stereotypes which have created prejudice towards African-Americans. This documentary movie is narrated to take the spectator back to the antebellum roots of African-American stereotypical names such as boy, girl, auntie, uncle, Sprinkling Sambo, Mammy Yams, the Salt and Pepper Shakers, etc. It does so by presenting us with multiple dehumanized characters and cartons portraying African-Americans as carefree Sambos, faithful Mammies, savage Brutes, and wide-eyed Pickaninnies. These representations of African-Americans roll

For in the early years of television, African Americans were characterized as servants, maids, custodians, and as uneducated individuals. Families were depicted as low income, unemployed, poverty ridden, single parent households, living in an

The article “Television, Black Americans, and the American Dream” explained how Black Americans have been represented in the media and television. The media has shifted our understanding of racial inequality away from a structured process. This makes it seem as though racial inequality is “natural and universal rather than as result of social and political struggles over power” (Gray, p. 431). This is illustrated in the CBS News documentary The Vanishing Family: Crisis in Black America by following the lives of underclass, single parents. It highlights drugs, riots, and teenage pregnancy to show that

In the book Life is so Good, George Dawson and Richard Glaubman give a very rare representation of life in the early 1900s. George Dawson, a poor and illiterate black man tells life as it is through his experiences. These many life experiences are portrayed in new stories told chapter by chapter intrigue the reader of the book. This paper will review Dawson’s many stories and his perspective on life at the time, as well as the way his views and mindset compares to the philosophy of African Americans at this time.

Additionally, television shows on the late 80’s through the middle 90’s, present the same family concept but with a different topic. Comedy shows like “Married with Children” which illustrates a “white” family of four members living in a Chicago suburb area with an antisocial personality disorder, is a typical example of