Discuss how the weeks performances in Imitation of Life, Tropic Thunder, and Kara Walker's art pieces can be read using Feagin and Elgin's systemic racism theory. Discuss the perspectives of the artists and the ways that their perspectives align themselves with and/or depart from the theoretical arguments offered. Please mention Omi and Winant's theory of social formation as an important point of departure for their analysis.
Monday, July 22, 2013
Week 2- Disrupting the Black-White Binary Module B
Discuss how the weeks performances in Imitation of Life, Tropic Thunder, and Kara Walker's art pieces can be read using Feagin and Elgin's systemic racism theory. Discuss the perspectives of the artists and the ways that their perspectives align themselves with and/or depart from the theoretical arguments offered. Please mention Omi and Winant's theory of social formation as an important point of departure for their analysis.
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Racial Formation Theory and Systemic Racism Theory are two lenses through which we can look at issues of race and racism in US society. Both theories agree that race is socially constructed and that it is central in US society. However, while Omi and Winant argue for shifting meanings of race over time and a progressive development in US society from racial totalitarianism to a racial democracy, Feagin and Sirk argue that racism is deeply embedded in major US institutions (education, media, politics etc.) and that it is a “foundational, large-scale and inescapable hierarchical system […] devised and maintained by whites and directed at people of color” (4). They criticize Omi and Winant for being too idealistic and for avoiding naming Whites as the oppressor.
ReplyDeleteThe all-encompassing nature of racism is exemplified in Imitation of Life, where Sarah Jane’s race structures all areas of life, her psychological well-being, her education, her career choice, and her relationships. The film critiques the privilege and benefits that Whites have access to and that Sarah Jane can only make use of when she passes as white, thereby reflecting Cheryl Harris’s theory of whiteness as property. On the other hand, the film reiterates Black character types, such as the Mammy and the Tragic Mulatto, which shows the pervasiveness of systemic racism in popular culture.
Kara Walker picks up on the historic embeddedness of racism by engaging with the history of slavery in her art. Through her silhouettes she examines the power structure of racism, which was founded in the past through master-slave-relationships. Walker critiques stereotypical images of Blacks by depicting Blacks in caricaturistic ways as a marker of race. By rewriting dominant narrative of slavery, Walker’s art is a form of critique of and resistance to systemic racism and thus a form of empowerment for African Americans.
Lastly, Tropic Thunder critiques the film industry, a major US institution that participates in upholding systemic racism, for its stereotypical representations of African Americans on the screen and the use of blackface.
Eventually, the performances pick up on the systemic nature of racism, raise it to our consciousness, and critique it, thus finding a source of resistance and empowerment within the racist system of the US.
Even so it is very difficult to define race, race relations and racism, Omi and Winant tried to do so anyways with their racial formation theory. For them race is a historical shift, a formation in meaning and definition. Feagin and Elgin basically agree on this definition, but add more details to it. They establish the systemic racism theory saying that race created and creates structures. Whites having shaped a racial hierarchy from the past to the present and their role in founding social and political institutions caused them to become the superior and most influential racial group.
ReplyDeleteIn the movie Imitation of Life Sarah Jane pretends to be white in order to have all the privileges she would not have as a black girl. The movie refers to the systemic racism theory by broaching the issue of whites being the powerful race. Being seen as white Sarah Jane can have a white boyfriend, she can work wherever she wants and she does not have to fear oppression from her school mates. She denies the skin color of her mother, but always when the secret comes out, all good things, such as her boyfriend, turn away from her.
The movie Tropic Thunder can be read the same way. In the story, white people are being in charge of doing the movie, black actors are stereotyped and black face is used. By having a white actor pretending to be African American, the white man shows superiority by putting on a different race.
Kara Walker on the other hand is more concerned with the history of oppression and racism. She makes slavery the subject of her work, but also plays with the idea of how people can identify a special race or scenery. Using those stereotypes and historical events correspond to the racial formation theory. By painting a slave serving his or her master or a white man desiring an African American woman, Kara Walker also picks up on the theory of Feagin and Elgin, taking the topic of racial order into her art.
The systemic racism theory, influenced by the racial formation theory, can be found in both movies and in Kara Walkers work. All three criticize racism and especially white predominance and force the viewer to rethink the definition of race.
Continuing in the tradition of rigorous debate that is perpetuated between scholars, Joe Feagin and Sean Elias respond to Michael Omi and Howard Winant’s theory of racial formation. There are some shared notions in the analysis of race by the respective theorists: it is believed that race is socially constructed and not biological in nature, and is embedded in U.S. society and in the popular imagination. Despite the agreements that exists between these social scientists, there are many instances where the two theories differ in approach. Omi and Winant’s racial formation theory is well established and has been the dominant approach to race relations since the 1980s and 90s. The basic gist of racial formation theory is that race and racism have evolved over time, where attitudes, practices and institutions no longer exist today as they once did in the past. The shifting “racial formation” happened in the U.S. from the 1820s to 1930s, and that once the formations were made, they have been in a constant state of alteration.
ReplyDeleteIn response to these findings, Feagin and Elias note that while merit is found in Omi and Winant’s theory, yet due to its optimistic tone, it fails to address the systematic and historical anchors that have created racism. Feagin and Elias hope to address these failures in dismissing the idea of a racial democracy, in analyzing how racism is a foundational aspect of American-ness, and it is still far reaching in our institutions, and communities. Feagin and Elias point out that constructed notions of race lie in European colonialism and its history of slavery in America. The theories offer different views of American society as well. Omi and Winant are gentler in their depiction of communities, in that they see racism as a negative side affect in an “otherwise healthy society,” whereas Feagin and Elias see racial oppression and inequality as something ingrained in our social system. In order to change these weaknesses one must transform the institutions themselves through law and legislative practices (note last week’s discussion on Harris and Critical Race Studies). The black/white binary as explored in our class in week 2, helped me to notice the underlying actuality/notion of biological inferiority in U.S. cultural history, and to remind myself that race relations played out in today’s society is based on systemic practices established decades ago and have weaved their way into the American imaginary. Stereotypes concerning bi-ethnicity are also systematic; certain rights and privileges associated with whites are steeped in the history of white supremacy and domination that are still felt in contemporary society today.
In class we discussed Imitation of Life and the tragic mulatto myth, where we were able to identify the dynamics between the histories of misogyny though the categorization of the black body. We see the stereotypical Mammy and Mulatto depictions of blacks, which explain how gender assumptions and race relations have their roots in the racial formation theory discussed by Omi and Winant (shifting perspectives of race are assimilated into dominant systems over time). However, because of the good/evil categorization of the Mammy and Mulatto figures embodies in this case by Annie Johnson and Sarah Jane her daughter, we see that Annie is perceived as “good” because she accepts her ‘place’ in society and lives within the rules of her time. Sarah Jane on the other hand, is aware of her predicament. She lives between worlds based on her skin tone, and sees that the privileges afforded to whites is just within grasp if she can change her race through ‘passing’ as another. Sarah Jane in the end is the person the audience pities because of her self-destructive nature. The film, while critical is some ways (two single women raising children alone), still pushes the agenda in Hollywood and of the filmmaker, who evidently believed that race mixing was taboo and lead only to one’s demise. Bi-ethnicity is “beautiful but threatening, inherently problematic and leads to insanity.” In essence, Sarah Jane only exists “to give the white protagonist an emotional life lesson, and thus the film never lets her escape from the “Tragic Mulatto” stereotype” (Matters of Race on PBS – see link below).
ReplyDeleteAs another example, Kara Walker presents us with a revisionist history of the dominant white narrative of slavery through her art form. Walker gives the racial identification process depicted in her images agency to choose how the social relationships depicted are told. The black woman as ‘other’ or ‘sexual’ is depicted throughout which draws our attention to the history of misogyny on plantations, and helps to re-create another mulatto myth in the minds of the white majority that is not tragic. In general both theories are very pertinent in current discussion surrounding race and racism. Both are very academic in nature, but are applicable in every day life.
Sources:
www.pbs.org/mattersofrace/essays/essay4_mulattoes.html
www.mixedracestudies.org
Michael Omi and Howard Winant. Resistance is Futile?: A response to Feagin and Elias. Ethnic and Racial Studies.Volume 36, Issue 6, 2013. Special Issue: Symposium - Rethinking Racial Formation Theor