African Americans and Stereotypes
...o put and end to racism and stereotypes of African-Americans. (The Case 3) I feel that the research I gathered was very adequate in helping me find information on the case of Brown vs. The board of education. The articles treated it in a positive respectful manner and I found this very helpful in my quest for research because I wanted to gather articles that were easy to read through and find information on. I always feel that it is hard to find research that is informative and thorough not just some false articles written by an unknown source. I also enjoyed the topic; I felt that it was something that I could get a lot of information for and write easily. Things missing out of the article that I thought should have been in there were more facts about the case; it only dictated details, and didn't really give to many interesting facts. I felt this article was very thorough and concise. While I was reading, I wondered how stereotyping can affect our everyday lives. Is there a lot of it on television, books and movies? Since this was a question of mine, I decided to narrow it down too books and see, which was the first book to raise a controversy over African America Stereotyping. I was able to successfully find what I was looking for. One of the most famous examples in the media that relates to stereotyping is the play Uncle Tom's Cabin by Harriet Beecher Stowe. Harriet expressed a need to awaken sympathy and feeling for the African race in her novel. The main point of in the writing Uncle Tom's Cabin was to bring to light, slavery, to people in the north. In this she hoped to eventually sway people against slavery. Uncle Tom's Cabin became an abolitionist's bible. During its time it was revised, dramatized, and published often. The effect of her book on the north and everywhere in the US was unforeseen. The book was popular and caused abolitionism to run wild among northerners. The south hated the book because of its portrayal of its (The South's) peculiar institution. It might have been influential enough to be considered one of the causes of the civil war, by creating a greater number of northerners against slavery. (Smith 1) There are five main African American Stereotypes used in everyday media and in pieces of literature. First there is "The Tom"; know also as the "Good Negro". Always as "Toms" are chased, harassed, hounded, whipped, enslaved, and insulted, they keep the faith, and never turn against their white masses, and remain hearty, submissive, stoic, generous, selfless, and kind. They also endear themselves to white audiences and emerge as heroes. Second is "The Coon"; there are actually three types: "The pure Coon", "the pickaninny" and the "uncle remus". The pure coons were the most degrading of all black stereotypes. They were the no account-niggers, those unreliable, crazy, lazy, subhuman creatures good for nothing more than eating watermelons, stealing chickens, shooting crap, or butchering the English language. The "pickaninny" was generally a black child, a harmless, screwball creation whose eyes popped and whose hair stood on end with the least excitement. Probably the most well-known "pickaninnies" are Buckwheat and Stymie from the Hal Roach Our Gang series, syndicated to television through the 1980s as The Little Rascals. (Bogel 9) Finally, the "uncle remus" is another harmless, friendly stereotype, given to acquaint, naive and comic phenomena. He was immortalized in the Disney film Song of the South, which is a corruptive piece of Old South propaganda put together to make money, yet it clearly signaled the demise of the Negro as fanciful entertainer or comic servant. Third we have "The Tragic Mulatto" they are portrayed usually fair-skinned, trying pathetically to pass for white. "The Tragic Mulatto" is a sympathetic character and this it is said they are because of their white blood. Next there is "The Mammy", this is the predominant female black stereotype. "The Mammy" is usually loud, independent and overweight. (Bogle 12) Her offshoot is the aunt Jemima, who is a sweet, jolly and good-tempered. Lastly, "The Brutal Black Buck", who is another malevolent and enduring stereotype, the buck was introduced to audiences the 1915 film Birth of a Nation. The character of Gus (played by a white actor, Walter Long, in blackface) occupied the buck role in this film. "Bucks" are always "big, bad niggers", over-sexed and savage, violent and frenzied as they lust for white flesh. The buck stereotype played on the white audiences fear of black-white miscegenation, as the threatening black man was set in contrast to the idealized white woman. "The buck" is bestial, uncontrollable in his sexual appetite. The buck type was to reoccur as a subtext of the discourse surrounding the rock and roll craze of the 1950s. (Stereotypes 2) My theoretical position on the topic of Stereotyping of African Americas, is that ...