Over the summer, I worked as a Resource Development intern at the Center for Civil and Human Rights. My fellow interns and I were very close with our supervisor, so one day she asked us for advice on what she should screen for her girls weekend. "I'm looking for something like 'Insecure' but not 'Insecure' because we have already seen every episode... but you know, there really isn't anything else like 'Insecure'".
The core of what she is referring to in this statement is a recurring conversation around media and culture - what good is greater representation of people of color when those creating the representation are not people of color too? As addressed in a recent Brooklyn College newspaper article, much of what makes 'Insecure' unique is that Issa Rae didn't want it to be "rooted in 'the struggle' or the 'dramatic burdens of being black'", but rather "allowed to be carefree in the same way that whiteness in television is allowed to be."
The show was written by a black woman for black women, and though it is exciting that it enjoys such a diverse audience, that has not altered who it is ultimately for. There is a clear lack of equal representation in media and culture, but that has little to do with the actors and artists themselves... Hollywood's pervasive whiteness is most damaging in the writers' room, in the fields of creation that a host of people of color excel in, but frequently are not given access to in the same way that white people are.
This should be more widely seen and understood as a problem, the idea that this leaves white creators at the helm of characters with lived experiences they quite simply could never understand. All too often, white creators design characters of color through a lens of struggle and hardship they have only observed second-hand. Ironically, this results in the primary function of black characters being to ruminate on the focus of race in their lives.
As we have discussed in class and through our readings, it is not that people of color have not experienced struggle and hardship, but rather that is not their sole lived experience. Black people are not simply members, but makers of their communities, not passive in the face of challenge, and not one single identity, but a multiplicity of personalities and needs. Perhaps the greatest gift in people of color creating characters of color is that those characters retain the freedom to be imperfect and to speak and live for and beyond the implications of the color of their skin.
http://bcexcelsior.com/insecure-is-a-great-representation-of-blackness-and-heres-why/
Hannah Rose, you raise such an important point here! While it is crucial to acknowledge a history of oppression, all of the ways in which people of color have been targeted by the violence perpetrated by white people and the lasting impact of this history, it is equally as important to not simply view folks of color as victims, because that mindset is ultimately very dehumanizing. As Stephanie E. Smallwood writes, and as we've discussed in this class, we need to think about African American History and African American identity as a series of complex choices that is different for each individual. This complicates the narrative, and forces people to break away from their monolithic views of black people in the U.S.. I also think more media representation is important--especially media representation that demonstrates humanity, not just struggle against oppression. Nice blog post!
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