POSSIBLE VOCABULARY WORDS

You will be asked to define some of the following words…

The Old South

A farming area in the South American region different from other regions due to the enforcement of southern laws

Reconstruction

• A period in history, from 1863–1877 that involved the freeing of slaves and the vision of President Lincoln to enfranchise all freed men.

Antebellum

• A term used to refer to the period right before the civil war of 1861 in the Southern United States.

Miscegenation

• It refers to the mixing of people of different ethnicities and racial groups through sexual activity, cohabitation or lawful marriage.

The NAACP

• A civil rights organization, created in 1909 by W.E.B Du Bois, Ida Bell, Mary White and others for the sole aim of the advancement of all colored people. It is the most significant organization in the politics of African Americans.

 

The Hays Code

The hays code was a set of moral rules and guiding principles that spelled what could and could not be done during the filming of movies and other motion pictures that targeted a public audience in the US. The code was popular during the years 1922 to 1945.

Segregation

• It refers to the separation of public amenities and opportunities based on race, class or ethnic backgrounds.

Blaxploitation

• A genre in film that involved the characterization of blacks as heroes rather than sidelined supporting characters or the victims of rough treatment.

The Tom

The Coon

• A parody of dark-toned comic films where a vigilante youngster dresses as a raccoon for the aim of hiding his identity to his archrival.

The Tragic Mulatto

• An outdated description dating back through the 19^th century, of an individual of mixed race with black and white parents. More often than not this persons lack the sense of belonging and tend to have suicidal ideations.

The Mammy

• A term used to describe a woman of black heritage who took care of the children of white people.

The Buck

• A misrepresentation used to describe black men who were heavily masculine and refused to bend to the authority and will of the whites. The men were said to be violent and the situation the achievement of calmness came only by the murder of the individual. The term was common after the reconstruction epoch.

The Ku Klux Klan

• A white supremacist group that existed from 1866 and employed terror with an aim to restore white supremacy by unleashing violence on black schools that symbolized autonomy, and, freed slaves.

DW Griffith

• Griffith is an American writer and director famous for the film, The Birth of a Nation.

Melvin Van Peebles

• Melvin is an American actor, writer and filmmaker most famous for the film, Sweet Sweetback’s Baadasssss Song.

Spike Lee

• Lee is an American actor, writer, and producer popular for his contributions in Do The Right Thing and Malcom X.

Ernest Dickerson

• Ernest is and American cinematographer and director mostly known for his teamwork with Spike Lee and his role in directing the films Demon Knight, Juice and others.

The Paper-Bag Test

• A practice of racial discrimination that involved holding a brown paper bag against the skin of an individual before admittance to any facility. A person only gained access to the building if he or she was lighter than the bag.

The Noble Savage

• It refers to a character notably an outsider who has not been subject to the corruptions of civilization and portrays humankind’s intrinsic nature of goodness.

Manifest Destiny 

• An idea deeply seated in American culture where all its advocates believed that the United States would lead the whole of North America to an age of democracy and capitalism.

Anachronism

• The concept holding that someone, something or an idea belongs to different period in history other than the present.

Half-breed

• A term used to refer offensively to persons of mixed race, typically those who have their parents as a combination of a white individual and a Native American, mostly Indian.

Buffalo Bill

• Buffalo Bill is a fictional characterization in the film silence of the lambs where the main character killed women and skinned them to make a woman’s costume for himself.

AAIA

The Association of American Indian Affairs has a vision to create a world that upholds, values and respects cultures of the diverse Native Americans.

POSSIBLE ESSAY QUESTIONS

You will be asked to write short answers to some of the following questions…

List the five primary examples of stereotypes that have always been present in American black movies.  Identify each trait in a separate movie example.

• Magical Negro – John Coffey plays such a role in The Green Mile.
• The African American best friend – Lily in The Devil Wears Prada
• The Thug – Snoop inTthe Wire
• The House help –Aibileen and Minny in The Help
• The Brash woman –Most of the females in reality Tv shows like Basketball Wives

Identify 3 examples of race or class stereotypes from any media you personally have consumed outside of class.

• Blacks are mostly subject to disrespect and brutality
• Black women are least probable to appear as professional career women in most films.
• Most professional athletes in basketball and football are African American.

Compare and contrast the target audiences of Tabu and Ganja & Hess.

• Ganja and Hess targeted an audience thirsty for a horror movie that centered on blacks and one which highlighted the struggle of dead or dying civilizations. Similarly, Tabu also highlights a disappearing way of life and a struggle to keep up with reality.

Compare and contrast the target audiences of Nanook of the North and Without Fire* (*this screens in class on 2/19/19)

• Without Fire targeted an audience that related to the plight of Native Americans and how poverty was the main source of their problems. They lacked access to proper health care options, power and water. Nanook of the North on the other hand, wanted to reach out to the whites and show them how they ruined Eskimo culture. Both Films are appeal to the civilization of the white man to uplift them and not destroy their cultures.

From any films covered this semester, give two examples of class discrimination.

• In Ganja and Hess, Dr. Green is rich and able to hire chauffeurs and live a good life. Unfortunately to do all this, he exploits all those below him even though they are of the same neighborhood.

From any films covered this semester, give two examples race discrimination.

• In Black-ish, Anthony has high hopes of being company vice president only find out that he is to be second in command in the Urban Division. His disappointment suggests that there might be other factors other than his skill set that contributed to the decision to deny him his much desired position. His first guess is his skin color.

What was the driving factor of massive industry support for the wave of 1970’s blaxploitation films like Shaft, Ganja & Hess, and Super Fly?

• There was a high demand for films that gave people of African heritage a new perspective of themselves other than roles that primarily supported white main characters. The need for a new subgenre that brought our fully developed African American characters depicted as heroes that saved the day.

From the Bataille and Silet reading, how does the phrase “entertaining anachronism” apply to representations of Native Americans in cinema?

• The media among many other things contributes in the stereotypes sold to the publc. More often than not, Native Americans appear in TV as people of the past, uncivilized with a culture that does not belong to modern times.

In the “Black Like Us” episode of Black’ish, Anthony Anderson uses the term “CPT”, which stands for “color people time,” and which is often considered an offensive term.  Is Anderson’s use of this term in the context of the show an example of cooning, or satire, or both, or neither?  Why or why not?

• He is being purely satirical in using his funny attitude to address how important color is in the world and how they as a family continue to suffer discrimination based on their color. He does not mean to entertain, only to point out the issue colorism

Does Bill Cosby’s recent incarceration effect the documentary Color Adjustment?  How and why or why not?

• It does affect the impact of the documentary as all through the years of television the number of African American incarcerations continues to rise steadily.

Is Two Knight of Vaudevilles a progressive or regressive movie for 1915?

• It is a progressive movie as it opened up the way for individuals like Charlie Chaplib in the field of silent comedy.

Reference three examples of “colorism” in the works we have studied (…other than in the TV show, Black’ish).

 

Compare the images of immigration in The Immigrant (1917) and the Ellis Island sequence of The Godfather, Part II (1974).

 

What images in Ethnic Notions did you find most shocking and why?  What (if anything) should be done with historical but offensive images?

The image of the jovial African American man with white lips was the most shocking.

What is the complex legacy of the novel, Uncle Tom’s Cabin?

• The novel left a good legacy behind as it got people to read on the inhumanity of slavery and the injustices that come along with it. The anger stirred by the novel fuelled the civil war

Compare the depiction of slavery in Gone with the Wind vs Mandingo.  Which if, either, feels more accurate?  Why?

• Mandigo is more accurate because the slave fights for his life in the pits and earns money for his master. The master is ruthless and subjects him to humiliation and brutality.

Evaluate the Muddy Waters song that opens Mandingo, how does it frame the narrative?  Is it effective?  Why or why not?

• The song is effective as it does a great job in speaking about how one born at the at particular period can never be free.

In what specific ways does Without Fire (2013) approach its depiction of race and gender in comparison to Tabu (1931)?

• Both women depict women in an ever ending struggle to fend for themselves amidst many external forces that tie them down.

Contrast the depiction of native people in TabuvsNanook of the North?  Which depiction feels more honest and why?

• Nanook feels more honest as it shows a time when the Eskimos lived without civilization brought about by the Europeans.

What are the relationships between race and gender illustrated in Mo’ Better Blues?

• The film brings out a stereotype that women only exist for the sake of men and cannot exist on their own.Bleek views women’s needs only as second to the interests and desires of men.

How Ganja and Hess is like a traditional vampire movie?  How is it not like a traditional vampire movie?

• Like all conventional movies, Green becomes immortal and has an insatiable thirst for blood. However, unlike most vampire movies, they try to use religion to fend off their vampire-like nature.

How does Ganja and Hess compare to Def by Temptation?

• In both films, both main characters seek divine intervention in an attempt to chase away the demons of vampirism.
• They are both horror movies with underlying features of religion.

Compare and contrast the roles of religion in Ganja and Hess and Def by Temptation.  Reach a conclusion about religion and ethnic communities with regard to these two movies.

• The three stab wounds on Greens body suggests a representation of the holy trinity. The ancient dagger together with the trinity bring out characteristics of Christianity. Hess also finally allows himself to die at in the arms of Christian church, by dying at the shadow of the cross. On the other hand, in Def by temptation, the film portrays sin as something that is easily avoidable.

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