Sorrowful Black Death is Not a Hot Ticket and Seduction and Betrayal
Toni Morrison and bell hooks share the same views on how white America envisions blacks. In bell hooks' essays " Seduction and Betrayal" and " Sorrowful Black Death is Not a Hot Ticket" she focuses in on the portrayal of African Americans on the big screen. In "Seduction and Betrayal" hooks uses Spike Lee's Crooklyn to demonstrate how invaluable the life of a black person is. In " Sorrowful Black Death Is Not a Hot Ticket" she claims the Bodyguard and The Crying Game illustrate the notion that blacks, especially black females, are inferior to whites. In Toni Morrison's introduction to Birth of a Nation'hood , she suggests these same views by looking at the O.J. Simpson case. Through the use of these movies and courtcases, hooks and Morrison suggest that blacks are viewed as worthless, violent criminals, who are subordinate to the white race.
hooks believes, " The racial politics of Hollywood is such that there can be no serious representation of death and dying when the characters are African-Americans" (99). By stating this, she implies that black life in movies is thought of as useless. She finds that the majority of black death in movies is done through violence. An example of such a film is Paris Trout in which a young girl is brutally murdered and her relatives "too cowardly to save or avenge her life, ...willingly show the lawyer who will defend her killer the blood stains left by her dragging body, the bullet holes in the walls. Her life is worth nothing"( hooks, 100). Not even the girl's own family could find worth in her life. Her relatives cared so little that they were willing to accept money to show her kil...
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...al of black life are the views shared by the majority of Americans. Their views on this portrayal of blacks in America can be summed up in a quote taken from Melville's Benito Cereno, "We will see what the American...wanted to see: the head of the Negro 'fixed on a pole in the Plaza" (27).
Works Cited
hooks, bell. "Seduction and Betrayal." Writing as Re-Vision: A Student's Anthology. Ed. Beth Alvarado and Barbara Cully. Needham Heights: Simon & Schuster Custom Publishing, 1998. 108-111.
hooks, bell. "Sorrowful Black Death Is Not a Hot Ticket." Writing as Re-Vision: A Student's Anthology. Ed. Beth Alvarado and Barbara Cully. Needham Heights: Simon & Schuster Custom Publishing, 1998. 99-107.
Morrison, Toni. Introduction. Birth of a Nation'hood. Ed. Toni Morrison and Claudia Brodsky Lacour. New York: Pantheon Books, 1997. 7-28.
“Notes of a Native Son.” 1955. James Baldwin: Collected Essays. Ed. Toni Morrison. New York: Library of America, 1998. 63-84.
Baldwin, James. “Notes of a Native Son.” 1955. James Baldwin: Collected Essays. Ed. Toni Morrison. New York: Library of America, 1998. 63-84.
Sioux as told through John G. Neihardt, an Indian boy then a warrior, and Holy Man
In conclusion, after view this film, it is clear that one can see how black youth are being viewed as killers and savages. This is not true. There have been many admirable scholars and scientists who come from the African American culture. This movie, though it depicts what goes on in South America, takes the violence committed by black youth too far. One cannot view a film and take it that this is what a race is like. The filmmakers depicted black youth in a harsher light.
Duvall, John N. The Identifying Fictions of Toni Morrison: Modernity, Authenticity and Postmodern Blackness. New York: Palgrave, 2000. Print.
Baldwin, James. “Notes of a Native Son.” 1995. James Baldwin: Collected Essays. Ed. Toni Morrison. New York: Library of America, 1998. 63-84.
Hooks, Bell. "Narratives of Struggle." Critical Fictions:The Poltics of Imagnitive Writing. N.p.: Dia Center for the Arts, 1991. 53-61. Print.
In the Central America, most notably the Yucatan Peninsula, are the Maya, a group of people whose polytheistic religion and advanced civilization once flourished (Houston, 43). The Maya reached their peak during the Classic Period from around CE 250 to the ninth century CE when the civilization fell and dispersed (Sharer, 1). Although much has been lost, the gods and goddesses and the religious practices of the Classic Maya give insight into their lives and reveal what was important to this society.
Baldwin, James. “Notes of a Native Son.” 1955. James Baldwin: Collected Essays. Ed. Toni Morrison. New York: Library of America, 1998. 63-84.
James Baldwin had a talent of being able to tell a personal story and relate it to world events. His analysis is a rare capability that one can only acquire over an extensive lifetime. James Baldwin not only has that ability, but also the ability to write as if he is conversing with the reader. One of his most famous essays, “Notes of a Native Son,” is about his father’s death. It includes the events that happened prior to and following his father’s death. Throughout this essay, he brings his audience into the time in which he wrote and explains what is going on by portraying the senses and emotions of not only himself, but as well as the people involved. This essay has a very personal feeling mixed with public views. Baldwin is able to take one small event or idea and shows its place within the “bigger picture.” Not only does he illustrate public experiences, but he will also give his own personal opinion about those events. Throughout “Notes of a Native Son” Baldwin uses the binary of life versus death to expand on the private versus public binary that he also creates. These two binaries show up several times together showing how much they relate to each other.
In her article "Representing Whiteness in the Black Imagination" bell hooks argues that the distance between the white and black races created a tense relationship between the two. This tension caused a multitude of problems that are still present today including systems of domination, stereotypes of one another, white naivety of their privilege and fear of white individuals. Similarly, Ruth Frankenberg 's article "White Women, Race Matters" discuss these issues but from the perspective of a white feminist. Many of the same points can be connected to hooks ' arguments because the main aspects with races focus on the idea that whiteness is a perspective in which we see ourselves, others and society and also that whiteness continues to remain
By writing Sisters of the Yam: Black Women and Self-Recovery Bell Hooks gave black women a chance to relate to one another on issues that we are often afraid to express. In PSC 318 we often discussed the stigma of being a “strong black woman” and the negative aspects of that stigma. In my eyes thee is nothing negative about being strong and there is surely nothing negative about being a black woman. But, as a black woman we are looked at providers, caregivers, mentors, mother figures, a shoulder to lean on and much more. Bell Hooks touches on the touchy subject in the black community and that is mental health. Often times as black people we worry about physical health and spiritual health, in the black community our answer to everything and anything going wrong in our lives is to pray about it. Yes, God can heal and help us but Bell Hooks tells us in writing Sisters of the Yam: Black Women and Self-Recovery that we need to take care of our mental health as well as pray. Black women rarely go to therapist to talk about their problems because they are so worried about helping everyone else handle their problems.
Reflecting back on the statement historian Jaime E. Rodriguez gave on the impact that independence had on the people of Latin America. “The emancipation of [Latin America] did not merely consist of separation from the mother country, as in the case of the United States. It also destroyed a vast and responsive social, political, and economic system that functioned well despite many imperfections.” I believe that the eagerness to get rid of slaves
Morrison, Toni, "Recitatif." African American Literature: A Brief Introduction and Anthology. Ed. Al Young. New York: Harper Collins, 1996. 209-25.
hooks, bell. Sorrowful Black Death is Not a Hot Ticket Ed. Beth Alvarado and Barbara Cully. Needham Heights: Simon and Schuster