A RISE IN RACIAL REPRESENTATION

A RISE IN RACIAL REPRESENTATION

A RISE IN RACIAL REPRESENTATION

IN THIS SPREAD WE WILL DIVE INTO THE RECENT MOVE ON REPRESENTATION MENTIONING RACE BENDING AND REPRESENTATION IN MOVIES AND SHOWSBY MICHELLE ROSAS & ELIJAH MAYO

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The feeling of being welcomed, wanted or valued is pivotal to human development. Seeing people “like you” accomplish great things or become very successful, inspires and motivates people, it gives them hope. This is why we need representation in the media.

Sharing the flaws and improvements in representation within media

by Michelle Rosas, Carmesi/Video Director

“Underrepresentation, as a result, has the potential to establish harmful views and negative perceptions. For children who are developing their thoughts and behaviors, and for teenagers who are searching for identity and their place in society, media takes the role of a significant influence.” The stereotype and op- pression minority groups have faced are critical to their identity and self esteem. Representation, well done representation, can break those stereotypes that were created in the past.

Tokenism is when authorities or media put a person from an underrepresented group to show that they can be diverse with their casting. Having a token character won’t neces- sarily fix the problem of underrepresentation,it just makes it look like these companies want the public to know they are okay with minorities. Diving into the culture and showing the issues that are faced are ways that representation can be met.

A problem when it comes to accurately portraying represen- tation is that often the producers or people behind the camera aren’t familiar or are not a part of the culture they are “representing”. The show “Never Have I Ever” is a show about an Indian girl in highschool. The show follows her through her experience with her relation- ships, applying for college, being a teenager, and her culture and the importance of it in her life. The show was directed by an an Indian woman herself, Kabir Akhtar.

Senior Gandhi Anastcaio believes representation in media is important for people to see when it is done right. “People think putting a person of color on the screen is representation when it’s not”. The goal for representation in the media is to uplift marginalized groups, but that can’t be done by just adding a person of color.

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GETTING IT RIGHT: MEDIA IS MAKING PROGRESS

GETTING IT RIGHT: MEDIA IS MAKING PROGRESS

BACK TO CRIMSON

GETTING IT RIGHT: MEDIA IS MAKING PROGRESS

MEDIA BENDS RACE INTO CURRENT CASTING

An analysis of racebending in recent movies and shows, and how it affected the industry

by Elijah Mayo, photography director

With new iterations of movies popping out from every corner of movie companies, characters have begun to change as well. However, not in personality or archetype, but in ethnicity. Such as Ariel in the live action Little Mermaid played by Halle Bailey. In the original movie that came out on November 13th, 1989, the character was depicted as a white mermaid with roaring crimson hair. However, in the live action

Racebending has not only become prominent in Disney’s productions, and nor is it a new phenomenon. Characters like Nick Fury from Marvel, or Velma from Scooby Doo both had their races altered.. Despite Samuel L Jackson immortalizing the character for not only all Marvel fans, but for most people, his character in the comics was originally a white man. Debuting May 1st, 1963 in the comic Sgt. Fury and His Howling Commandos, he was changed 39 years later in 2002 in the Ultimate Comics series into an African American man.

remake that was released on May 26th, 2023, Ariel’s character had been casted by a woman who is African American, 19 year old Halle Bailey. This change resulted in a backlash of over 1 million dislikes of the trailer, with critics arguing that she shouldn’t be casted as the character if she was a different race in the first place.

In the original book itself, she was a white woman. “They were six lovely girls, but the youngest was the most beautiful of them all. Her skin was as soft and tender as a rose petal, and her eyes were as blue as the deep sea, but like all the others she had no feet. Her body ended in a fish tail.”

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MEDIA BENDS RACE INTO CURRENT CASTING

MEDIA BENDS RACE INTO CURRENT CASTING

ORIGINAL VS. RACEBEND

ORIGINAL VS. RACEBENDED

ORIGINAL VS. RACEBENDED

ORIGINAL VS. RACEBENDED

ORIGINAL VS. RACEBENDED

ORIGINAL VS. RACEBENDED

cut despite its cultural importance. However, this movie embraces it and shows how beautiful it could be.

Though the representation in media has increased and there have been great pieces that have come out, there are still improvements that could be made.

She shares how she has seen representation grow. “I remember seeing the “Cosby Show (1984)” , it was the first positive representation of a black family at the time,” she said. She also shares that a lot of people would see themselves in “the ghetto” or in tough situations. She mentions the “The Jeffersons (1975)”, the show shows African Americnas having high paying jobs and living in a high class neighborhood. “It showed successful black men and women with a family and that would show a certain group of people that there was a way out of that ghetto or that neighborhood”.McPherons also believes that representation is growing in nation-wide media but also locally. “I love the fact thateven our local KSBY is starting to branch out to more diverse groups of people. Reporting the news back to us to represent our community.”

The Netflix movie “Queen Charlotte” is recommended by U.S history and Ethnic studies teacher, Deborah McPherson. She believes the black representation in this movie is done very well. It demonstrates black women in positions of power and elegance. The show also

Akhtar. The show gets praised for doing a very good job with how important the traditions in Indian culture are for her family but also how difficult it is being a teenage girl discovering herself in highschool. Senior Lilian Shroyer says that, “I think a big problem with representation is that it’s not being done by people who have knowledge or have personal experience with these topics”.

highlights the beauty of African hair. Throughout history, ethnic hair was seen as “ugly” or told to get

Gandhi Anastacio Olivo (12)

Lilian Shroyer (12)

Deborah McPherson (US history and Ethnic studies teacher)

Maitreyi Ramakrishna She is Tamil Canadian and she played Devi Vishuakumar, the lead role in the Netflix show "Never Have I Ever".

Jenna Ortega She is an American actress from mexican and puerto rican herritage. She played Harley Diaz, the lead role in the Disney show "Stuck in the Middle".

India Amarteifio She is an English actress of Ghanaian ancestry. She played Queen Charlotte, the lead role in the Netflix movie "Queen Charlotte"

Many people think it is a part of the “woke agenda,” believing it’s only there to create a forced form of diversity.

Others believe it to be a mixed form of representation

“I think that racebending helps representation, but sometimes not in the right way. I think there have been times in the media that racebending has been done well, currently though I feel like media companies are using race bending as a way to make more money. The representation is there, but only to profit off of it.” Daniel Rodriguez said.

However, in my opinion, I find racebending to be an extremely important change. The change of the ethnicity among characters is able to bring to light representation for people of various races, for all sorts of different characters. More often than not however, the change does not mean anything in the story. But I believe it’s better for this to occur (at least in children's movies). It gives a soft representation towards various audiences. do not believe that this form of representation is enough. Racebending serves as a replacement for already existing characters' ethnicity, but I believe that we should have a combined representation of race bending and creating more characters that are people of color. This needs to be done by Hollywood itself and creating committees that are capable of giving the spotlight to more minority actors.

While Velma, a character that was white during the character’s fame and debut and only changed recently, was changed into an Indian woman. Being made on September 13th, 1969, her character was altered in the remake on January 12th in 2023. So what’s the reason for these changes?

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