race/ethnicity: Blacks/Africans

Below are two photos — one of Barack Obama as an adult and one of a young Obama and his Grandfather, Stanley Dunham (found here and here).  I tried a little experiment in class. I put up the photo of adult Obama and I had my students make a list of what characteristics made him identifiably Black, in their view. Every one of them put on their list his nose, lips, and hair, and several made comments about his ears or just that “the combination of all his facial features” was “clearly” Black.

Then I brought up the photo of young Obama and his grandfather alongside it:

It led to a really interesting discussion. Because my students think of Obama as Black, they saw all his features through that racial lens. It was obvious to them that he had “Black” facial features. After viewing the photos next to one another, they talked about how the two men look very similar, but their facial features seem “clearly” Black on one person and “clearly” White on the other because we’re used to believing that Blacks and Whites look very different. Because they believe in racial differences, they see them. This activity seemed to really help students grasp what I meant when I talked about the way we identify things as racial differences when they’re really variations that occur in many different groups that we swear are physically distinct from one another.

It’s interesting because I’d halfway expected my students to argue that Obama doesn’t “really” look Black at all — that they would say his skin color and hair, perhaps, were identifiable as African American, but that they would point out that he’s half-White and argue that in fact he doesn’t have stereotypically Black or White features. I mean, that would made sense, right? But I’ve tried this with three classes now, as well as several random individuals I’ve subjected to it to see if it might work as a class activity, and no one has yet failed to identify a number of the facial features Obama and Dunham share as specifically African-American features when they see them on Obama.

What a great example of racialization and the social construction of race.

See also our Pinterest pages: what color is flesh? and the social construction of race.

Gwen Sharp is an associate professor of sociology at Nevada State College. You can follow her on Twitter at @gwensharpnv.

Highjive at MulticultClassics writes: “The foreigner is stealing trade secrets. The White man is addicted to porn. And the woman is a shopaholic. Maybe the advertiser’s name should be changed to Stereotypes 360.”

NEW!  Jasmine sent us more banal stereotypes!  These are for eye care (found here).

Because old people NEVER have sex:

And all black people love the blues:

Yesterday Colin Powell endorsed Barack Obama for President.  In the cartoon below, syndicated cartoonist Gordon Campbell compares Powell to Benedicte Arnold, a general in the American Revolutionary War who defected to the British Empire.  So, Powell’s endorsement makes him a traitor.   Comments after the image.

As Rob Tornoe discusses at Politicker, this feeds into the idea that Obama isn’t a real American and, accordingly, neither is Powell.  That this is about skin color is revealed by the fact that he put Arnold in blackface. and uses the term “Race Patriot.”  The implication is, Powell is endorsing Obama because he’s black and that’s treason (i.e, anti-white and therefore anti-American).

It also speaks to white privilege and a phenomenon I’ve seen elsewhere during this election.  It is white privilege to be able to vote for Obama without your endorsement being attributed to the color of your skin.

(Found via Jezebel.)

I just saw a story about this image on “Countdown with Keith Olbermann” (image found here):

It is a “joke” included in the “October newsletter by the Chaffey Community Republican Women, Federated” (I read more about it here; the group is from San Bernardino, CA), in which they claim that if Obama wins, his face will be on food stamps, not dollar bills. From a story in The Press-Enterprise:

Fedele [the group’s president] said she got the illustration in a number of chain e-mails and decided to reprint it for her members in the Trumpeter newsletter because she was offended that Obama would draw attention to his own race. She declined to say who sent her the e-mails with the illustration. She said she doesn’t think in racist terms, pointing out she once supported Republican Alan Keyes, an African-American who previously ran for president. “I didn’t see it the way that it’s being taken. I never connected,” she said. “It was just food to me. It didn’t mean anything else.”

Uh huh. Right. Who could possibly have known that African Americans were historically portrayed in racist carictures eating fried chicken, ribs, and/or watermelon, or that there’s a long-standing political tradition of trying to connect Blacks and welfare in the public mind?

Honestly, it’s been awhile since an image of Obama actually made me gasp, but that one did.

UPDATE: Larry, from the L.A. Times‘ Daily Mirror blog, sent in a link to this post at the blog Please God No, in which the author claims to be the creator of the Obama bucks cartoon and says,

It was a satirical look at some of the Fox News watching right-wingers out there that are afraid of a government that sponsors welfare type programs. It was intended to poke fun at the unrealistic fears and agenda of racism that a fringe element of Republicans strongly embrace.

The author continues,

This “cartoon” (as described in the media), was meant to empower African Americans to stand up for and defend themselves against racial intolerance. This “cartoon” was prescribed to showcase the racial hatred and intolerance towards the “left” and it’s liberal “welfare” economic plan. Guess what? The radical right picked up this fumble and ran with it right into the opponents goal line. The fact that a website like this exists is not evidence of racial hatred or divide, but the fact that an image taken from this website was used in a legitimate publication to promote the Conservative agenda must be proof of either existing racism or utter stupidity.

I thought the author’s response might be interesting for a discussion of political parody and humor and the limits of satire. What makes political humor effective and what makes it, as in this case, actually appeal to the group the humorist claimed to be mocking? If people miss the satire, is that because they’re dumb or because the satire isn’t that good? If someone says they’re being satirical, does that automatically shield them from any accusations of sexism, racism, etc.? I really find the issue of humor to be fascinating–what we find funny, what happens when some groups don’t recognize what another group claims was an attempt to be humorous, and how claims of being satirical or “just joking” can be used to avoid responsibility for the content of statements or images. This seems like a particularly good example of some of those issues.

Dara G. sent in a link to this billboard in West Plains, Missouri, featuring a caricature of Obama in a turban meant to imply he’s an Arab/Muslim (found here):

NEW!  Here’s another (found here):

For other examples of accusations that Obama is Arab/Muslim (and that that is bad), see here, here, here, and here. For a non-racist caricature of Obama (showing it can, indeed, be done), see this post.

Thanks, Dara!

And I just saw on Rachel Maddow’s show that this image showed up briefly on the Sacramento County Republican Party’s website (image found here):

There’s more!

This image is from a recent rally (found here):

And, if you haven’t seen it yet, here is the by-now-classic video of supporters of a McCain rally yelling that Obama is a “terrorist” bound on spreading “terror” (found here):

I presume you can figure out for yourself how these might be used in classes. Negative messages about Arabs/Muslims, attempts to use fear of the connection between Arabs and terrorism, joking about torture, racist imagery, etc. etc….You don’t need me for this one.

To be fair, McCain, in at least one instance, has been attempting to temper this fervor. But, as Gwen mentioned in a previous post, those who stir up hatred often have a difficult time controlling it. I’d love to have some social psychologists weigh in on the phenomenon.

NEW! Man in Ohio hangs Obama from a tree in his front yard and boldly claims racist motivation (found here):

Even though I can’t read the text, I thought this ad was worth putting up.  I think I get the gist of it just fine.

Via Vintage Ads.

Vintage Ads put up another example of an ad, this one from 1931, using the idea of the “savage.”  In this one, her “impossible” behavior is compared to an Electrolux refridgerator.

 NEW!  Vintage Ads offered us another on this theme.  The text reads: “make like a medicine man in Voodoo Shorts.”  Don’t miss the spear.

Last week, in my Race and Ethnicity class, I was talking about how race was used by white elites in early American history to divide and conquer the poor who, black or white, had a joint interest in undermining the class structure from which those elites benefited.  I then show them this video by Tim Wise making this same argument and suggesting that using race to divide and conquer is still ongoing.  One student said: “No offense, but Tim Wise said it better than you.”  It’s true.

Anyway, I bring up this argument–that race is used to divide and conquer the poor and working class for the benefit of economic elites–because of a recent speech made by AFL-CIO Secretary/Treasurer Richard Trumka.  In this speech, below, Trumka argues in favor of bridging racial (and gender) divides in the labor movement specifically because of the phenomena that Wise describes.  In other words, Trumka calls for a join and resist strategy.  I think the two speeches nicely illustrate two sides of one conflict coin.

Don’t miss Tim Wise.

And here’s Richard Trumka:

You might also see this post on the way in which lefty movements and companies tend to focus only on one axis of inequality at a time, such that they are all undermining each other and, thus, the entire left agenda.

Hat tip to Peter D.

Why are people of color included in advertising aimed at mostly white people?

1.   To associate the product with a racial stereotype.
2.  To give a product “color” or “flavor.”
3.  To invoke ideas of “hipness,” “modernity,” “progressive” politics and other related ideas.
4.  To trigger the idea of human variation itself.

And, 5., as these ads show, to make you think that the company cares about diversity and racial/ethnic equality (whether they do or not).

(found here)

Text: “All human beings are born free and equal in dignity and rights.”  (found here)

Next up:  How people of color are included, starting with “white-washing.”

In this election, no one wants to be “elitist.” You know, the kind of person who went to an Ivy League, speaks perfect English, and avoids processed foods like high-fructose corn syrup.

Ben O. sent us these two ads, made by the Corn Refiners association, in which two historically marginalized groups–women and blacks–get it over on historically privileged groups–men and whites respectively–by exposing their obsessive-health-food-mania. Ben writes:

…the implication is that critics of [high-fructose corn syrup] HFCS are privileged (white and/or male) people who are condescending to inform black and/or female people that HFCS is bad, although they’re not only paternalistic but ignorant. And in both ads, standing up for the supposed virtues of high-fructose corn syrup appears to be an empowering action.

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=gxH[/youtube]

[youtube]https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=lQ-ByUx552s[/youtube]

Nice observation, Ben!

Lisa Wade, PhD is an Associate Professor at Tulane University. She is the author of American Hookup, a book about college sexual culture; a textbook about gender; and a forthcoming introductory text: Terrible Magnificent Sociology. You can follow her on Twitter and Instagram.