Sunday, March 25, 2012

Black Women in films........





The Image of Black Women in Film
           As we examine and explore the Civil Rights movement in the United States we can look at films being produced to see how America was responding to the internal societal strife as Black Americans.
          If black men were experiencing the pain of social injustice and inequality in America, black women’s challenges were even more difficult. They had the double yoke of race and gender as they experienced oppression and discrimination.
          If we look at the image of black women in American films one can find many examples of white people’s perception. For example, in the both silent films and talkies we see negative stereotypes. Before films with sound, black characters were played by whites in “black face”. The white versions of black characters were limited to five types: the tom, the coon, the tragic mulato, the mammy, and the black buck. Black victimization was the consequence of these negative stereotypes. Movies, such as The Debt (1912) and In Slavery Days reinforced the mulato characters to “an evil and degrading creature”.
          In the film, Birth of a Nation in 1915 the American cultural attitude epitomized the negative black image; and, it exploited the worst fears in the minds of whites. It took the advent of black independent films for black woman to have a more flattering portrayal in America’s movie house. Women like Ethel Moses and Bea Freeman emerged as viable black actors. The first black movie star was Edina Morton.
          With the invention of sound in movies the negative image and stereotype would become even more planted in the American psyche. Why? Because the movies needed music, rhythm, and dancing; this sets up the self-limiting roles that ultimately tells viewers that, blacks are here to entertain us. That was the extent of their contributions between the years of 1927-1940.
          After the stock market crash of 1929, Blacks were portrayed in films as the obedient, loyal servant; as his master’s best friend. In a time when people were losing faith in everything the most famous “mammy” played by a black actress was Louise Beavers. She starred in films such as “She Done Him Wrong” (Mae West) and “Bombshell” (Jean Harlow). In the film “Imitation of Life (1934) she protested the use of the word “nigger” and ultimately got it removed from the script. 
          Other Black women were influential as well, like Nattie McDaniel, who was nominated “Best Supporting Actress” for her role as mammy in “Gone with the Wind”.
          In the forties, with the depression over, blacks “exchanged their mops and buckets for zoot suits and sequined gowns” (138).
Two well known black actresses emerged, Hazel Scott and Lena Horne. Walter White, who was the head of the N.A.A.C.P at the time, felt that Lena Horn would alter the depiction of black women in American movies. She resisted roles that depicted her as a maid or a prostitute. Ultimately she was blacklisted during the McCarthy witch hunts for communist sympathizers, and her association in the council of African Affairs, and also her friendship with Paul Robeson.
          Dorothy Dandridge was one of the leading, black, women movie stars during the trendy 1950’s and 1960’s. She was the first black movie star to be nominated for an Oscar for best actress.
Later, Diana Sands introduced a new image for black woman in films. She was a “contemporary, un-typed, intelligent black women…neither mammy nor mulato.” (143)  in 1972 she starred in Georgia, Georgia, which was the first film with a screenplay written by black women. It was Maya Angelou
          It wasn’t until 1967, in Otto Preminger’s, “Hurry Sundown” that we see the “first major, big budget, start studded motion picture to center on the militant spirit of the mid-sixties and the Black Revolt”.
Diane Carroll was the actress who depicted the “post-integrated women” and “the middle class negro lady”. She was an educated Northern black woman who reflected in her speech, class, mannerisms, look and lifestyle that of white middle class America.  Movies like Paris Blues and Sundown would be good examples.
Cicely Tyson is the first genuine movie star since Dandridge to transcend all prior black stereotypes. In the movie “Sounder”, she won a best actress Oscar nomination from the National Society of Film Critics.
As the Civil Rights movement continued throughout America, the role of black actors and actresses reflected the struggles and challenges that  Blacks  experienced in a racist society and the courage it tool to seek “equal protection under the law”
                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                                     

Sunday, March 11, 2012

Dad's making a difference....

Fathers becoming a driving force in PTA

Sunday, March 4, 2012
New York --
At Public School 11 in Manhattan in New York City, the senior president of the Parent Teacher Association is a vivacious chatterbox who ascended the school's executive board the way many do: forging bonds with parents and teachers, doing an impressive stint as treasurer and finally being drafted for the top slot by a growing fan base.
The one thing this executive officer did not do is man the cupcake table.
"I'm not into the baking," said Juan Brea, an admission that once would have been unheard-of in the PTA.
Brea, who favors football, blue blazers, Polo cologne and chopping wood in his Catskills backyard on weekends, is part of the changing face of the PTA. What was once an easygoing volunteer group made up mostly of stay-at-home moms has begun to give way to male leadership.
"This is like running a small business," said Brea, 43, whose day job is chief operating officer at a small nonprofit. "I'm an operations guy. I believe I add value."
A 2009 study by the National Congress of Parents and Teachers and the National Center for Fathering, a nonprofit educational organization, found that 590 of 1,000 fathers surveyed nationwide said they attended school parent meetings. That is up from 470 out of 1,000 a decade earlier.
And in many of the top-rated public schools across New York City, where parent groups have become ever-more-efficient fundraising machines in the face of mounting budget cuts, fathers with financial expertise and a zest for leadership are not just going to those meetings, but running them.
The shift reflects a number of underlying social trends: more women with demanding jobs, more men underemployed in a lingering recession, more shared parenting responsibilities overall and the professionalization of the PTA.
In School District 2, which winds through some of Manhattan's priciest neighborhoods, at least 10 of the approximately 40 elementary and middle schools now have male parent-group leaders, up from just a couple 15 years ago.
On Staten Island, the male firefighters, police and emergency-medical technicians who used to shy away from PTA meetings now call many of them to order. And in brownstone Brooklyn's District 15, PTA boards have been inundated with male leadership, in what officials say is a 15 percent jump from five years ago.
For the most part, female PTA leaders applaud the injection of testosterone. But "both women and men would be lying if they were to say gender dynamics were not an issue," said Michelle Ciulla-Lipkin, a president of the PTA at P.S. 199 on the Upper West Side of Manhattan.
http://sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/c/a/2012/03/04/MNA11N9B7O.DTL

Thursday, March 1, 2012

Occupy Wall Street, San Francisco Oct. 15th - 10,000 People March!

Al Jazeera surveys 'occupy protests' in Asia

"Occupy Wall Street" lands in Europe

California students voicing thier frustration




California college students protest education cuts

Several hundred students were joined by Occupy Oakland demonstrators at UC Berkleyƕs Sproul Plaza for a National Day of Action Thursday March 1, 2012. Students were protesting higher fees as well as taxes.
(03-01) 22:41 PST San Francisco (AP) --
Students, educators and Occupy Wall Street activists held demonstrations Thursday across California to protest state budget cuts to education, partially shutting down at least one college campus.
Hundreds of students blocked entrances to the University of California, Santa Cruz, and prevented cars and buses from entering the coastal campus, school officials said.
"The campus has been effectively closed to vehicles," said campus spokesman Jim Burns. "Clearly it's had an access impact for many students, staff and faculty."
School administrators had warned the campus about the protest. Many classes were canceled or rescheduled, and administrative offices were not fully staffed, Burns said.
The Santa Cruz blockade was among the demonstrations held on about 30 college campuses across California to protest rising tuition and call on lawmakers to restore funding to higher education. Rallies, marches, teach-ins and walkouts were scheduled to coincide with state budget negotiations, organizers said.
In San Francisco, about 200 demonstrators holding signs that read "Tax the Rich" and "Refund Education" held a teach-in in the lobby of the California State Building before attending an afternoon rally outside City Hall. College students and Occupy activists around the country held demonstrations as part of a "National Day of Action for Education."
About 15 of the demonstrators were taken into custody when they refused an order to disperse around 6:30 p.m., said California Highway Patrol Sgt. Diana McDermott. The 15 were cited on suspicion of trespassing and released.
At California State University, Los Angeles, about 300 students marched through campus blowing whistles and chanting, "No cuts, no fees, education should be free," according to the Los Angeles Times. At a rally in front of the campus bookstore, the group held signs that read "Stop Privatization" and "Defend Public Education."
The California protests are a prelude to a major "Occupy the Capitol" rally in Sacramento on Monday. Students and faculty members planned a "99 Mile March for Education and Social Justice" from Oakland to the state capital over the next few days.
The protesters are calling on Gov. Jerry Brown to reject any budget deal that includes higher education cuts or tuition increases. They also want the governor to support a ballot measure that would raise taxes on millionaires to pay for education and social services.
"We've destroyed our tax base and we stopped funding the most important parts of our society," said Josh Brahinsky, a UC Santa Cruz graduate student and union representative who helped organize the action. "We're calling on the state to tax the wealthy and use that money to build services for all of us."
The campus demonstrations were coordinated by ReFund California, a coalition of student groups and labor unions that organized a series of sometimes rowdy campus protests during the fall.

Read more: http://www.sfgate.com/cgi-bin/article.cgi?f=/n/a/2012/03/01/state/n112721S11.DTL#ixzz1nwTzABE1