There’s an article on BET.com today called “2004 Oscar Nominees are Mixed Blessing.” Though disappointing that there are no African American nominees this year, there are 4 non-white folks up for awards:
Djimon Hounsou, Best Supporting Actor, “In America”
Benicio Del Toro, Best Supporting Actor, “21 Grams”
Ken Watanabe, Best Supporting Actor, “The Last Samurai”
Keisha Castle-Hughes, Best Actress, “Whale Rider”
I hate to admit it but I’ve only seen one of the four movies so far. But “Whale Rider” was an amazing film, focusing on the Maori people of New Zealand, and the theme of tradition vs. acculturation, one that is dear to our hearts here at NAD. I had the good fortune to go to New Zealand this summer and got a fascinating glimpse of how they are dealing with the growing pains of increasing diversity. In addition to the Maori that make up about 10% of the population, there is a booming Asian-Pacific Islander population that makes up another 10% or so of the population.
Here’s a great website to check out Maori culture.
I was also in Australia, and fascinated yet pained to learn about the “Lost Generation;” not the bohemian literati Americans that lived in Paris, but the thousands of Aboriginal children that were forcibly removed from their homes in a clumsy and deadly attempt at assimilation. As I learned from many Australians, the whole subject was buried and “not talked about” for many years. In fact, the madness didn't stop until 1969. The parallels are amazing with the horrific experiences that many Native Americans were forced to undergo in the notorious Indian Schools. The whole subject greatly impacted me, so expect more blogs on this subject in the future.
In the meantime, here's a really great essay I found on the subject.
It’s sad to learn about the struggles of so many oppressed groups around the world, yet reassuring to know that many countries, like the United States, are undergoing the slow process of self-discovery and making amends.
With the Super Bowl less than a week away, I'll join the ranks of thousands of Boston fans hoping for a Patriot victory. I've just weaned myself from the lithium habit I picked up after the Red Sox series in October. (Disclaimer: I'm just kidding. Manic-depression is a serious clinical condition that does require lithium and affects Red Sox fans the world over).
I'll also join the masses of marketers to see what the best and the brightest of Madison Avenue have to offer. Last year, I sat with pen and pencil, counting the number of commercials with a multicultural theme. I was liberal in my scoring criteria: any ad counted that had a multicultural theme (like Visa's Yao Ming/Yogi Berra commercial) or a non-white cast or cast member in a predominate role (like Reebok's Terry Tate commercial or Pepsi Co.'s Sierra Mist's Fire Hydrant guy). Still, I came up with about a third.
There's an article in today's New York Times about Gillette returning to Super Bowl advertising, and in general, a return to more traditional male oriented advertising. What the article calls "casting a clear eye for the straight guy." Click here to read the article.
It will be interesting to see how the ads play out this year, from a multicultural persective. For a great sneak preview, here's a link to SuperBowl-Ads.com, but the only ad here you might call multicultural is Halle Berry in Catwoman . Maybe the best part of this website is that you can view Coke's 1979 "Mean Joe" Greene commercial. In his incredible book American Skin, Leon Wynter credits this ad with being commercial America's first real introduction to a non-white role model. He tags a whole generation with the label "Hey Kids," based on the kids who grew up with or after this commercial, for whom a multicultural America is all they've ever known.
I'll see you at kick-off time.
The prestigious research house the Pew Hispanic Center released the results of a survey on Latino attitudes toward the war in Iraq, the economy and 2004 presidential election. It's a fascinating study, conducted in December, 2003 and January, 2004, enabling for a comparison of attitudes both before and after Sadaam's capture.
Some highlights of the study:
- There was a strong positive shift after Sadaam's capture in how Hispanics rate President Bush's handling of the war. For example, in December 32% approved of the way the president is "handling the situation in Iraq". This number increased to 47% in January.
- Over two-thirds feel that it is more important that the President focus on the economy rather than on the war on terrorism
- About half feel the Bush administration mislead the American pubic about the seriousness of the threat in Iraq
- 37% interviewed in January would prefer to see George Bush win the 2004 presidential election over a democratic candidate up ten points from December. There was a drop from 56% to 47% in the number saying they would a democratic candidate.
Another must read from the Pew Hispanic Center downloadable on the same page is their 2002 National Survey of Latinos. It's the definitive source on how Hispanics feel on a host of issues like language, identity and values.
In his State of the Union Address last night, George Bush hinted of a constitutional amendment to prevent gay marriage, though he didn't go all the way and ask for one as some had feared. Rather, he cushioned his speech with rhetoric about the sanctity of the family and the evils of liberal judges.
To quote the President:
"On an issue of such great consequence, the people's voice must be heard. If judges insist on forcing their arbitrary will upon the people, the only alternative left to the people would be the constitutional process."
Reactions were mixed, according to the Los Angeles Times.
Conservative groups, which form a key part of the president's political base, were pleased with the high-profile attention he gave the issue, but some said it was time for Bush to directly call on Congress to pass a constitutional amendment. Instead, they heard murky, carefully parsed language. Gay rights activists expressed relief that the president did not expressly propose a constitutional amendment, which they said would be unprecedented and wrong. "In more than 200 hundred years of American history, the Constitution has never [been] amended to deny basic rights and responsibilities," said Cheryl Jacques, president of Human Rights Campaign, a Washington advocacy group. "Such a move," she said, "would deny gay couples such fundamental rights as the ability to visit a partner in the hospital or the protection of Social Security survivor benefits."
We'll have to wait and see how this one unfolds. Here's the whole article.
For those of you following the spat between the Source magazine and Eminem
there's a good article in the LA Times today by Randy Lewis. For those of you who haven't, it's a good introduction to the race politics of hip hop. To quote:
It was a press conference called by a high-profile congresswoman, the founder of a magazine once considered "the Bible of hip-hop" and a respected Los Angeles community activist. The goal: to tackle issues of racism in the music industry and to announce a plan "to reclaim ownership of hip-hop for the African American community.But there was also an elephant in the room, one that all on hand did their best to ignore: the ongoing feud between the Source and the world's most popular rapper, Eminem, who is white.
The attacks escalate in the Source's February issue, which hit stands last week - with Eminem on the cover. Several articles again paint him as a racist and a culture thief, a white kid who has profited enormously, and unfairly, from an art form created by blacks.
The magazine's new issue also charges Eminem, who has been widely embraced not only by Anglos but by black, Latino and Asian fans and other hip-hop artists, with using phrases derogatory to all African Americans.
There are issues worth debating about Eminem's rise - the rise of a white figure to the top of the hip-hop game - and how it reflects racial attitudes in America," says Craig Marks, editor in chief of Blender magazine, which covers rock, pop and hip-hop. "Unfortunately, the Source may not be the best-qualified magazine to lay those out."
"Adult education is a wonderful thing. You meet a lot of interesting professors" -- Woody Allen in Annie Hall
I don't think anyone would argue that the unprecedented immigration of the
last two decades has changed the face of America. But changes are not
always what we're expecting. Check out this Washington Post article about a new kind of high school student -- adult immigrants. A sample:
The growth of Washington's immigrant communities has prompted public schools to focus attention on young men and women such as Gonzalez, who are several years older than their classmates in algebra. Many fled nations in Africa, Latin America and Asia, where war or poverty forced them out of school, and they arrived in the United States lacking the English skills or academic backgrounds to go straight to college.Some cannot produce transcripts from their homelands to prove that they earned enough credits to graduate; others have not taken the courses required for a U.S. diploma.
So they enroll in their neighborhood high school, seeking to better
themselves, even if it means feeling out of place among their younger
peers.Until recent years, educators were not openly embracing this population, because the schools didn't have the appropriate resources to deal with them," said Francisco Millet, director of Fairfax County's English for Speakers of Other Languages program. "School districts are now becoming more cognizant that these students are out there."
Millet said many districts have been slow to respond, but Fairfax has made it a priority. The county offers a transitional program for students who have gaps in their education and provides other support through its three alternative high schools. "We developed programs, and they came and appeared at our door," he said.
I wanted to put a tribute to Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. on our website, so I
asked a very dear friend of mine, Thomas Arthur Simons Jr. for
some help. Thomas is a 13 year old African American young man that I've
known and loved since he was born. He also happens to be an adorer of Dr.
King and his legacy.
Thomas sent me a piece called "Reflections," written by his godmother, E.F.
Archie. It brought more than a tear to my eye. Click here to read the
piece. I hope you enjoy it. Thanks, Tommy Jr.
As the nation celebrates the birthday of the Reverand Martin Luther King Jr., we are also reminded that May marks the 50th anniversary of Brown vs. Board of Education, the Supreme Court decision that made segregated schools illegal. Reason to celebrate, yes, but we still have a long way to go. As an article in Sunday's New York Times points out:
Millions of black students are celebrating Brown's anniversary in schools almost as segregated as when it was decided. It is now true, as the court held, that ''separate but equal facilities are inherently unequal.'' But 70 percent of black students attend schools in which racial minorities are a majority, and fully a third are in schools 90 to 100 percent minority. The fierce resistance that school desegregation has met in the political realm, and more recently in the courts, has many civil rights advocates and scholars lamenting what one legal academic calls Brown's ''hollow hope.'' But others are going back to the Brown decision, this year more than ever, looking for new ways to press for school integration. ''If you really believe in Brown, you can't celebrate it right now,'' says Gary Orfield, director of the Harvard Project on School Desegregation. ''But the potential is there.''
Read the whole piece for a good history of the civil rights movement. And to get a real feel for how far away from the goal of integration we still are. Let us not forget that it wasn't until 1999 that New Hampshire -- home of the notoriously conservative newspaper, the Union Leader (and my home state) -- finally approved a Martin Luther King Jr. Day, changing from the more "acceptable" Civil Rights Day.
A Gallup poll released last week shows that public sentiment is not in favor of either NAFTA or more immigrants entering the country. Though the results are disappointing, the Gallup website has an interesting video that summarizes the poll and explores how attitudes toward the economy and immigration are related.
Also, click here for an overview of how American attitudes toward immigration have changed over the last 39 years.
I must confess that I've caught the blogging fever from my cohort in crime, Mr. Thomas Tseng. I'm already gripped with angst, thinking about the sleepless nights that await me. It's noon on a beautiful Southern California Saturday morning and I'm glued to my computer screen taking in the latest headlines.
Here's an article that's sure to get your gander up, no matter where you might stand on the whole multicultural America ruckus. It focuses on a question that's being bandied about BET.com these days: "Does it bother you that Hispanics now outnumber African-Americans in the U.S.?"
Here's a sample of what you'll find in the New York Times:
The response has been torrential. One visitor to the site wrote, "Blacks are beginning to experience another wave of racial bias and favoritism not in our favor." The writer complained that employers now have a preference for bilingual applicants, and bemoaned "attempts to replace our threatening stance against discrimination with a Hispanic vote."But another cautioned: "Sounds like the same old trick to me. `Divide and conquer.' Are we really going to let some numbers dictate how we treat one another?"
That statistical shift, years in the making, hardly came as a surprise. Yet it has captured the attention of both Latinos and blacks, who have been grappling with its meaning in meeting rooms, on radio shows and on the Internet.
Those conversations have raised hard questions: Does the ascendance of Hispanics mean a decline in the influence of blacks? Does it doom, or encourage, alliances between the two groups? Does the old formula for those alliances - shared grievances - have much meaning given the diversity of income and status even within each group?
There is a great article from the New York Times that talks about how marketing to Mexican folks has changed on both sides of the border. Thanks, Seth Ginsberg. Here's an excerpt:
Mexican brands now compete side by side with products like Gatorade, Hershey bars and Dove soap. Colonia Condesa has changed as well. It and other urban neighborhoods have become magnets for affluent people working in service industries, many of them tied to international companies.Along with economic changes have come cultural ones. By the mid-90's, it was O.K. to admit that you spoke English. Bookstores, coffee shops and movie theaters reflect a cornucopia of international influences. Amsterdam Avenue, an odd elliptical street at the heart of Condesa, is now described as one of the trendiest spots in town (at least according to last September's Vanity Fair).
Nafta's first decade has not only changed Mexican supermarkets, it has transformed American ones. "Made in Mexico" labels have popped up on products on the shelves of states as unlikely as Iowa, as our exports to the United States more than tripled.