Author: welch.516

Text Review: Antoinette Nwandu’s ‘Pass Over’

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Spike Lee’s production of Antoinette Nwandu’s allegorical play ‘pass over’ presents issues of racism and white supremacy in an entertaining way that leaves the audience captivated yet unsettled using a single prop and a few heartfelt performances. The story sets on the block of 64th and Martin Luther King Drive where two homeless black men, Moses and Kitch exchange humorous banter and dream of better days ahead. They talk about what they’re going to do when they get to the “promised land”. The dialogue is playful, and we see the full spectrum of emotions from both characters. Happy about the days to come, yet sad about those they’ve lost to police violence. The two are approached by a cheery white man dressed in a white suit who questions their use of the N-word, “saying if I don’t get to say it, you don’t get to say it.” Gun shots are heard, and the white man is standing while the two black men are taking cover. The man leaves them a basket of food and exits the stage. One of the men tries to leave the corner and a police officer immediately stops him. The play concludes in a shocking way when Kitch is shot by the man in the white suit who returns in the last scene.

This play is riddled with symbolism, seen immediately in the set design. 64th alludes to the Civil Rights Act of 1964 which outlawed discrimination based on race, and Martin Luther King obviously was instrumental in the Civil Rights movement. They mention things like crossing over the Jordan River into the promised land, Passover and the name Moses, which are all referring to Moses delivering God’s people out of Egypt (slavery). Also, the first white man to enter the play was named Master which has slavery implications. Major themes addressed in this play involve the interaction two black men and two white men. The play depicts a white power view and an othering by the white men over the black men. The black men are slaves to the white men. They hide in fear and recognize their lower status and the slave-master relationship. Physically they can’t leave the corner, but maybe this represents a socioeconomic bondage as well. This play asks us to question our power structures, and calls to dismantle oppressive establishments like the police to give equal treatment to all races.

Week 15 – Photography on the Front Lines of the Spanish Civil War

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The growth of media in the last century has played an integral role in shaping our beliefs, to a fault in many ways. In Susan Sontag’s Regarding the Pain of Others, she examines the effects of photography on public sentiment, specifically war imagery. The popular adage “A picture is worth a thousand words”, although quite cliché, is embodied throughout her writing. The notion that one picture can convey complex and sometimes multiple ideas that mere words cannot. This presentation briefly explores the origins of professional wartime photography, specifically during the Spanish Civil War, and mentions some key photographers who would pave the way for professional photography moving forward into World War II and beyond.

 

SPAIN. November 7th, 1938. Near Fraga, the Aragon front. Loyalist troops during an offensive on the Rio Segre.

 

The Spanish Civil War was a major event in Spanish and European history, introducing some of the major ideological conflict that would spread across Europe as the catalyst for World War II. Apart from being a major historical event, the Spanish Civil War would be the ground-zero for professional photography on the front lines of military combat. As Sontag states in an article in the New Yorker (December 9 2002), “the Spanish Civil War was the first war to be witnessed (‘covered’) in the modern sense: by a corps of professional photographers at the lines of military engagement and in the towns under bombardment, whose work was immediately seen in newspapers and magazines in Spain and abroad.” These photographers were present from the initial uprisings in 1936 to the collapse of the Republican government in 1939, putting themselves at risk on the front lines to disseminate these dramatic images around the world.

 

SPAIN. Cordoba front. Early September, 1936. Three Loyalist militiamen in a gully aiming rifles.

 

Photographer Robert Capa introduced in Picture Post as “the greatest war photographer in the world” captured arguably one of the most iconic photographs of the century titled “Death of a Loyalist Militiaman”. Robert Whelan in “Roberta Capa in Spain”, published by Aperture interprets the image stating, “The photograph is an overwhelmingly powerful statement of the human existential dilemma, as the solitary man is struck down by an unseen enemy, as if by Fate itself…the photograph is a haunting symbol of all the Republican soldiers who died in the war, and of Republican Spain itself, flinging itself bravely forward and being struck down.” Capa would later photograph some of the most iconic and graphic images of D-Day landings on Omaha Beach. French magazine Regards, in a time where French publications gave no credit to photographers, stated that it “sent the one of its most qualified and audacious photographers to the Spanish capital.” Photographers Gerda Taro (partner of Capa) and David Seymour are also often cited as the primary representatives of war photography in that era.

 

SPAIN. Cerro Muriano, Cordoba front. September 5th, 1936. Republican militiaman (Federico BORRELL GARCIA) at the moment of death. (“The Falling Soldier”).

 

The focus early on in photojournalism was to emphasize photographs as truthful objective representations, but war propaganda would soon challenge this philosophy. Propaganda posters would be deployed during the Spanish Civil War by Nationalists and Republicans, displaying images that would recruit people to their cause. Caroline Brothers notes “whether to intervene was a question theoretically tied to public opinion, at least in the foreign democracies, and since this opinion was informed at least as much by images as by text, the press photographs of the Spanish Civil War can be understood as weapons rather than simple illustrations.” These images which may have been seen as an artform in the early days of wartime photography, would soon be weaponized to challenge public opinion about war.

 

 

Sources:

“Robert Capa: Death of a Loyalist Soldier (1936-Probably Printed in the 1930s or Early 1940s).” Artsy, https://www.artsy.net/artwork/robert-capa-death-of-a-loyalist-soldier.

Photojournalism during the Spanish Civil War, https://library.ucsd.edu/speccoll/swphotojournalism/.

 

“Robert Capa and the Spanish Civil War: Magnum Photos Magnum Photos.” Magnum Photos, https://www.magnumphotos.com/newsroom/conflict/robert-capa-spanish-civil-war/.

 

“Yo, Is This Media Gerrymandering?”

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Abstract

While it has been accepted that the government consists of three branches which separate its powers among the branches so no single party can have too much influence, there is a quickly emerging fourth branch, which has gone unchecked for too long: the media. While the media doesn’t have designated powers like the government does, it arguably has more influence. In this article, I examine what I’d like to call media gerrymandering. Gerrymandering means to manipulate the boundaries of (an electoral constituency) to favor one party or class. What if we applied this concept to the media? The media is drawing their own lines to favor one party or class, marginalizing many groups, elevating others, and controlling the constituency. Specifically, I’ll be discussing the recent case of Gabby Petitio. and the ramifications of her coverage in the media.

 

 

 

“Missing White Woman Syndrome”

The term “missing white woman syndrome” was first coined by Gwen Ifill of PBS, and it expresses the inherent bias that exists that the media will cover a story and search for a white woman over a colored woman. According to black feminist theory, those who disappear who are typically white, female, and young receive much greater media attention than racial minorities who also disappear. Often the news headline will use words like innocent to portray the victim as perfect and angelic, not deserving of such treatment. Black women are no given the same exaltation in the media when they go missing.

 

 

Speaking of missing white woman syndrome, have you heard about Gabby Petito? If you have connection to the internet, then you’ve probably heard of her. Searching her name brings almost 18 million results. If you’re unfamiliar, Gabby Petito was a 22-year-old, white woman from New York who went cross-country road tripping with her fiancé which ended in a murder investigation, Petito the victim. While the case is very sad and we should be talking about it, there is a limit to how much coverage one person should get, especially at the expense of other cases and groups of people. Every major media source covered this story for weeks and you couldn’t get on social media without this story being shared. I’ve read many interviews where people ask reporters if she was a celebrity based on the amount of coverage she was getting. In the video from Monica Coleman from ABC 10 I’ve shared, shows one of these instances With the entire media covering the story of an average white woman’s disappearance, it fails to cover stories of black women who go missing or are victims of heinous crimes. CNN contributor Ana Navarro expressed sympathy for the Petito family, issued a call on Instagram for more inclusive coverage. “I want to take nothing away from this horrible case. My thoughts are w/her family,” she wrote. “I just want there to be same interest and energy [for] every disappeared young woman in America.” Omékongo Dibinga, a professor at American University, argues that the issue is deeply rooted. “People just don’t see us in the same way that they see these White women and White girls,” he said in an interview. “We want the Petito family and everybody else to get justice, but we’re just saying that we want some of that coverge], too, and we don’t get it.” There is a real sentiment of feeling left out and misrepresented in the media by many. I can’t remember a time when a black woman got media attention in a criminal case. As journalist Mara Schiavocampo said on CNN, “This actually has real life implications for women of color. Why? This makes them less safe because perpetrators, predators, know that if you want to get away with murder, you seek the victim that no one is going to look for.

 

Native American Representation

White American institutions and individuals have overwhelmingly created and defined prevalent representations of racial minority groups, including Native peoples. The resulting representations reflect negative, inaccurate ideas about Native Americans while ignoring positive, accurate ideas. Consequently, biased understandings of how contemporary Native Americans look and behave permeate U.S. society. A simple google search can show that the media still portrays Native American wearing traditional garment and feathers, when this is not an accurate contemporary view of many cultures. You might be surprised to know that many Natives wear your average T-shirt and shorts. Biased ideas and representations of Native Americans – particularly the scarcity of positive, accurate, and contemporary ideas and representations – constitute the modern form of bias against Native Americans and perpetuate a recursive cycle of low expectations, prejudice, and discrimination that reinforces disparities in domains from public health to education. Here in the United States, there is an overwhelming priority to wealth and success. It is generally very respectable if someone goes to Law school or becomes a doctor. Many people would view wealth as the driving force for life itself. Culturally, we see that many Native Americans don’t align with these principles. This causes majority white groups to view these groups as lower class, and a group to have power over. The very birth of this nation was conceived out of bloodshed and subjugation of Native peoples. Much like the relationship between whites and African Americans, there is a very dark history between them that is still deeply rooted in our institutions. The Indian Child Welfare Act is a recent example that steps in the right direction as far as fighting back against white assimilation. In 1978, The Indian Child Welfare Act gave Native American tribes jurisdiction over child welfare cases involving Native children. Up until then, the U.S. government separated 25-35 percent of Native children from their families and placed them in foster homes, often placed in non-Native homes. Surveys revealed that children were removed from homes because their families practiced communal childrearing, which is normative in Native American communities, but conflicts with the nuclear family model that prevails in white, middle-class homes. The blatant media bias toward white women leaves primitive ideas about groups that do not allow the average viewer to be informed about minority groups.

 

 

What does this have to do with Gabby Petitio and white women syndrome? In Wyoming, the state in which Petito was found dead, a report released this year by Wyoming’s Taskforce on Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons found over 700 Native American people went missing in the state alone between 2011 and 2020 with virtually zero media coverage.  Abigail Echo-Hawk, an enrolled citizen of the Pawnee Nation of Oklahoma, is the director of the Seattle-based Urban Indian Health Institute and executive vice president of the Seattle Indian Health Board. “What we see is systematic bias, institutional and structural racism and the vilifying and the placing of blame on the victims themselves and their families for when these people go missing and murdered,” Echo-Hawk said. “And what we see is absolute injustice. And that is why Washington state ranks one of the highest for missing and murdered Indigenous women and girls.”

 

A More Representative Future in Media

It has been clearly stated that minority groups are not represented in the media, and when they are represented, they are misrepresented. The root issue might be in the teams behind producing news and media content. Many news teams lack diversity and so there is inherent bias for white women on news teams to cover white women, because it hits home for them. What if we diversified every media team or at least try to promote minority cases and stories? We are so easily shaped by the content we consume. Changing the media changes hearts. We need to promote stories of all people from all walks of life so we can be better informed and love others better. We live in a culture where we love following cold cases and binge shows about serial killings that involve white women, like Ted Bundy for example and are inoculated to horrifying stories. There is a true danger in presenting a single story. It marginalizes important minority groups and elevates others. Showing the single white woman story tells minorities that they are not important or worthy to be represented.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Dairy Showcase: The Cross-Country Star

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If you’ve been following the news or been on social media in the last two months, you probably came across some sort of headline about missing 22-year-old New Yorker, Gabby Petito. She vanished after taking a cross-country road trip with her fiancé. Later, her body was found in Wyoming and the case was ruled a homicide, her fiancé still at large. This story blew up on all platforms, receiving 398 mentions from Fox News, 346 from CNN and 100 times on MSNBC in the seven-day period following her initial coverage. Why did this case receive so much press when there are many other missing person cases? Maybe it’s the intrigue of a “true crime” case that is now of interest in entertainment. Some, however, believe this is a matter of systemic bias in media coverage.

Journalists wait near the North Port, Fla., home of Gabby Petito’s fiance on Sept. 20. (Octavio Jones/Getty Images)

“If the woman who is missing looks like your own daughter or granddaughter, and you’re a newsroom executive, you’re going to gravitate more toward it,” Reid said. “If this is the way that these [other] young women look, maybe they’re not noticed as much. But we need to change that.” The MSNBC host Joy Reid criticized the coverage of this case noting that there is a misrepresentation of minorities in media positions. With a disproportionately white newsroom, inherently there will be bias toward cases in which you can relate to or as Reid states, “look like your own daughter or granddaughter”. Omékongo Dibinga, a professor at American University, argues that the issue is deeply rooted. “People just don’t see us in the same way that they see these White women and White girls,” he said in an interview. “We want the Petito family and everybody else to get justice, but we’re just saying that we want some of that [coverage], too, and we don’t get it.”According to a report released this year from Wyoming’s Taskforce on Missing and Murdered Indigenous Persons, 710 Native American people were missing in the state between 2011 and 2020. “Media portrayal of missing persons differed between Indigenous people and White people,” the report concluded.

From left to right, Ahyla Grey Bull, Destiny Spoonhunter, Kiera Spoonhunter, Alea Sanchez, Alicia Sanchez, Annalilla Sanchez and Arianna Sanchez. Credit: Paulita Spoonhunter

Connecting with a theme from this course, Adichie’s The Danger of a Single Story seemed to be a relevant parallel. There is a danger in presenting the single story. White women are portrayed as innocent and in need of protecting while other minority women aren’t covered in the media. This gives the impression that only white women go missing and it fails to recognize the hundreds of nonwhite females who go missing. There must be equal representation in news media teams in order to tell the full story.

 

References:

Barr, Jeremy. “Even within the Media, Some Question the Amount of Gabby Petito Coverage.” The Washington Post, WP Company, 23 Sept. 2021, https://www.washingtonpost.com/media/2021/09/23/gabby-petito-media-coverage-missing-white-black/.

Grant, Emily A., et al. “UW Research Finds That Indigenous People in the State Are Missing and Murdered at Disproportionate Rates, Media Coverage Lacking.” Wyoming Survey Analysis Center, https://wysac.uwyo.edu/wysac/projects/mmip-report/.