Being Called One of These Dudes

Along with the advance of technology has come a disinterest in books and reading. I understand that to be the reason why our generation has lost most of their creativity and imagination.

As an African growing up in America, you’ve undoubtedly been called one of the following:

Alex Haley’s Roots was once the bane of my existence. The movie is great and the story is timeless, but for some reason kids liked referencing this dude (Kunte Kinte) as soon as they hear the word “Africa”. Don’t get me wrong, I don’t have anything against Toby. It’s just that around the end of middle school or so I began to get stressed about going to school the following Monday that it reran on TBS’s cultural movie Saturdays.

“Give us free” or “Give-is-Us-s-Free” was another infamous quote to taunt Africans and the children of African immigrants in America. In this Spielberg pic (Amistad), Djimon Hounsou played the role of Joseph Cinque and the quote were his first words (in the film) that were spoken in English. Notice that the two most widely-used reproaches while teasing about Africa are related to slavery. They (we) are educated to be ashamed, and so we defend ourselves by separating ourselves.

The movie was a classic. Nobody in their creative mind can refute that. However, it manifested a still very Hollywood and unrealistic view of Africa. It was like you either came here poor or as a slave, or you were once a prince that had a zoo in your back yard and utopia-like, melodramatically submissive brides to choose from. And even though he was a prince, he was still unhappy with the custom and tradition of Africa and had to come to America to find true love.

Note from Hollywood to viewers: Even the wealthiest in Africa are unhappy there! Feel better about what we did to your ancestors!!!

Note to self: Wait, are they serious?

I understand that there are barely any African men in contemporary mainstream media. Boris Kodjoe doesn’t really rep his Ghanaian heritage, and Barack Obama has had to hide any reference to Kenya for his campaign. Akon, though an alright singer, is not an accurate description of every African man. He is not an accurate description of every Senegalese man. He is not an accurate description of every African-American man (yep, he’s American too). He is an accurate description of Akon. I guess it happens across the board though within the contemporary black community, since women that grow their natural hair tend to get called India Arie (whether or not they look like her), and etc. We also get trained to expect and accept one representation for every and all of our “categories”. When there is a talented black female singer with European features, I suspect people to say that she is “trying to be the next Beyonce”. Why we can’t have more than one talented black female singer with European features, I don’t know.

Words can’t describe my disdain for this dude. The BET comedian, who calls himself Michael Blackson is capitalizing on the new era of minstrelsy with bizarre, embarrassing, exaggerated, and annoying interpretations of life as an African man. “Mudda Sucka” is his token phrase, and he harps on most stereotypes of Africans; from making fun of his skin complexion and embellishing his accent (he’s been here a while, so I know it isn’t what he makes it out to be), to referencing spears and voodoo. Minstrelsy should be outlawed, but I’ll expound later.

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Tags: African References, Akon, Djimon Hounsou, Eddie Murphy, Kunte Kinte, Michael Blackson, Teasing

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