Thoughts on Ethnic Notions by Eloise Fairbrother

The most interesting part of Ethnic Notions for me was understanding that in order for black people to make it in American theater and film/television, they had to play into the stereotypes and be racist in order to cater to the white audience. Many black actors/performers even had to wear black face to appear “more black”, which is to say, more stereotypically black. This not only caused racism to widely spread in America, as the only media depictions of black people were horrifically racist and stereotypical, it also instilled self-hatred into black people. One example of this was “The Mammy”, a dark and docile black maid on television who appeared as somewhat of an “antithesis to the white lady”. White women were often depicted as beautiful, which meant that their job was to essentially sit still and look pretty for their husbands. On the other hand were black women, who were often presented as ugly but useful, forcing them to be used as servants. This also enforced the idea that black people were only useful to serve white people, which was in turn, enforced by the very existence of the television show. 

In my Migrants in the US Media class, we read an article by my professor, Dr. Katarzyna Marciniak, titled Palatable Foreignness. While all black people in America wouldn't be considered "foreigners", I feel as though ideas brought up in this article are able to relate to what I saw in Ethnic Notions. The distorted depiction of black people in the media helped white people tolerate black people in their society–it proved to white people that black people were there to serve them, whether that be through slavery or entertainment. In the article, Marciniak brings up the idea of a “useful exotic”, as well as ideas of foreigners as healers. Essentially, black people were only tolerated by white people when they found them useful. If black people weren’t able to heal them, they didn’t have a purpose for them. Overall, the depiction of black people in the media in the 20th century severely damaged many white peoples’ perceptions of black people, therefore creating a racist and bigoted environment in America.