Allegory Depicted In Spike Lee's Film, Santa Claus

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Colorless Allegory pervades human history as a common, but effective tool for persuasion and teaching. These unique, fictional stories with cautionary undertones are shared across the world. Virtually everybody knows at least one or two folktales. Many, if not most, of them teach some moral or warning. They are intended to help guide one’s actions to include moral consideration and practical discretion. In western countries, Santa Claus is said to know how one acts, without being physically present. Given this, a child may learn to act in a moral fashion without immediate social pressure to do so. Scandinavian countries have a history of using folktales about wood elves stealing children in order to discourage wandering too far from safety. …show more content…

This is best validated by Sal’s Italian ethno-centric pizzeria. Every aspect of the pizzeria in the film is very calculated and deliberate. People within the film speak about it with a nostalgic undertone; a cool, inoffensive color scheme was chosen; many of the characters that interact with it serve pivotal roles. Given the location's importance within the film, it is important that a director dictates how the audience intuits the the social climate and ambience of the pizzeria. Do the Right Thing makes it relatively easy for viewers by employing a scientifically replicable depiction characters’ dialogue in reference to the pizzeria. One scene depicts Da Mayor, a friendly, but downtrodden man, looking for alcohol money at the pizzeria. Sal recognizes Da Mayor as a positive part of their community because of is friendly, unobtrusive disposition and offers compensation for the small task of sweeping the storefront. Mookie, a black delivery boy, expresses appreciation for his kind deed. This exchange is reminiscent of the aforementioned principle of reciprocal trust and accountability. This is not to say Spike Lee had read an article about scientifically replicable interactions between communities and ethnic gathering places; it is the nature of psychological and social sciences to provide a qualitative or quantitative logic trail for phenomenon that can …show more content…

The extent of individual’s connection to the restaurant varies, but generally share components grounded in history, nostalgia, and tradition. Nostalgia is most overtly associated with Sal’s Pizzeria when Buggin Out attempts to organize a boycott of Sal’s on the grounds that he felt excluded as a black individual from the restaurant. He feels this way because Sal only frames notable italian figures on his wall, but no African Americans. Buggin Out is almost unanimously rejected. People say they love Sal’s pizza, and that they've been patrons since they were children. Here is an important disconnect between the Komakech’s article, which almost exclusively cites ethnic stores as providing identity to members of the corresponding ethnicity. Despite this, the largely black community in Do the Right Thing identifies with Sal’s italian-centric restaurant. Sal reciprocates this by asserting throughout the movie that he appreciates the community he lives in, and feels it is important to be a positive part of it. Herein begins the ambiguity of the actions of Buggin Out and Radio Raheem, who choses to assist in the boycott. While the aggressive actions of the two are are difficult to rationalize, their motivations come from a purer place. While members of the community identify with Sal's italian pizzeria, there is no place they can culturally claim as their own. This is evidenced

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