Black African American Men Stereotypes

African American women make up eight percent of the United States population, the women in this minority group deal with negative and positive stereotypes on a daily basis. These stereotypes are apparent within mainstream media. With today’s children having more access to media. now more than ever, they are subjected to these stereotypes at a young age (Adams-Bass, Bentley-Edwards, & Stevenson, 2014, n.p.). When blacks have more Afrocentric features like thick lips, bigger noses, or a darker skin tone, they are more likely to have a negative stereotype towards them (Conrad, Dixon, & Zhang, 2009, n.p.). There are numerous stereotypes within television shows; portraying black women as happy, overweight, and always in the kitchen, or as rude, loud, “gold diggers” (Adams-Bass, Bentley-Edwards, & Stevenson, 2014, n.p.). It is believed that if stereotypical images in media are replaced with realistic images, it could benefit African Americans. For example, showing them in managerial positions or positions of authority could support getting them to those positions (Stevenson & Swayne, 1999, n.p.). In a study done on African American portrayal in business-to-business direct mail, they found that the percent of ads showing African Americans were almost equal to the percent of African Americans working in the business world (Stevenson &

In Brent Staples article “Just Walk on By”, Staples shares his thoughts on the way marginalized groups interact. He uses his own experiences as a young African American man to shed light on how people can have implied biases that affect the way they treat other people. Staples does this to demonstrate how society develops preconceived notions in the minds of individuals about marginalized groups, primarily African American men, which are often a flawed representation of the people within these groups. The rhetoric he uses is key to developing an understanding persona and an emotional appeal that exposes the implied biases of people without alienating or offending the audience, to whom-- among others-- he attributes these biases.

Why do we judge a black man? Is it because they might live in a house that we wouldn’t give a second look? Or because they can’t afford the nicer things that they’d like to have? How is it their fault the for society treating them bad because sometimes they have to do bad things, things that are unthinkable to us as middle-class, just to put food on the table for one more night so their children don’t starve? They don’t walk around with their noses up because they forced their parents to buy them the new pair of shoes they just seen or expensive name brand clothing.

Society has always forced women and men into gender roles that dictate what types of behaviors are acceptable, desirable, and appropriate for them despite their actual or perceived sex. Gender is a socially constructed form of identity but it is also racially constructed as well. Gender can be displayed through intersectional perspectives, you can discover many ways to display gender specifically in the culture of African Americans and how they differ from the dominate white culture. I am a Haitian American female and I found that through the pictures I captured of my friends, family members and I were of us inexplicably participating in gender and displaying femininity. I also observed my friends and family especially the men participating

Frederick Douglass’s “What the Black Man Wants” captures the need for change in post Civil War America. The document presses the importance for change, with the mindset of the black man being, ‘if not now then never’. Parallel to this document is the letter of Jourdon Anderson, writing to his old master. Similar to Douglas, Mr. Anderson speaks of the same change and establishes his worth as freed man to his previous slave owner. These writings both teach and remind us about the evils of slavery and the continued need for equality, change, and reform.

Ralph Ellison is an African American Novelist, scholar, and writer. He is most known for his best Novel, Invisible Man, which won the National Book award. He was also referred to as the invisible man. He was named after one of the most well-known poets, Ralph Waldo Emerson

Martin Luther King Jr. is remembered for many things. He is a world renowned civil rights activist whose words affected the hearts of many. His marches united people race demanding the rights for all Americans in a peaceful, yet effective manner. His speeches drew crowds of thousands of people, whose lives were affected by his words. But how was Dr. King able to do so much with just words? Simple, it wasn’t just the words but the language he used in them. When Dr. King wants to create emotions in a crowd he used strong, emotional language or pathos. However when Dr. King needs to respond to criticisms he uses logical, well thought out statements or logos. In “Letter From Birmingham Jail” King

Hip Hop was the wildfire that started in the South Bronx and whose flames leapt up around the world crying out for change. James McBride’s Hip Hop Planet focuses on his personal interactions with the development of Hip Hop culture and his changing interpretations of the world wide movement. Many of his encounters and mentions in the text concern young black males and his writing follows an evolution in the representation of this specific social group. He initially portrays them as arrogant, poor, and uneducated but eventually develops their image to include the positive effects of their culture in an attempt to negate their historical misrepresentation.

Will society ever view African-Americans as people and not as less than? In “Chokehold” Paul Butler will discuss this very idea depth. Butler provides history on why and how society sees African-American men as violent thugs. Butler goes on to explain in detail how the chokehold plays a part in oppressing African-American men and how to avoid the ramifications of the Chokehold, if possible. In the last chapter, Butler provides various ideals in effort to rid the Chokehold in its entirety.

The Freedman sculpture by John Quincy Adams is a very effective piece for alluding to African Americans status during its era. In 1863, John Quincy Adams Ward is considered to be the first sculptor that accurately represented African Americans in his work. The Freedman was shown to the public after Abraham Lincoln gave the Emancipation Proclamation speech which had gone into effect at the beginning of that year. The sculpture showed the new found freedom of African Americans. The statue is made of bronze and is of a black man, with a shackle on one wrist in a sitting position that indicates the motion of rising. The piece is intended to speak to art critics who recognize the allusion to the classical Greco-Roman sculptures. Since the Greco-Roman tradition is held in high regard, Ward asserts that the black man has taken an elevated position in American society worthy of respect.

John Howard Griffin is the author of the nonfiction book entitled, Black Like Me. While Griffin is most famously known for this book he has also been the author of other works, such as The Devil Rides Outside, Land of the High Sky, and The Church and the Black Man. In 1959, John Howard Griffin decided to get a firsthand account of what being black was like in the southern parts of the United States. Griffin himself is a white man living through the racial segregation happening in the 1950s, but feels he needs to become a black person in appearance to adequately experience life from an African American point of view. “How else except by becoming a Negro could a white man hope to learn the truth?” (1). This somewhat twisted premise will become

In the story “On the Subway” two different people, from total opposite worlds are brought together. The literary techniques such as tone, poetic devices, imagery , and organization help this contrast be possible.

¨If Hip Hop has the ability to corrupt minds, it also has the ability to uplift them.¨ Hip hop music, also called rap music, is a music genre developed in the United States by African Americans consisting of a stylized rhythmic music that commonly accompanies rapping, a rhythmic and rhyming speech that is chanted. Mainstream hip hop culture is also filled with misogyny and negative images of women. These artists are unaware that sexism has been forced onto them through the brainwashing from the media, which is controlled by a patriarchal society. Conversely, feminism is the belief that both genders should have equal power. Mainstream hip hop culture contradicts feminism because it degrades women, promotes male dominance and hypermasculinity. On the other hand, feminism focuses on equity for both genders.

Barry Beckham’s novel, Runner Mack, was published in 1972 and became the first baseball novel written by an African American. The novel follows the life of Henry Adams, a young African American male who moves to a northern city in an attempt to initiate his professional baseball career and start a home with his new wife, Beatrice. Beckham invokes Langston Hughes’s poem Harlem in which Hughes asks “What happens to a dream deferred?” to tell a common, yet underrepresented story of the black experience in America. Henry’s undying belief in the American Dream exemplifies the illusion that every person has the chance to achieve their dreams and obtain social mobility by pulling themselves up from their bootstraps. But Henry, like many African Americans,

Identity is the pursuit of artists in their work, especially after the end of World War II. Artists have different ways to express their own identity of meanings in their works by many diverse factors such as gender, class, cultural factor, and political factor. In this article, I will compare Ah Xian and Kerry James Marshall works of art, and analyze the similarities and uniqueness of their works as well as the process and reasons of their identity. I will explain the construction of identity and fluidity of identity by comparing the art works of Ah Xian and Kerry James Marshall.