bell hookd and mass media

bell hooks uses her writing to demonstrate to others how some are oppressed in our society or marginalized. Those who are dominant in our society use their power to stay in power. The dominant class is particularly upper class, males, white and heterosexual. This is the norm our society is ran by. bell hooks isn’t interested in who runs our society but the way they stay in power and particularly the way they stay in power through the use of language.

In Teaching Resistance: The Radical Politics of Mass Media bell hooks explore how language used in forms of mass media is used to keep the dominant as the leaders and keep African Americans in their role, as the submissive. bell hooks gives many examples of movies and how they damage the image of the black person. I can think of a recent example that wasn’t taken very well.

Norbit, in which Eddie Murphy played several roles including the leading role of a black lady, could have cost him his academy award for Dream Girls. Norbit was an obese older African American lady and played into many stereotypes about black people. Some enjoy this movie while many were taken aback by its blatant racial stereotypes that the movie put across. Eddie Murphy should have thought about this role a little bit more and tried to portray a positive image instead of perpetuating the same old myths about his race. In the end, the academy saw this serotype being portrayed and didn’t like it and this played a major role in Eddie Murphy not winning the academy award that year which I think is an important step in getting people to realize stereotypes like this seen in mass media everyday and change them.