Alternative media is a big part of our everyday life. Anything that is not mainstream Hollywood medium is alternative right? That's almost a rhetorical question but not many people realize or understand the importance of media, mainly because the first thing that comes to mind when someone talks about media, they think of Hollywood, Los Angeles, celebrities. Many people have underestimated the distribution of other media outlets that are not mainstream can also reach a board audience and create awareness.
Social media is a part of our daily routine nowadays whether we want to admit it or not, we live on facebook, twitter, tumblr, foursquare. Checking in at places where we've been and updating our status or just constantly tweeting about our lives. Those are all messages being sent out to the cyber world that everyone is somehow connected in many ways. In this case, I strongly believe that now it's the time and place where one person can really do make a difference in the world and if their story is strong enough, it will capture the eyes and heart of hundreds, thousands, even millions of people.
Ethnic media is becoming more and more common. Although not many mainstream films really express or show the true ethnic side of a specific race or gender, there are numerous films made by "smaller" directors that touches upon the subject. Before I introduce an inspiring short documentary that I encountered while researching, I just want to touch upon the movie "The Help." Personally I have never seen the movie but I have seen many "unhappy" reviews for the movie on the depiction of racism.
http://www.thefrisky.com/2011-08-11/racist-or-raving-what-critics-are-saying-about-the-help/
To an extent I do agree with the reviews in similar aspect of the link Louis posted below in "How Hollywood Depicts Race." I feel that this movie would fall right into the list. Also in Melissa Harris- Perry's reading of "One Crooked Room," African American women always fall in the three main stereotypes of being the Mammy, Jezebel, and Sapphire (33). She surfaces the fact that black female actresses are willing to accept the stereotypical Mammy role where they are casted as the nurturing and caretakers of white women and children (29).
However, after reading John McWhorter's article ‘The Help’ Isn’t Racist. Its Critics Are. I can't say that he did not have a point, but that's not the message we are trying to get through. In Bell Hook's "Making Movie Magic," she explains the reason for the criticism she writes in her essay is to "provide a critical perspective that could be useful to audiences and to him [Spike Lee] by enabling us to see Lee's work in new ways, to reimagine and reenvision...movies do not merely offer us the opportunity to reimagine the culture we most intimately know on the the screen, they make culture." (9). If everything we see on the big screens is a mere reflection of the society then justice and real representation of colored women will never see the light of the day, simply because they are constantly being stereotyped in films and in television culture as a whole.
To make matter more interesting, I asked my friend who is white, who is as American as he can be (generations of families all born in the US). I wanted to heard what he had to say after viewing this movie. As expected, he enjoyed it and said it was a sad, moving story with some humor in it. When I tried to get his opinion on whether he sensed any type of racism or misrepresentation or stereotyping of the African American society, he bluntly replied, "the movie is retelling a piece of American history, at a time where there were slaves and black women worked as maids." To him, the movie was made pure for entertainment and he said critics needed something to write and talk about. After all, Octavia Spencer won the supporting-actress Academy Award, it didn't matter that she was colored, he said.
I thought that was something interesting to share.
So moving forward...
...to alternative media
I came across this inspiring documentary directed by a young Korean Canadian student who volunteers for www.jane-finich.com and actively promotes multiculturalism in her society. I feel that she is a great example of someone who is passionate about film studies and takes advantage in using alternative media to share her stories with others. Also although the website takes place in Canada, there are lots of other outlets to distribute films in the United States. I enjoyed her documentary very much not only because she is a talented filmmaker but that we need people with her passion to share stories that we, you and I, are not aware of these real life occurrences. I mean I've learned about the Vietnam war in school but I have never heard of kind hearted people like Uncle Bob that still existed in our society. It's kind of a sad reality, but we must encourage more filmmakers to look at the light and not be afraid to share their stories and to fully take advantage at what is available for media outlets.
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