Black People and African American Actors Essay

Stereotyping is the automatic/ exaggerated mental pictures that people hold about a particular racial group without taking individual differences into consideration. Examples of stereotyping would be the main characters of the movie Rio2, Jewel and Blue being voiced by white actors whilst their ‘wild’ relatives are voiced by ‘non-white’ actors implying sophistication as well as in the movie Despicable Me 2 where El Macho and his son are given a Spanish image portraying a smooth talker and an irresistible lover that is often stereotypes about Spanish people. [87] People seem oblivious to the racial content due to various distractions like visual stimuli such as 3D effects and the contrasting use of color, sound effects such as surround sound and the voices of the character and lastly the plot of the story. Most people are over stimulated by these ‘distractions’ that they rarely notice the stereotyping. Another factor would be that parents neglect the responsibility to screen the movies that their children are watching. In some instances the stereotyping may be instilled in some parents from birth resulting in children seeing stereotyping as normal behavior. [96] Subtle racial prejudices towards Hispanic and Black people in Rio2 were the implication that ‘wild’ Amazonian Macaws voiced by ‘non- white ‘actors are uncivilized. Songs sung by these Macaws are primarily voiced by African American actors accompanied by rhythmic beats and movements with catchy phrases primarily found in native song and dance. Roberto (wild Macaw) is voiced by the singer Bruno Mars who is from a mixture of Jewish and Hawaiian decent implying (help with that word). Pedro and Nico two rapping, gangster, music loving birds are voiced by two equally successful and famous rappers Will.I.Am and Jamie Foxx [99] From this passage I can conclude that even though warnings about stereotyping may be placed before animation movies, many parents would still allow their children to watch it. [31]