Posted: Thu 17 Aug 2006 06:04 Post subject: Music to Denote Race: Condescending Music
Has anyone else noticed how in "mainstream" episodic TV shows and movies, when the story involves a person of color, the soundtrack becomes filled with music to underly the race or ethnicity of person of color? For instance, I've noticed that when such a TV show has a black/mulatto person, inevitably soulful Gospel music or the sound mournful woman underpins the black/mullato person's character, etc. Similarly, the same thing happens when an Asian person is on screen. Lyric-less, string instrumentals play some Chinese music. Or, a Native American comes on screen, cue the drumbs and chanting!
How often does this occur and in what context? Are these shows you mention black-themed? Are they created by blacks? I will concede that many shows on television that address "urban themes" in an episode (themes involving black people living in the ghetto), will often use, depending on the scene and emotions conveyed by the actors, some kind of "black music". It's done to add to the mood of the scene. Is it done? Yes. Is it the norm as per your description? I haven't seen it, but then I probably watch different shows on television. Can you give examples?
Native Americans are rarely portrayed on television at all today, and portrayals of Native Americans today are less likely to reflect the half-naked savage warrior type common in cowboy movies of old.
Asians are almost always in the background in television today, especially Asian men. At least that's what I've seen on television in the present. We still have the neutered Asian male martial arts expert or brainy science geek type today, but I'm not aware that the kind of theme music you describe being the norm whenever an Asian character presents him/herself on the screen.
Joined: 04 May 2005 {Posts: 2021 } Location: santiago, chile
Posted: Thu 17 Aug 2006 15:10 Post subject: Re: Music to Denote Race: Condescending Music
triguy wrote:
Has anyone else noticed how in "mainstream" episodic TV shows and movies, when the story involves a person of color, the soundtrack becomes filled with music to underly the race or ethnicity of person of color? For instance, I've noticed that when such a TV show has a black/mulatto person, inevitably soulful Gospel music or the sound mournful woman underpins the black/mullato person's character, etc. Similarly, the same thing happens when an Asian person is on screen. Lyric-less, string instrumentals play some Chinese music. Or, a Native American comes on screen, cue the drumbs and chanting!
Gag!
Does this irritate anyone else?
I got the same feelings when I see BBC or National Geographics reports about "exotic" countries. And they play in the background Flamenco (Spain) in a report about the Argentinean Gauchos, Mariachi music in Cuba, or African rythms when showing Macchu Picchu.
Joined: 28 Apr 2006 {Posts: 282 } Location: 51st State
Posted: Thu 17 Aug 2006 16:07 Post subject: Re: Music to Denote Race:
I suppose I would only find it condescending or irritating if people of color were stereotypically underpinned with a certain kind of music, like bonga beats, or gospel voices.
Just so happens yesterday I found myself ‘kicking back’, and taking in the movie The Terminal. Composer John Williams feels that the use of clarinent and accordian in the orchestral piece, used as a musical motif for lead character Viktor Navorski (stateless after a coup in his ficitional homeland), strikes the right tone as an idiom of Viktor’s Eastern European personality and ethnicity.
The subplot involving the "Harlem Jazz" picture works it way into the soundtrack too, for me symbolic of free-form and in transit situation of the lead character. He has to improvise without passport, visa, country status confined to the international lounge of an airport.
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