last year around this time actually I
was in the Philippines for about a week
on a school that community service trip
and I remember on the long bus ride from
the airport I watched a movie now I
couldn’t actually hear anything that was
being said because the volume had been
turned all the way down but the images
spoke loudly enough there was an early
2000s movie Hollywood and it featured an
african-american male just and be the
actual embodiment of so many stereotypes
about african-american men so he was
dancing across the street and playing
basketball and at some point in time he
went to prison and then broke out of
prison
etc and I remember thinking to myself at
the time what a typical man what a
typical black man and as I heard myself
think those thoughts a we were shocked
came over me stereotyping generalizing
these are things that I am actually so
personally passionately against and yet
there I was stereotyping and
generalizing but more so that was a
Eureka moment for me because it was what
inspired me to write a compendium of
poems that I’ll be presenting to the
school community in April on the subject
matter of stereotyping generalizing in
the negative effects thereof and in the
words of Nigerian author Chimamanda
Ngozi Adichie the danger of the single
story um it’s also why I’m here talking
to you today
in that moment I asked myself that if
that simple negative image is what I had
to find within myself as the typical
black man then how did that affect how I
saw my brother’s what did that mean
about how
so my uncle’s my cousin’s my friends my
ladies and gentlemen that’s what I’m
here to discuss today
you see negative stereotypes as
constructed perpetuated by the media
they don’t just affect the way the
masses view marginalized groups within
society they affect the ways that we
members of these marginalized groups
grow to view ourselves the liberties the
limitations that we give ourselves and
to address this matter I think I should
tell you a bit about my context so my
name is eluate emilio or any cagey
midoriko or to me my very calm for short
I was born in England as already said
and I lived there until I was four and I
moved back with my family to my home
country Nigeria and moving back here
with a number of challenges on a more
personal level I remember that myself my
brothers we were teased by a number of
our peers at school because of our
distinctly British accents I still have
a bit of a trace of it not as much now
as before and it’s interesting how at
that age I was so teased but teachers
adults people in places of authority
would just smile when I spoke when my
brothers smoked it was so endearing you
know and what I found surprising was how
much my accent to them made me more
privileged and made me see more delicate
more sophisticated the notion that they
had that I hate the most was that my
accent made me seem somewhat more
intelligent and so how does this affect
little Nigerian children you might ask
why is this such an issue is because for
example when two children have gone home
and memory
and practiced a poem just as much as one
of another as one another and then they
come back and present that to the class
in the hopes that they can both be
entered into the school poetry
competition and yet one of them is
turned down because the girl with a
British accent quote unquote is a
teacher actually said this sounds more
intelligent that instills within them
the mentality both of those children the
mentality that what is of the West is
what is best that a Nigerian accent or
Nigerian manner Nigerian practices
Nigerian context will never be
comparable to in English and in a
country where English is the official
language therefore that someone
insinuates than a Nigerian expressing
themselves as a Nigerian accent may
never be viewed as someone with this
highest status or with as much to offer
as one who speaks as an English accent
see this post colonial mentality is one
that manifests itself in so many ways
that is just one of the examples and
while we are no longer Nigeria that is a
physical colony of Britain many
Nigerians many Africans are having their
minds in my opinion colonized by the
media today now of course I can’t
directly say that without taking into
account the fact that colonization is
not something that one can just throw
out there’s being recreated because of a
few media biases and assumptions of
course not the effects of colonization
are too great to quantify and I won’t
simplify them as such also people can
argue that what is happening today with
the media and portrayals that are as an
effect of the hierarchy of the racial
hierarchy that has been embedded within
so many post-colonial nation societies
as an effect of colonization but what
I’m here to discuss on negative images
and their effects on members of
like myself more often than not blacks
are portrayed as dangerous or servile
uneducated or unattractive in a lot of
Western media and the thing is be it
that doesn’t just affect the way we are
portrayed in other countries because if
you take Nigeria for example where I
come from on the radio on the television
on the internet these are the images
that we see these are the shows that we
watch the movies that we watch Hollywood
is not something that is lost or trapped
or boxed in to the United States for
example it’s something that transcends
borders of countries look at the images
that we have of Africa in the media I’ve
always had a hard time associating the
images of abject poverty of violence at
the media cells of Africa with my home
in Nigeria and that’s what course can be
attributed to the fact that I won’t lie
I am privileged not just as a Nigerian
not just as a black person or an African
but as a human being I’m grateful to God
for all of the things that I have and
the fact that I haven’t been exposed to
war to poverty to famine a lot of the
things that unfortunately many people
had to deal with many people suffer
today tomorrow yesterday but my problem
with the way the media portrays Africa
it’s not misrepresentation I have a
problem with under-representation Africa
is a big continent there are more than
50 countries but it is so often
generalized but you have even figures
within politics such as Joe Biden refer
to the whole of Africa as one country
look at in the 1980s song by the band
band aid it was titled do they know it’s
Christmas and it was written or
performed in response to famine in
Ethiopia and yet the whole song is
addressed to the whole continent of
Africa with degrading lines such as
nothing ever grown
it never snows the only water that ever
flows are their tears in Africa do they
know it’s Christmas time at all how does
that make me feel I mean first of all
these are straight-up fallacies it’s
just wrong
Africa is a concept that has so many
different climatic regions you have
tropical climates such as that which
exist within Nigeria you have the desert
you have the savanna so generalizing and
just giving straight up incorrect facts
or assertions it’s just plain unfair and
that’s just one way in which Africa is
underrepresented and misrepresented
another is that a lot of Western
television shows and Hollywood movies
don’t in my opinion often enough feature
distinctly African characters and cast
members a lot of the time the closest
that we black Africans get to having
Africans in these movies and TV shows is
African American actors or Afro British
actors and actresses and so how does
that affect us well as a youth I can
tell you for free that growing up
watching television shows what listening
to music we so often see characters that
we have a lot in common with as those
that we can emulate more than others so
things like age ethnicity the people
that we see the images of people that we
see that we feel we have something in
common with become our role models I
remember for example that I loved Hannah
Montana but I always found Raven from
that serene but somewhat more relatable
for me I find that so many of my peers
back home in Nigeria especially the boys
enjoy adopting aspects of African
American hip-hop culture especially as
portrayed by the media
I want to some of the negative effects
of this the fact that a lot of the time
these images that are associated with
aspects of that culture are very
negative you see young black men on
television
being abusive aggressive images of
aggression men committing acts such as
suspect criminals at what is shown on
television you had men beating women
black men I’m referring to what does
that make young men view as acceptable
as worthy of emulation what do they
therefore aspire to become or look at
the images that we have of young black
women you see I come from as I said
Nigeria most of us are black many of us
are like my skintone but of course
there’s a wide range she had people
significantly lighter than me people
rather darker than me and so when I
watch television shows or when I see
music videos and the women who are
deemed as beautiful are significantly
lighter than me then maybe if I didn’t
have a mother who affirms me constantly
that I am beautiful then I’m supposed to
be proud of Who I am because of what I
have to offer it not because of the
color of my skin then maybe I would have
been many of the women buying bleaching
creams today because they feel as if
they are not beautiful enough as black
women as dark women dark women and
television shows a lot of the time in
Western media especially shows from the
United States even though specifically
meant to empower African Americans
feature dark-skinned women as less
attractive less desirable aggressive
angry they’ve been dealt a bad hand of
society so I’ve told you about the
effects on one who looks at these and
looks at the media for images that they
feel they can relate to and some
characters that perhaps they can emulate
but what happens when one doesn’t adhere
to certain stereotypes and by speaking
with the accent that I do and dressing
the way that I do by being able to
relate to ask
that said more than one culture in the
way that I have I’ve been nothing but
myself for my whole life but to too many
people I’ve always been different I’ve
been an exception to the norm it’s
incredibly unfortunate the number of
times that someone has walked up to me
and said you’re not black enough and
what does that mean well I’ll tell you
when it strongly suggests it suggests
that I’m not angry enough all the time
not poor enough it suggests that maybe
I’m too confident or I’m not enough of a
replica of a dark-skinned
african-american female as negatively
portrayed in way too many Tyler Perry
movies you don’t sound black enough you
don’t sound African enough you are an
Oreo you’re not really African and all
of these translate to you aren’t cookie
from Empire nor are you Eddie Murphy
from coming to America or maybe even
Lupita Nyong’o from 12 years a slave you
see a lot of the images that the media
sells as I have tried to illustrate are
negative overly simplified generalizing
an education of course is what enables
us to see through these constructions
and protests allowing them to remain the
status quo but my sadness lies in the
fact that the media is also a mirror and
that it reflects what society actually
believes what people think the notions
that they have and what that means to me
is that we are very far from achieving
equality and open-mindedness and that is
why people like me
Africans blacks dark-skinned women are
portrayed in the ways that we so often
up so members of society I look to you
today and I have a few questions why do
we always feel the need to put labels on
everything and everyone
do we not realize that when we do such
so simplistically we ignore the
individuality originality complexities
and even contradictions that lie within
ourselves as unique human beings my talk
today is a call for all of us to not
allow our minds to be soiled fertile for
seeds of under-representation
misrepresentation and the effects there
are to be sold by the media because
these seeds germinate into negative
preconceived notions and therefore
impose limitations on our own ability to
reason independently so please let us
make blank pages of our minds today
because that is the only way that we can
truly see ourselves in the ways that in
in the ways that we actually are and not
with the 2-dimensional character traits
that the media has assigned us on the
basis of our skin tone or our gender our
socioeconomic status our belief systems
etc because only then will we truly be
in charge of our present and our
identities but also our future and our
destinies thank you very much [Applause]