in_the_media

Character in middle-school skit draws protest of racism

Media Outlet: 

Baltimore Afro-American

A Virginia woman faces up to one year in jail for disrupting a middle school dance production containing a character she considered racially offensive. The woman objected to a stereotypical "Mammy" character, a caricature of African-American women who were exploited as wet-nurses in the 19th century. "Nothing can claim to be literary art that derogates human beings because of their race, religion, or gender," said Molefi Kete Asante, a professor in the Department of African American Studies at Temple. "This is nothing more than buffoonery."