Zip-a-dee-doo-dah zip-a-dee-ay
My, oh my, what a wonderful day!
Plenty of Sunshine headed my way.
Zip-a-dee-doo-dah zip-a-dee-ay
Mr. Bluebird's on my shoulder.
Its the truth. Its actual. Everything is satisfactual.
Zip-a-dee-doo-dah zip-a-dee-ay
Wonderful feeling. Wonderful Day.
click to watch clip:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47ak4vjiNzw
My, oh my, what a wonderful day!
Plenty of Sunshine headed my way.
Zip-a-dee-doo-dah zip-a-dee-ay
Mr. Bluebird's on my shoulder.
Its the truth. Its actual. Everything is satisfactual.
Zip-a-dee-doo-dah zip-a-dee-ay
Wonderful feeling. Wonderful Day.
click to watch clip:
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=47ak4vjiNzw
Zip-a-dee-doo-dah is a great song. Almost every little kid (and adult) can sing it a the top of their lungs, especially when they're having a really good day. However, this song has come to be taken (and perhaps made to be taken) way out of context. I actually never realized it was from the animated movie ,"Song of the South." Disney no longer officially sells this movie. It is indefinitely out of circulation because of the huge racial controversy promoted in the film. Some argue that it is more an issue of historical placement. It is set right after the civil war and so the blacks in the movie aren't slaves, but sharecroppers on a white plantation. However, the movie portrays their lives as this happy, carefree one in the care of their kind white master. The blacks are portrayed as subservient, kindly, entertainers who enjoy their life and who's goal is to serve the white people.
The question is, should we be disturbed by this harmless, quaint historical animation?
The answer is, yes.
But the reason is deeper than just the historical setting.
In that time, its a fact that blacks were not very well educated. That was a result of white man's laws. The improper speech presentation could theoretically be justified that way. But where the most racist messages come through, I believe, is through the actual animated characters. Uncle Remus tells a story to the little white boy who is trying to run away from home about Brier Rabbit. All the characters in the story are black--represented by black voices. And they are all shown to be slow, foolish, inebriated, or conniving. So what if the historical context consisted of the blacks not being as educated? What does that have the do with "black" animal cartoon characters?
The message of the film seems to be at a very base level, that not only are blacks less educated and informed by whites, but simply less intelligent. That is why at its core "Song of the South" is a very racist misrepresentation that should be understood very carefully and not just watched for entertainment purposes.
The message is not as carefree as the song would have you believe.
The question is, should we be disturbed by this harmless, quaint historical animation?
The answer is, yes.
But the reason is deeper than just the historical setting.
In that time, its a fact that blacks were not very well educated. That was a result of white man's laws. The improper speech presentation could theoretically be justified that way. But where the most racist messages come through, I believe, is through the actual animated characters. Uncle Remus tells a story to the little white boy who is trying to run away from home about Brier Rabbit. All the characters in the story are black--represented by black voices. And they are all shown to be slow, foolish, inebriated, or conniving. So what if the historical context consisted of the blacks not being as educated? What does that have the do with "black" animal cartoon characters?
The message of the film seems to be at a very base level, that not only are blacks less educated and informed by whites, but simply less intelligent. That is why at its core "Song of the South" is a very racist misrepresentation that should be understood very carefully and not just watched for entertainment purposes.
The message is not as carefree as the song would have you believe.
1 comment:
I agree, Emily. And a lot of my concern has to do with some very intangible meanings and values that surround the representations in movies like Song of the South. It came out in 1947, and I can't help but think that a nostalgic, gosh-remember-back-when-life-was-simple-and-happy depiction of poor, uneducated, but happy black sharecroppers had a fairly distinct socio-political power back then (maybe even more power than it would have today). It's that nostalgic air that worries me. If you show poor and uneducated black sharecroppers circa 1885 and the tone is one of documentary realism or social protest or tragedy or even a drama of human dignity, that's one thing. But when these happy-go-lucky quasi-free black men and women are essentially the homey backdrop for a story about a bratty, privileged white boy's coming of age, that's more problematic for me. And although some attention is paid to classism in the movie (the "poor white trash" neighbors are discussed with some seriousness in the film), there's no discourse give to why grown black people have to address white adults as if they (the blacks) were children. The poverty of the poor whites, in other words, is treated as a topic requiring explanation, while the poverty of the poor blacks is accepted as a matter of course, a staple in the way things were in the "good old days."
There's some troubling stuff in all that "zippity doo dah" happiness. I think very much of the idea of wearing masks when I see Uncle Remus, but that consciousness comes from awareness raised in other areas of my life (and from other media), not from this Disney film, which seems content to let Remus huck it up and "show dos pearly whites" all day long.
Happy? Sure! Racist? You bet, and all the more so by recasting a national shame as shared cultural memory, as if all Americans should look back to the days of slavery and sharecropping as better, simpler times.
I am now shutting up.
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