This is perhaps the best article I've read which makes sense about what is really behind the backlash against the film SELMA that resulted in the Academy snubbing its brilliant black director, Ava DuVernay and, by extension the actor who played MLK, David Oyelowo. Clearly, Ms DuVernay tells many truths in this film that capture the humanity and spirit in the black experience at a critical juncture of its history. Given the current events in Ferguson, New York and Ohio the presumption of black humanity seems to have been in question in the tragic killings of unarmed young men. SELMA affirms that humanity by demanding that we look at the intimate, affective black experience in the Civil Rights Movement rather than just watch it in the abstract from the comfort of safe, distant "history." This article by Brittney Cooper makes an outstanding contribution to our understanding of that experience in all its complexity and fullness.
This is perhaps the best article I've read which makes sense about what is really behind the backlash against the film SELMA that resulted in the Academy snubbing its brilliant black director, Ava DuVernay and, by extension the actor who played MLK, David Oyelowo. Clearly, Ms DuVernay tells many truths in this film that capture the humanity and spirit in the black experience at a critical juncture of its history. Given the current events in Ferguson, New York and Ohio the presumption of black humanity seems to have been in question in the tragic killings of unarmed young men. SELMA affirms that humanity by demanding that we look at the intimate, affective black experience in the Civil Rights Movement rather than just watch it in the abstract from the comfort of safe, distant "history." This article by Brittney Cooper makes an outstanding contribution to our understanding of that experience in all its complexity and fullness.
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