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1 Slide: Acknowledgement Of Country. Firstly, as a representative of Curtin University
and as an active participant in reconciliation I would like to proudly acknowledge the Nyungar
people past, present and future as traditional owners of this land.
2 Slide: Introduction Hello, my name is Joanne Samarasinghe and
my presentation is on Otherization, language use and stereotyping using the Holliday, Hyde
and Kullman as my starting point.
3 Slide: Thesis The dominant power’s use of blatant stereotyping
in media creates the Hispanic foreign “other.” 4 SLIDE: HISPANICS, LATINA’s and LATINO’s
I’d like to note that I will be using the descriptors of Hispanics, Latina’s and Latino’s
exchangeably. The term Hispanic is an example of a trend
in language use. Oboler (1992, 22) in her 1992 article on “The
Politics of Labelling” explains that the term has come into general use to refer to
all people whose ancestry is predominantly from one or more Spanish-speaking countries.
5 SLIDE: Homogenization This type of labelling is known as homogenization
(HHK) and Oboler (1992, 22) also agrees it is an example of implicit homogenization,
as it is a “denial of the diversity of national, linguistic, social, historical, cultural,
gendered, racial, political and religious experiences.
6 SLIDE: DECONSTRUCTION Using the concept of deconstruction I will
be analysing presentations of Hispanic’s in the media.
To deconstruct means to ‘take apart’ to enable greater insight and analysis (Holliday,
Hyde, and Kullman 2004, 2)
The Holliday, Hyde and Kullman text seeks to question representations and with this
I will explore the media’s language use, stereotyping and otherization of Hispanics
(2004).
7 SLIDE – MEDIA OTHERIZATION Hispanics have experienced otherization for
years in the media through the use of often one-dimensional stereotypes. The media is
dominated to promote the ideals of Anglo-culture and has therefore been structured to harbor
that need and to communicate the ideas of that controlling class.
*Create pic- Dominant USA- Controlling Class? The dominant force in the production of media
consumed by the world is American. In the 1970’s, respected Herbert Shiller
(1975,3) spoke of growing American power in media and how it was becoming important to
analyse the use of “techniques of persuasion, manipulation and cultural penetration” due
to the increase in use of communications and technology. He probably never imagined the
power now wielded by American media through far more sophisticated technological capabilities.
8 SLIDE: HEGEMONY -> OTHERIZATION Holliday, Hyde and Kullman (2004) discuss
that This power promotes it’s own hegemony to
the depravation of “others”. This is otherization (21-35).
Hegemony can be so subtle in society that it needs to be deconstructed (39, 123)
I will explore media examples and how this create a “foreign other” and a division
of “us” and them” through the reinforcement of stereotypes of the Hispanic self (23-24).
9 SLIDE: STEREOTYPES
Stereotypes are created, believed, and perpetuated through the media.
However, Avruch (2002, 14-15) argues that it is an inadequate idea of culture that uniformity
is distributed to all members of a group.
Roman in his 2002 article in The Journal of Gender, Race, and Justice discusses that representation
of Hispanics in the media is almost always in very stereotypical ways (Roman 2000, 39-40).
Giving blatant and pre defined characterisitics to a culture is a form of culturism.
10 SLIDE: STEREOTYPES
Another stereotype is the almost obligatory thick Hispanic accent or the portrayal of
having very poor English language skills. Consider Speedy Gonzalez as a well known example
of this. His cousin and sidekick, the lazy, drunken Slowpoke Rodriguez was even more offensively
constructed with overt stereotyping. This video also shows the lazy stereotype.
11 SLIDE: ROMAN Roman explores 4 main stereotypes of Hispanics,
number one being the hot-blooded sexy character- the macho man or the sultry curvy ***, (Roman
2000, 39-40)
12 SLIDE: ROMAN. Number two is the gangster or gang-member
who is almost always a drug dealer. , (Roman 2000, 39-40).
Take the cult 1983 movie Scarface as an example. The Title character in this Rags to Riches
tale is constructed with the following essentialist stereotypes of a Latino – he is an immigrant
- A gang member - The romantic
- Hot tempered - Family orientated
- Drug Lord
13 SLIDE: ROMAN. Number three is the Snazzy Entertainer or
portrayal as the male buffoon or female clown. (Roman 2000, 39-40)
And number four is the immigrant, often an illegal immigrant
(Roman 2000, 39-40) 14 SLIDE: STEREOTYPES
Roman (2000) argues “that these media images, myths, metaphors, and stereotypes play a critical
role in establishing society's vision of Latinas and Latinos”. In other words, these stereotypes
serve to reinforce both the characterizations of Latin and Hispanic Community from the perspectives
of both the dominant and the dominated. 15 SLIDE : ESSENTIALISM CRITICAL THINKING
Holliday, Hyde and Kullman suggest that Essentialism “needs to be defined strongly, recognized
and fought against wherever it is found.” (Holliday, Hyde, and Kullman 2004, 3)
16 SLIDE Media aimed directly at children is influential
in shaping world views and essentialist stereotyping needs to be challenged. Therefore I ask you
to consider the children’s movie “Hop”. I think it is important to emphasise that
on first look this film might look innocent because the main characters are cartoon animals
but the stereotyping is something much more insidious and damaging.
17 SLIDE The portrayal of this chicken Carlos is constructed
as the “Hispanic Other”. Of which Cassello in his 2012 Huffington post
article likens the portrayal as “Akin to the worst examples of racial and ethnic stereotyping
found in twentieth century film.” 18 SLIDE – video
19 SLIDE Note how
•Carlos is fat and less adorable than the other chicks. Shore (2011) describes the
•Other “chicks” as child-like, wide- eyed simpletons & Carlos as downright sinister.
This all ties back into Holliday, Hyde and Kullman’s concept of Otherization and “reducing
the foreign Other to less than what they are.” 20 SLIDE: Video
21SLIDE Carlos is in every way prepared for the promotion,
being second in command. But the idea strikes the retiring Easter Bunny as outlandish and
he laughs in Carlos' face. 22 SLIDE Video
23 SLIDE Video 24 SLIDE
Shore (2011) succinctly summarises that the movie’s overall message is that
if you are a Latino, you can do the work… but you'll can only advance so far. You might
make it to second place. But being first or dominant will be denied you -- and you'll
never be told why (Shore 2011). The dominant culture reinforces their power
over the foreign other. In this case subtly hidden within a children’s movie.
25 SLIDE To conclude, I have looked at the homogenization
of Hispanics. Deconstructed media otherization with the exploration of the common and fatiguing
stereotypes. As well as shown how overt and subtle essentialism needs to be critically
examined as it clearly creates the “Hispanic Other” and promotes the hegemony of the
dominant culture.
26 SLIDE - References