Whitewashing in Hollywood silently affects our children

The reaction to the 2016 Oscars, which birthed the trending topic #OscarsSoWhite on Twitter, highlights a serious problem in our country — a lack of representationfor non-white communities. Watching a movie in the 1950s is still somehow reminiscent of today. We have put an end to blackface, the practice of coloring a white person’s face with paint to fill the role of a historically non-white character without hiring an accurate representative. Yet major blockbuster films did not commonly hire non-white characters for major roles until just recently. Our movies now typically feature a white cast, with the exception of a few minor roles played by people of color. For the second year in a row, the Oscars failed to recognize the comparatively few roles played by minorities. By doing so, the institution feeds into an endless cycle.https://digitalcommons.library.umaine.edu/racial_justice/1186/thumbnail.jp