No Aspiration Without Representation

Meet Tip! DreamWorks’s first ever black main character.  I don’t know if you guys have heard, but DreamWorks has a new movie in the works called Home and I am beyond excited. I’m still a child at heart and extremely proud of it (I have the Disney category on Netflix bookmarked for easy access). I’ve always had a soft spot in my heart for DreamWorks over Pixar because my uncle used to work there (if you say you didn’t like How To Train Your Dragon, you are lying), but I’ve always had a slight tinge of dislike for both of them because they have more non-human characters than they do black characters. In fact, before Tip was introduced, the only black character in the CGI World of Pixar and DreamWorks was Frozone from The Incredibles.

Several other blogs are praising DreamWorks for beating Pixar to having a black female heroine, but I hope that people don’t assume that now that there is one there’s no need to continue to have anymore.  I’m no Negative Nancy, but I can’t count the number of times someone told me to stop harping over the fact that there could’ve been more diversity in Disney’s Frozen because I already got my black princess in The Princess and The Frog and that there are no black people in colder parts of Europe.

Contrary to popular belief, just because you have one token black girl in your group doesn’t mean that you suddenly have the most diverse friend group in the world.  Similarly, just because a major company has one show that features a black character doesn’t mean that it has suddenly become the most innovative, diverse company that looks out for all of its viewers. Representation on the screen particularly for black girls is so important especially when we’re in an age of technology and the number one go-to babysitter is a TV.  When we see things, we are prone to imitating them (see Social Learning Theory), but you are more likely to imitate them if you see someone who looks like you doing the thing (we didn’t get Whoopi Goldberg by chance, you guys).

If my little cousin doesn’t see black women frequently on the television as she’s growing up, it’s very likely that she’s not going to see herself as an actress because that role seems to be exclusively reserved for pretty white women with blonde, straight hair.  We push to see a larger representation of women on screen and in a non-sexual light as my friend Idiot Nerd Girl explains in her own blog, but I think it’s even more crucial to get more black women on the screen.  The same concept applies when I google image search “beautiful woman” and only see white women and the occasional Photoshopped lighter skinned Beyoncé.  Seeing nobody who looks like me on the first page of results suggests that I can’t be beautiful—which clearly isn’t the case *hair flip*.

When we watch different TV shows, we usually just accept the characters for who they are unless they are not within the status quo, even if it’s a white washed approach to a culture (See Roony Mara being cast as Tiger Lily in the next Peter Pan movie).  But when we add a featured actor/actress of color, everyone seems to lose their cool because it’s not canon (see Michael B. Jordan as Johnny Storm or Quvenzhané Wallis as Annie).

Don’t get me wrong, I’m still pumped for Home, and seeing this on the screen is a HUGE step forward for representation.  I just hope it doesn’t stop here.  The fact that we have Tip as a main character should be as surprising as having any other race being shown—but it stands out because it is rare to see African-American girls featured on the screen, let alone featured as a main character in a 3D animation film by DreamWorks.  Tip in Home is a great step forward for representation, and I’m looking forward to seeing more with my cousin in the near future.