Dearborn
is
my
safe
haven, a city with the highest
concentration of Arabs in all of
America, a place for people who
are just like me. Growing up,
I had the best of both worlds.
I was able to connect with
my Middle Eastern roots and
culture in a city that has the best
Mediterranean food around. I
could speak Arabic and not feel
out of place. My days would be
filled with visiting “khaltos”
(Arabic word for aunts) and
potlucks where we would eat
our days away while playing tag
outside with the neighborhood
kids who were more like family
than friends.
However, my city was never
meant to be this vibrant, lively
and diverse. Henry Ford built my
town with the intention that it
would be a slum for his workers
of color and their families, but
that backfired because he’s given
me a home unlike any other. As a
Muslim, I grew up with mosques
and
religion
surrounding
me. During Ramadan (holy
month of fasting), our bakeries,
restaurants
and
stores
stay
open until 5 a.m., but are closed
during the day because everyone
refrains from eating. Ramadan
is my happiest month because
it’s when our nightlife shines
through; kids play in the streets
until three in the morning,
families come over and stay until
“suhoor” (sunrise, when fasting
resumes for the day), friends go
out to hookah lounges and our
mosques are the fullest they get
every year for taraweeh prayer
(special Ramadan prayers). I
never grew up with a Christmas,
but I believe Ramadan more
than made up for it.
Despite all of the wonderful
things about Dearborn, I spent
my whole life fighting to get
out of its bubble. I hated the
relentless gossip and people set
in their old ways from the old
country. I wanted to see more
than my picturesque town and
I grew up with such big dreams
fighting
against
the
status
quo. And despite all of this,
now that I am in Ann Arbor, I
yearn for my town. I become
retrospective and think back to
the now defunct Arab-American
festival on Warren Street, my
old neighborhood growing up
and of my wonderful parents
who instilled in me the values
of family, culture, tradition and
community. Even though I live
only an hour away, I feel like
everything I have ever known
has been ripped away from me.
Back home, I would spend
my days eating grape leaves,
falafel,
tabbouleh,
fattoush,
etc. Needless to say, during my
first week at the University
of
Michigan,
my
pampered
taste buds found the dining
hall food bland, unappetizing
and incredibly foreign. I saw
students carrying plates filled
to the brim with food I had
never before seen in my life and
downing it all like it was nothing.
Meanwhile, I needed extra salt,
unattainable lemon slices and
unheard-of spices to season
my food, all of which seemed
wholly unavailable in the South
Quad Dining Hall. My biggest
realization since setting foot on
campus is that I may have grown
up in America, but my taste buds
are 100 percent Middle Eastern.
I don’t think I had a decent meal
besides pizza for days. This self-
inflicted “starvation” forced me
to throw away my pride, call
my mom and beg her to make
me food I could genuinely eat,
telling her I would board a bus
back home to Dearborn for the
day if she did. Now, as I sit in my
dorm room, my supply of Arab
food is dwindling and I am once
again venturing out into the
dining hall hoping for the best.
They say you never appreciate
something until it’s gone and it
has never rung truer because
now, I want my home back.
The Michigan Daily — michigandaily.com
Michigan in Color
Monday, September 10, 2018 — 3A
The definitive ranking of “Bring It On”
Hands down, the “Bring It On”
movie franchise is one of the best
series of all time. If you don’t agree
with this then you probably just
need to sit down and watch them
all again to reeducate yourself on
cinematic greatness. Time and
again, the “Bring It On” movies
have been ranked, but never
have they been ranked by their
representation of people of color,
only the quality of the film. With
the removal of the “Bring It On”
franchise from Netflix, I decided
the time had come to undertake
the task of ranking them by this
specific criterion.
* “Bring it On: The Musical”
will not be included in this ranking
as this is solely a ranking of the
“Bring It On” films. “Bring It On:
Worldwide #Cheersmack” will
also not be included in the ranking
simply because the movie sucks
and is an embarrassment to the
“Bring It On” franchise.*
5. “Bring it On: Again.”
This placement should come as
no big surprise as the first “Bring
It On” sequel was one of the least
successful movies in the franchise
and the least talked about by fans.
This lack of notoriety within the
fandom is most likely due to its stark
lack of representation of people of
color. The only named character
of color is the main character’s
(Whittier)
Black
best
friend
Monica. This does not say much
about the writer’s inclusiveness
due to the rampant popularity of
the “Black best friend” trope seen
in pretty much every ’90s to ’00s
teen movies. (i.e., “10 Things I Hate
About You”, “Clueless”, “She’s All
That”, etc.) Not only was Monica
the lone person of color in the
film, but her role was completely
relegated to fulfilling negative
stereotypes of a Black woman:
loud, sassy, rude, always talking
back and ready to give someone a
piece of her mind.
Overall, the movie had an
extreme lack of representation
of people of color, and the one
character
that
made
up
its
representation completely fulfilled
a stereotype.
4. “Bring It On: In It to Win It”
Just like “Bring It On: Again”,
the only main person of color is
the Black best friend. Though the
main character’s love interest is
extremely ethnically ambiguous,
he also could just be white with a
heavy tan. So, we’ll keep the tally
of actors of color at one and a half.
(After research, I discovered that
the actor is actually half-Filipino,
but his race is never mentioned nor
in question throughout the whole
movie, so he will remain ethnically
ambiguous.)
But back to the Black best friend.
Just as in “Bring It On: Again”,
the character is a stereotype of a
Black woman complete with slang,
a fiery attitude and an eagerness to
start fights. But even worse than
the character Monica in “Bring
It On: Again”, this movie’s Black
character, Aeysha, is even more
shockingly over the top with her
one-liners and phrases that try to
solidify how “Black” she is. Such
phrases include “You know a cheer
Crip can’t be hitting it with a cheer
Blood.” She actually compared
two of the biggest and most violent
gangs in American history to
opposing cheerleading teams and it
was played for laughs.
However, “In It To Win It”
narrowly tops “Bring It On: Again”
because, despite lines like the
aforementioned, there are some
redeeming moments in the movie
involving Ayesha’s subplot. One
of these moments comes when
she’s going completely over the top
trying to prove her “Blackness” by
twerking in a cheerleading routine
and continuing to talk in her
caricature Black fashion. A Black
female cheer coach pulls her aside
and asks her why she’s making
a fool of herself pretending to be
this stereotype. It showed at least a
glimmer of self-awareness.
The second redeeming moment
is when Aeysha admits to putting
on this “super Black” character the
whole time to gain respect because
she used to be teased for being
an “oreo” in junior high (Oreo is
the taunting nickname given to
Black kids who are perceived as
being “white on the inside, yet
‘Black’ on the outside”). While the
movie attempted to reinforce this
good message, it didn’t go deep
enough or really followed through,
especially when the movie ended
that “touching note” with a white
character telling Aeysha, “ooh,
you’re whiter than me.” Aeysha
agrees and says she’s proud of that
fact.
3. “Bring It On: Fight to the
Finish”
“Bring It On: Fight to the Finish”
is significantly better than the first
two, simply because it is one of the
only “Bring it On” movies to have a
main character of color, a working-
class Latina named Lina. Rather
than giving the exaggerated image
of what it is like to be a person of
color from a white perspective
like the other movies, “Fight to
the Finish” gives a person of color
a chance to helm the story. This
movie does a great job stripping
the norms of the “Bring It On”
franchise by making the upper-
class white cheerleaders the evil
antagonists. It also includes a love
storyline including an interracial
romance of Lina and the popular
white basketball player in her new,
predominately white school. In
the end, the movie does a good job
showing people can work across
class and racial differences to
succeed and work together for a
common goal.
The only problem I have with
this movie in particular is even
though Lina is Latina and is of
Latinx heritage, that’s never really
celebrated. She speaks Spanish
with her family but that’s about it.
Everyone in her old neighborhood
from East Los Angeles is either
Black or Latinx, but neither of
their cultures or heritages are
celebrated. All of them are just
grouped together by the social
identity of being lower class or
“poor,” and that’s how they’re
referred to for the whole movie.
Being a person of color in the movie
is just equated to being poor and
their individual identities as people
of color are just erased. Also to top
it all off, the movie still has the
cringey stereotypical role of the
Black best friend.
2. “Bring It On: All or Nothing.”
Two
words,
Solange
and
Knowles. And one more word,
Rihanna. Okay, but star-studded
cast aside, “Bring It On: All or
Nothing” does a great job with
its people of color representation.
The storyline is flipped from the
storyline of “Bring It On: Fight to
the Finish”. A privileged white
girl, Britney, moves to Crenshaw
Heights, an inner city close to Los
Angeles. At Crenshaw Heights,
Britney learns to check her white
privilege and that (gasp) people of
color aren’t that different from her.
This movie has some of the best
representation of people of color
in the franchise as multiple main
characters are Black or Latinx.
REEM ABURUKBA
MiC Columnist
Yearning for the comfort of home
The need for more POC rom coms
When I first watched Netflix’s
original film “To All the Boys
I’ve Loved Before”, my mom was
there, and we hesitantly clicked
on the trending movie. Obviously
no longer in our teenage years,
we were sure our enthusiasm
wasn’t going to match the hype.
However,
minutes
into
the
movie, our living room rang with
boasting laughter and dramatic
gasps, an easygoing warmth
emerging as we relaxed more and
more into the lighthearted story
of Lara Jean Covey and Peter
Kavinsky.
When I watched it for a second
time, my aunt was there, and
we sipped beautiful magenta
Youthberry white tea together.
With every sugary sip, I lost
myself a little bit more in the
sweetness of Covey’s whimsical,
bubblegum
pop
romance.
I
soaked up the predictable, but
charming love story, secretly
wishing for my own Kavinsky.
When I watched it for the third
time no one else was there, and
I laid cuddled up in my blanket,
my eyes watching the screen but
my thoughts caught in tangles.
I began to wonder why I found
myself
watching
this
movie
repeatedly when hundreds of
other selections were only clicks
away. Dejectedly, I realized it
wasn’t the trope-filled storyline
that kept me coming back. It
wasn’t even the cute boy. It
was the starry-eyed simplistic
depiction of romance with people
of color, one that isn’t afforded to
people who look like me.
When I chose not to watch it
for the fourth time, I thought to
myself, “When will Black women
have their Lara Jean Covey and
Peter Kavinsky?”
“To All the Boys I’ve Loved
Before”
is
Netflix’s
newest
romantic comedy that is breaking
the internet for not only its playful
plot, but for its wonderful Asian
representation in a carefree,
lighthearted film. Coming out
only two days after the critically-
acclaimed “Crazy Rich Asians”,
the film tells the story of 16-year-
old Lara Jean Covey, a mixed-
race Korean-American girl, and
her not-so-pretend relationship
with high school heartthrob
Peter Kavinsky.
This movie was the non-
cultural exposé for which I
didn’t know I was yearning. It is
incorrect and dismissive to call
the film post-racial; however, “To
All the Boys I’ve Loved Before”
is revolutionary because, as a
romantic comedy, it portrays
the race of its main character
without centering its entirety in
combating negative stereotypes
and racial hardship.
Too
often,
movies
with
predominantly
Black
casts,
or movies that feature Black
characters
in
general,
focus
only on Black stories that have
an element of trauma. We know
them as our slavery-themed, civil
rights era, Tyler Perry’s Christian
guilt storylines. We also, however,
know them as our indie Oscar-
nominated films that have begun
to dominate the box office.
Regretfully,
I
struggle
to
name critically- acclaimed Black
movies without racial trauma at
its core. Films like “Moonlight”,
“BlacKkKlansman”,
“Sorry
to
Bother You”, and “Dear White
People” need to be produced, and
they feature amazing storylines
that deserve recognition. But I
can only wish the Black movie
experience can become more
diversified to showcase movies
with race-based trauma can exist
at the same time and in the spaces
as movies that choose not to.
In the same token, if “Get
Out” can exist to make Black
interracial relationships a plot
point for horror and thriller,
movies that show lighthearted,
romantic, bubblegum pop Black
interracial relationships should
and can exist, as well.
It is unfair for the success
of Black film to ride on the
exploitation of trauma. It is
also unfair for Black folks to
be voided of cinema that lets
Black experiences flourish. It’s
why action movies like “Black
Panther”
and
comedies
like
“Girls Trip” are revolutionary;
it’s because they show Black
characters in dynamic roles that
are usually reserved for white
characters.
The movement for lighthearted
Black
representation
extends
beyond the realm of film. We’ve
seen it in photographer Myles
Loftin’s
multimedia
project
HOODED, a project to humanize
Black men dressed in hoodies;
social media movements such as
#BlackBoyJoy, #BlackMenSmile
and
#CarefreeBlackGirl;
Quil
Lemons’
photo
series
“Glitterboy”; and numerous other
projects focused on presenting
alternative
depictions
of
Blackness.
People of color are craving
representation that exceeds the
limited scope of narratives that
have historically been portrayed
in film. As a hopeless romantic
and a lover of love, I am craving
a predictable, trope-filled, cringy
romantic comedy with a Black girl
unapologetically loving and being
loved. It is time that we see Black
representation that flourishes just
as much as it does in quality as it
does in innocence and sweetness.
Maybe one day, Black women,
too, will have their Lara Jean
Covey and Peter Kavinsky.
NA’KIA CHANNEY
Senior MiC Editor
EFE OSAGIE
Assistant MiC Editor
Read more at
MichiganDaily.com