Photoblog 3: Visual Stereotyping

Stereotypes of Movie Posters:

Africa Screams

When one first views the movie poster for Abbott and Costello’s “Africa Screams”, the mindset of the time becomes instantly apparent. Africa Screams debuted in 1949, indeed a time where stereotyping of African people here in the United States was present in all forms of media.

Bud Abbott and Lou Costello were an extremely popular comedy duo known primarily for their baseball themed “Who’s On First?” routine. With a wide series of films involving the duo traveling and encountering all sorts places and peoples, it comes as no shock that the two would eventually end up basing a film around travels to Africa. The poster for Africa Screams, as it appears above, is a blatant and somewhat shocking example of visual stereotyping of African peoples in entertainment. This gross representation of African tribesmen and women is a shock today, however in 1949 such imagery was more likely to be met with laughter; a serious issue that further perpetuated racism in the U.S.

This depiction of African people was certainly commonplace in cinema and animated works for the 1940s and later, and this stereotyping of African physical features lead to many insults and forms of hate speech becoming more widespread. The African people on the poster are portrayed as having huge lips, cartoon eyes and sharpened teeth. Abbott and Costello are much more detailed, and actually appear to resemble humans. The comedy duo are seen roasting in a giant soup cauldron, while the de-humanized African tribesmen linger excitedly with a cookbook. Stereotypes such as this were demoralizing to African Americans and perpetuated a misrepresentation of African peoples for years.

Images such as what we see in the poster instill a mentality that people of African descent are less than human; that they are amusing and savage cartoon characters for us laugh at. These portrayals were, and are still insulting to the African tribes and their descendents. Upon viewing this poster in a modern setting, one instantly feels a sense of shock or even embarrassment at these stereotypes. It is clear that no consideration was taken as to the impact such stereotypes may have had of African Americans at the time that this image was created.

Hopefully, as the U.S. continues to grow and change socially, we can continue to move away from gross stereotypes in images. Many physical stereotypes are still used today for cheap attempts at edgy humor. It is important that we move away from such ideas, as they will only do harm.