My summer favourites — BLM edition
Like a lot of you, I’ve spent this summer reading, listening and watching content that educates me on the Black Lives Matter movement. There is a ton of important academic research out there but as a film buff and book worm, I took to the world of storytelling to help me better understand the history and background behind this movement.
I’m sharing below my favourite summer book, movie and TV show that used real and fictional human stories to bring the context of the Black Lives Matter movement to life. If you’ve read or seen them, let me know what you thought!
Americanah — written by Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie
Reading Americanah was such a beautiful experience — I didn’t want the book to end. So I mean it completely when I say it’s a must read. The book claims to be a love story, but I actually thought that was the weakest link. The story is set as a love story between Ifemelu and Obinze, but what shined for me was Ifemelu’s (or Chimamanda’s) observations on race, immigration and politics in America.
The book delves into the African immigrant experience in USA and England. Ifemelu moves to America to complete her undergraduate degree while Obinze, unable to get an American visa, moves to England and ends up becoming an illegal immigrant. Two different yet shared experiences of identity changes, racism, acceptance, and belonging. Chimamanda is raw, honest and supremely perceptive. And the icing on the cake is her wonderful prose and writing style — her dialogues are real, relatable and laugh out loud funny.
The book is insightful — raising important issues about the intersectionalities of being Black, specifically an African Black woman in America. At times, the book is indulgent and the writing could use some editing, but when it’s good, it’s absolutely brilliant.
Do the Right Thing — directed by Spike Lee
Set in Brooklyn, the movie focuses on a single day (which also happens to be the hottest day of the summer) in the lives of racially diverse people who live and work in a lower class neighbourhood. It shows the relationship between a white Italian pizzeria owner and the Black local community — when one of the locals, ‘Bugging Out’ gets upset at the pizzeria’s hall of fame wall that shows only white actors, tensions arise and the wall becomes a symbol of racism. The movie’s end credits paid ode to people who had lost their lives to police officers, 30+ years later, this movie is still as relevant, if not more.
In line with Spike Lee’s aesthetic, this movie is filled with quirky, exaggerated characters and memorable dialogue. It offers an original and witty way of looking at the lives of Black people and the perspective that Black people have on life at large. It gives you an open, unbiased and non-judgemental view of why riots happen and how things spiral out of control.
You’ll find this in any BLM watchlist and it’s my favourite. It pushes your thinking and perspective but in an off-beat and subtle way.
When They See Us — created by Ava DuVernay
Currently available on Netflix, this show portrays everything that is wrong with our current police and political system. It’s a brutal viewing and I’d be surprised if you weren’t a bubbling emotional mess after watching this. This four episode series depicts the wrongful conviction of five Black teenage boys from Harlem for the violent rape and assault of a 28 year old New York banker. DuVernay is real and emphatic in showing how the NYPD detectives and the New York County prosecutors framed these innocent boys and traumatized them into false confessions which resulted in prison times of varying lengths and cruelty for each of them.
The story of the Central Park Five (as the boys were commonly known) is truly sensational. It makes you pause and think about the truth and what you thought was the truth as portrayed by the media and antagonists like Donald Trump. It’s a tragedy amplified by the current criminal justice system that actively targets black and marginalized youth. You see how they were dehumanized and how they become scapegoats of a city’s hostility and racial stereotyping.
This series opened my eyes to the atrocities certain sections of our society face because they have to comply with a system that isn’t built FOR them.
I’m sure DuVernay used her artistic license to exaggerate scenarios and I can’t comment on the accuracy of every detail but the emotion, sensitivity and intimacy of the police interrogations, the prison bullying and the convicts trying to integrate back into the real world is beyond moving. You feel so strongly for all the characters and the injustice they face will haunt you.
I haven’t felt this affected by a television series in a long time.
