Yola Instagram – Swipe and read! Your first instinct would be “why not?” If you don’t consider the context of the last 30 years in the industry. If you don’t know how many people have talked about this look it up it’s mad insidious.
In my experience I’ve noticed this tactic take multiple forms. 1) An attempt to get elements of our culture out from under the hands of culturally black black people and 2) in the same breath to uplift⚪️ passing black artists or visually less racially ambiguous artists who are not culturally black and centre ⚪️ culture in particular. All forms are a dispossession and subsequent colonisation of cultural resources.
All forms need our assistance to be successful, so to refuse to play a part is a stand against the same kinda cultural appropriation that means most people still don’t know who Sister Rosetta Tharpe was. They done been doing this for decades! As you can tell by all my interviews during the Elvis movie promo period I was kinda obsessed about trying to correct that omission in American musical history. So if you wonder how it happens when we don’t know why people aren’t celebrated, this is step 1 in a long and storied strategy, and it’s peak coloniser mentality! Separate off one black person, give them wealth/accolades/rewards (for being or agreeing to stoop to being mid AF) so they can benefit from the dispossession of a whole people, sound familiar? #colonisation #culturalappropriation #cultureiswealth #munilong #kwanzaa thanks for this @beingblackislit & @munilong | Posted on 27/Dec/2024 20:22:48
