Question 3

3) Discuss the way in which race is portrayed in these two videos:
a. Ghetto Delta Airlines-
b. Everest College advertisement-
How are they the same, and how different? (50-75 words)

Both videos construct what it “means” to be African American, though they make this argument in different ways. The Everest video makes a statement about “black culture,” without being critical of it. The Ghetto Delta Airlines the same kind of stereotypical information, but is critical in doing so.

Both videos make a comment on African Americans being lazy. Ghetto Delta Airlines says things like “straight sittin’ on yo ass” and Everest says things like “You spend all day on the phone anyhow” and “yur sittin on the couch, watching T.V. and your life is passin’ you by. You keep procrastinatin’.” Both construct African Americans as being uneducated as can be seen by the slang used in both videos (with Ghetto Airlines being the most exaggerated) and the fact that the Everest commercial is in fact a commercial for black people about higher education. Both videos also contain other stereotypical indicators of black culture, like the man’s crooked hat in the Everest video and the rhyme scheme used by the blond man in the Ghetto Airlines video.

The videos are different strictly based on the idea of the Critical Post-Modern View versus the Aesthetic Post-Modern View. The Ghetto Airlines is depicting the critical, but the Everest video is only the aesthetic. The Everest video flattens the signifiers of “blackness” to appeal to black people. It doesn’t make a statement about the stereotypes that it creates. The Ghetto Airlines video, on the other hand, moves beyond the aesthetic and into the critical. In the Ghetto Airlines video the stereotypes are exaggerated to the point where you know that it’s exaggerated, bringing in the elements of “thick” women, gangs, and slander towards women. Additionally the statements are being made by the stereotypical white man with a “white” accent, making a sharp contrast between the two.