𝕊ℂ𝐇𝐄𝐁𝐑𝐄𝐖𝕀𝕊ℝ𝔸𝔼𝕃𝕀𝕋𝔼𝕊: Why the Increase in Black Memes
Channel: HEBREW ISRAELITES (Charleston, S.C)
Date: 24/11/2022

Key Words:
#livingwhileblack
#blacklivesmatter
#israelitelivesmatter
#hebrewisraelite
#CulturalAppropriation
#CulturalDenigration
#anti-black memes
#caricature

Key Terms:
Cultural Appropriation
minstrelsy
Cultural Denigration
caricature

References:
https://journals.uic.edu/ojs/index.php/fm/article/download/10420/8325
https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-cultural-appropriation-5070458
https://www.wpr.org/your-favorite-meme-chances-are-it-was-influenced-black-culture
https://www.theguardian.com/culture/2018/jul/08/why-are-memes-of-black-people-reacting-so-popular-online

Abstract:
The subject today explores how structural racism encodes itself into social media. Subjects include: Digital Blackface and racism on social media

I AM:
 An Israelite who invests in thinkers—journalists, scholars, filmmakers, and public policy analysts—who generate big, bold ideas that have an impact and spark new conversations about the most pressing issues of our day. The book, film, and multimedia projects that brethren will work on during their fellowship will cover a wide range of policy topics, such as the emergence of the global anti-Israelite agenda, the colonial roots of global mental health, the civil rights movement, (which we'll extend to Human Rights) wealth inequality as seen through the gaze of service workers,(not middle-class) endangered languages, and more. 

Why:
Why the increase in black memes:
Why are memes of black people reacting so popular online?

1 of 3
Excerpt: from Lauren Michele Jackson's "Your Favorite Meme? Chances Are It Was Influenced By Black Culture"
Cultural commentator Lauren Michele Jackson says the chances are pretty good that many of your favorite memes were created and/or influenced by black culture. It's an argument she makes in her book, "White Negroes: When Cornrows Were in Vogue ... and Other Thoughts on Cultural Appropriation."
-(your audio-soundbite)
-https://www.wpr.org/your-favorite-meme-chances-are-it-was-influenced-black-culture

Cultural Appropriation:
 What Is Cultural Appropriation? 
Cultural appropriation refers to the use of objects or elements of a non-dominant culture in a way that reinforces stereotypes or contributes to oppression and doesn't respect their original meaning or give credit to their source. It also includes the unauthorized use of parts of their culture (their dress, dance, etc.) without permission.

 Appropriation
Appropriation refers to taking something that doesn't belong to you or your culture. In the case of cultural appropriation, it is an exchange that happens when a dominant group takes or "borrows" something from a minority group that has historically been exploited or oppressed. 

 Cultural Denigration
Cultural denigration is when someone adopts an element of a culture with the sole purpose of humiliating or putting down people of that culture. The most obvious example of this is blackface, which originated as a way to denigrate and dehumanize Black people by perpetuating negative stereotypes.
https://www.verywellmind.com/what-is-cultural-appropriation-5070458 

2 of 3
Excerpt from: Ellen E Jones - Why are memes of black people reacting so popular online?
The online popularity of images of black people – is a fact of internet life and, in recent months, an increasingly controversial one. Racist caricature (a picture, description, or imitation of a person in which certain striking characteristics are exaggerated in order to create a comic or grotesque effect.) and impersonation are widely accepted tools of white supremacy, but it’s when minstrelsy’s 19th-century traditional tools of boot polish and a wig are replaced with 21st-century equivalents that the confusion begins. 
(minstrelsy - the form of entertainment associated with minstrel shows, featuring songs, dances, and formulaic comic routines based on stereotyped depictions of black Americans and typically performed by white actors with blackened faces.) 
Are gifs being used to disseminate/spread racist stereotypes in cyberspace? 
Was the “black marching band dances to Fleetwood Mac” meme an example of “digital blackface”, as suggested in a recent high-traffic Twitter thread? Is there something problematic about white people using brown-skinned emojis? And what about the Black Lives Matter Facebook fundraising page that was revealed to be run by two unaffiliated white men in Australia? 

It’s significant that digital blackface’s first boom period, around the turn of the decade, coincided with the Obamas moving into the White House.   ”

The point, however, is that all these instances of digital blackface exist within the same cultural context: a racist one.   says Lauren Michele Jackson, the Chicago-based cultural critic whose 2017 Teen Vogue article first brought the notion of digital blackface into the mainstream. And, yes, that would include deliberately using the wrong colour emoji.