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Black Oscars: From Mammy to Minny, What the Academy Awards Tell Us about African Americans
A timely exploration of Oscar-nominated Black actors and the complicated legacy of the Academy Awards.
In Black From Mammy to Minny, What the Academy Awards Tell Us about African Americans, Frederick W. Gooding Jr. draws on American, African American, and film history to reflect on how the Oscars have recognized Black actors from the award’s inception to the present. Starting in the 1920s, the chapters provide a thorough overview and analysis of Black actors nominated for their Hollywood roles during each decade, with special attention paid to the winners. Historical patterns are scrutinized to reveal racial trends and open the question of whether race relations have truly changed substantively or only superficially over time.
Given the Oscars’ presence and popularity, it begs the question of what these awards reflect and reinforce about larger society. In the meticulously-researched Black Oscars, we see how the Academy Awards are an indispensable guide to understanding race in mainstream Hollywood and beyond.
In Black From Mammy to Minny, What the Academy Awards Tell Us about African Americans, Frederick W. Gooding Jr. draws on American, African American, and film history to reflect on how the Oscars have recognized Black actors from the award’s inception to the present. Starting in the 1920s, the chapters provide a thorough overview and analysis of Black actors nominated for their Hollywood roles during each decade, with special attention paid to the winners. Historical patterns are scrutinized to reveal racial trends and open the question of whether race relations have truly changed substantively or only superficially over time.
Given the Oscars’ presence and popularity, it begs the question of what these awards reflect and reinforce about larger society. In the meticulously-researched Black Oscars, we see how the Academy Awards are an indispensable guide to understanding race in mainstream Hollywood and beyond.
- GenresFilmRaceNonfiction
312 pages, Kindle Edition
First published May 24, 2020
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December 21, 2022
As a disclaimer, I should say that while I love movies, I have zero interest in the Oscars. Black or White. The red carpet, the $150,000 gift bags, the self congratulatory adulation of ultra wealthy people, definitely not my thing.
The Oscars however are undoubtedly a huge part of American culture and as such can’t be easily dismissed if you want to understand where America was and is socially at a particular moment in time.
Gooding’s book attempts to view the black experience in America through the Oscars and a series of rubrics he created to judge whether the paltry number of Oscar nominations and wins by black people (77 nominations, 19 wins at the time of publication) reflects any progress in how people of color are represented in film.
To give a small example of the categories he created:
1) Black non-American: Where black actors from other countries play roles in American films.
2) Deja Vu: Denotes actors like Denzel Washington and Sidney Poitier who have either won or been nominated for multiple Oscars.
3) Still in the Struggle: Films that depict black people as struggling either financially or emotionally with a problem based on race
4) Crossover: When a black actor comes from a field other than acting such as a musician, comedian or other as opposed to a classically trained actor.
There are at least a dozen more but these 4 appear in his criticism the most so any discussion of this book perhaps starts here.
When I first read these I was intrigued. I wanted to see how he used them but found myself increasingly frustrated as almost any film he discusses falls into one of these categories.
While I wouldn’t argue that these things do occur in films with black actors, they are also extremely limiting. Do we dismiss a Denzel film because he’s a great actor and therefore has garnered multiple nominations? Or are we arguing that he’s only nominated because he’s “safe” for the white academy?
In a similar vein, why should black actors or studios for that matter limit themselves to classically trained actors. I understand that the infrastructure for aspiring black actors needs to be better but at the same time, if a musician can act, I fail to see a problem.
The “black non-American” category in particular troubled me. He cites as an example the lead actor in Jordan Peele’s “Get Out” who happens to be British but uses an American accent in the film. The author’s criticism is based on his belief that a black British actor doesn’t have the same insight into racial issues in America that a black American actor would.
This is of course assuming that black men from say, London, don’t experience racism. Perhaps racism does have its own specific cultural nuances but at the same time, I think being black in a white society, any society, probably prepares you pretty well for some nasty things.
I also took issue with his seemingly dismissing any black/white friendship in a film as being some kind of dog whistle that “good” black people are always willing to sacrifice themselves for whites.
Yes the power balance in some films is certainly problematic but arguing for example that Sidney Poitier sacrificing his life for his white friend is racist because Poitier “gains nothing from his sacrifice” is odd. Friendships, black or white, are usually not so transactional. Actual friends do sometimes make sacrifices for each other without weighing what’s in it for them.
Finally, while the author has some really interesting background information on the first black Oscar winner, Hattie McDaniel for her role in Gone With the Wind, (the ceremony that year was specifically held in an integrated hotel so that McDaniel could attend and yet she was not allowed near the stage. Rather she was sat at a table out of view with a white “chaperon”).
In 2022 we can certainly debate whether McDaniel’s role as the maid “Mammy” was racist. Some academics argue that she was subverting the white power structure in the film by being the one Scarlett relied on, while others argue that her agency was limited to being a maid.
Whichever side you come down on, McDaniel herself repeatedly said that she was proud of her work in the film and if she thought it was harmful to other black people she would have never done it.
The author however dismisses McDaniel’s words by arguing that as the daughter of an actual slave, McDaniel didn’t understand what she was doing by performing in that role:
“Perhaps because she was the daughter of former slaves, McDaniel’s victories were viewed and treasured differently, relatively speaking. McDaniel herself stated that ‘if I had for one moment considered any part of the picture degrading or harmful to my people I would not have appeared therein’.
Unfortunately, she may have been too close to see clearly. As the daughter of sharecroppers, she was directly affected by the economic evils of racial discrimination. Thus, her personal history may have primed her to the point where it did not take much to persuade her that she was making significant change relative to her original socioeconomic position.”
Arguing that she was a kind of naive dupe is for me, patronizing in the extreme. Who is he to say how McDaniel should have felt about her role? He may wish that she condemned the role and the film but she did not.
And that ultimately is where the book falls apart in that the author has a very specific idea of what films including black people should look like, even if it runs contrary to historical accuracy. When he criticizes the Mandela biopic “Invictus” for Mandela not holding a grudge and seeking revenge after being released from prison because it might injure white sensibilities I had to ask myself, he’s talking about Nelson Mandela right?
Does he really believe that the reason Mandela doesn’t go on a revenge tour is because it would make white people uncomfortable? Of course the actual Mandela did nothing of the kind so it’s fanciful in the extreme to muse about this kind of historical revisionism simply to satisfy your particular issue. So when he writes:
“One of the movie’s early scenes features an older, genteel, and gray Mandela lecturing a younger official named Jason about the power of using ‘forgiveness as a weapon.’
While this may be true, Americans did not dump tea in Boston Harbor, kicking off the American Revolution, in the name of forgiveness. In other words, messages of forgiveness and patience appeal to the Romantic racialist sensibilities that revenge is never the proper course of action, even after suffering wrongfully from the ravages and savages of racial apartheid.”
I didn’t know what to do with this paragraph. The author may be unable to understand how Mandela could forgive his tormenters but that’s not Mandela’s issue. Yes, white people like to see non-violent black people. But Mandela actually was non-violent (at least after prison. HIs life pre-imprisonment is another subject).
If you make a movie about him you can’t have him shooting at every white person he sees (or dumping tea in the harbor apparently).
When he compares a peaceful Mandela in “Invictus” to the fictional Killmonger in Black Panther who actually did seek out weapons to get revenge, I was done with this book. Mandela, actual human being with words and deeds. Killmonger, a figment of someone’s imagination. There is very little that is instructive in comparing them.
Ultimately by the time I got to the end, his criticisms of films with black actors (he found two out of 77 nominated and 19 winners that weren’t objectionable) just became tedious.
White people and black people friends? Bad.
Denzel nomination? Racist.
A film set in 1950’s Mississippi depicting Octavia Spencer and Jessica Chastain in a feel-good friendship?:
“…Would be a better movie if the power dynamics were reversed. It would be fascinating to see whether audiences would have been as receptive had the power and aesthetic dynamics between the two been reversed”.
Because there were lots of black people in 1950’s Mississippi who were in positions of power over white people right?
“Lady Sings the Blues”?:
“The final analysis is that this movie fits established patterns of non-free Black women and embodies the Physical Wonder archetype in that her singing talent remains the central feature of Holiday’s appeal.”
Considering that Holiday is in fact known and loved for her singing, is he suggesting that a film that revolves around her talent is racist? Would a film about Muhammad Ali not focus on his boxing?
I wondered at times if the author actually enjoys watching movies as he claims to.
He is so deep into his academic rubrics about what “black” films should look like that he is unable to step back and say that interracial friendship doesn’t always have to mean something, or that Denzel Washington is just a really good actor. We may not like history, but it functions as a marker as to where we were as a society and where we are heading. We aren’t entitled to make Mandela into a bitter man bent on revenge simply because that is how we feel, any more than we can tell Hattie McDaniel that she shouldn’t have been proud of being the first black person to win an Oscar.
Instead let us watch and learn from film history. Watch critically yes, but watch with an understanding that not every film will cleanly fit the narrative we imagine for it.
The Oscars however are undoubtedly a huge part of American culture and as such can’t be easily dismissed if you want to understand where America was and is socially at a particular moment in time.
Gooding’s book attempts to view the black experience in America through the Oscars and a series of rubrics he created to judge whether the paltry number of Oscar nominations and wins by black people (77 nominations, 19 wins at the time of publication) reflects any progress in how people of color are represented in film.
To give a small example of the categories he created:
1) Black non-American: Where black actors from other countries play roles in American films.
2) Deja Vu: Denotes actors like Denzel Washington and Sidney Poitier who have either won or been nominated for multiple Oscars.
3) Still in the Struggle: Films that depict black people as struggling either financially or emotionally with a problem based on race
4) Crossover: When a black actor comes from a field other than acting such as a musician, comedian or other as opposed to a classically trained actor.
There are at least a dozen more but these 4 appear in his criticism the most so any discussion of this book perhaps starts here.
When I first read these I was intrigued. I wanted to see how he used them but found myself increasingly frustrated as almost any film he discusses falls into one of these categories.
While I wouldn’t argue that these things do occur in films with black actors, they are also extremely limiting. Do we dismiss a Denzel film because he’s a great actor and therefore has garnered multiple nominations? Or are we arguing that he’s only nominated because he’s “safe” for the white academy?
In a similar vein, why should black actors or studios for that matter limit themselves to classically trained actors. I understand that the infrastructure for aspiring black actors needs to be better but at the same time, if a musician can act, I fail to see a problem.
The “black non-American” category in particular troubled me. He cites as an example the lead actor in Jordan Peele’s “Get Out” who happens to be British but uses an American accent in the film. The author’s criticism is based on his belief that a black British actor doesn’t have the same insight into racial issues in America that a black American actor would.
This is of course assuming that black men from say, London, don’t experience racism. Perhaps racism does have its own specific cultural nuances but at the same time, I think being black in a white society, any society, probably prepares you pretty well for some nasty things.
I also took issue with his seemingly dismissing any black/white friendship in a film as being some kind of dog whistle that “good” black people are always willing to sacrifice themselves for whites.
Yes the power balance in some films is certainly problematic but arguing for example that Sidney Poitier sacrificing his life for his white friend is racist because Poitier “gains nothing from his sacrifice” is odd. Friendships, black or white, are usually not so transactional. Actual friends do sometimes make sacrifices for each other without weighing what’s in it for them.
Finally, while the author has some really interesting background information on the first black Oscar winner, Hattie McDaniel for her role in Gone With the Wind, (the ceremony that year was specifically held in an integrated hotel so that McDaniel could attend and yet she was not allowed near the stage. Rather she was sat at a table out of view with a white “chaperon”).
In 2022 we can certainly debate whether McDaniel’s role as the maid “Mammy” was racist. Some academics argue that she was subverting the white power structure in the film by being the one Scarlett relied on, while others argue that her agency was limited to being a maid.
Whichever side you come down on, McDaniel herself repeatedly said that she was proud of her work in the film and if she thought it was harmful to other black people she would have never done it.
The author however dismisses McDaniel’s words by arguing that as the daughter of an actual slave, McDaniel didn’t understand what she was doing by performing in that role:
“Perhaps because she was the daughter of former slaves, McDaniel’s victories were viewed and treasured differently, relatively speaking. McDaniel herself stated that ‘if I had for one moment considered any part of the picture degrading or harmful to my people I would not have appeared therein’.
Unfortunately, she may have been too close to see clearly. As the daughter of sharecroppers, she was directly affected by the economic evils of racial discrimination. Thus, her personal history may have primed her to the point where it did not take much to persuade her that she was making significant change relative to her original socioeconomic position.”
Arguing that she was a kind of naive dupe is for me, patronizing in the extreme. Who is he to say how McDaniel should have felt about her role? He may wish that she condemned the role and the film but she did not.
And that ultimately is where the book falls apart in that the author has a very specific idea of what films including black people should look like, even if it runs contrary to historical accuracy. When he criticizes the Mandela biopic “Invictus” for Mandela not holding a grudge and seeking revenge after being released from prison because it might injure white sensibilities I had to ask myself, he’s talking about Nelson Mandela right?
Does he really believe that the reason Mandela doesn’t go on a revenge tour is because it would make white people uncomfortable? Of course the actual Mandela did nothing of the kind so it’s fanciful in the extreme to muse about this kind of historical revisionism simply to satisfy your particular issue. So when he writes:
“One of the movie’s early scenes features an older, genteel, and gray Mandela lecturing a younger official named Jason about the power of using ‘forgiveness as a weapon.’
While this may be true, Americans did not dump tea in Boston Harbor, kicking off the American Revolution, in the name of forgiveness. In other words, messages of forgiveness and patience appeal to the Romantic racialist sensibilities that revenge is never the proper course of action, even after suffering wrongfully from the ravages and savages of racial apartheid.”
I didn’t know what to do with this paragraph. The author may be unable to understand how Mandela could forgive his tormenters but that’s not Mandela’s issue. Yes, white people like to see non-violent black people. But Mandela actually was non-violent (at least after prison. HIs life pre-imprisonment is another subject).
If you make a movie about him you can’t have him shooting at every white person he sees (or dumping tea in the harbor apparently).
When he compares a peaceful Mandela in “Invictus” to the fictional Killmonger in Black Panther who actually did seek out weapons to get revenge, I was done with this book. Mandela, actual human being with words and deeds. Killmonger, a figment of someone’s imagination. There is very little that is instructive in comparing them.
Ultimately by the time I got to the end, his criticisms of films with black actors (he found two out of 77 nominated and 19 winners that weren’t objectionable) just became tedious.
White people and black people friends? Bad.
Denzel nomination? Racist.
A film set in 1950’s Mississippi depicting Octavia Spencer and Jessica Chastain in a feel-good friendship?:
“…Would be a better movie if the power dynamics were reversed. It would be fascinating to see whether audiences would have been as receptive had the power and aesthetic dynamics between the two been reversed”.
Because there were lots of black people in 1950’s Mississippi who were in positions of power over white people right?
“Lady Sings the Blues”?:
“The final analysis is that this movie fits established patterns of non-free Black women and embodies the Physical Wonder archetype in that her singing talent remains the central feature of Holiday’s appeal.”
Considering that Holiday is in fact known and loved for her singing, is he suggesting that a film that revolves around her talent is racist? Would a film about Muhammad Ali not focus on his boxing?
I wondered at times if the author actually enjoys watching movies as he claims to.
He is so deep into his academic rubrics about what “black” films should look like that he is unable to step back and say that interracial friendship doesn’t always have to mean something, or that Denzel Washington is just a really good actor. We may not like history, but it functions as a marker as to where we were as a society and where we are heading. We aren’t entitled to make Mandela into a bitter man bent on revenge simply because that is how we feel, any more than we can tell Hattie McDaniel that she shouldn’t have been proud of being the first black person to win an Oscar.
Instead let us watch and learn from film history. Watch critically yes, but watch with an understanding that not every film will cleanly fit the narrative we imagine for it.
November 23, 2023
I read this book in conjunction with Oscar Wars, which was a broader history of the Oscars, because I felt that while I enjoyed that book there were some pretty obvious omissions from the story likely because the book simply couldn’t fit everything.
This book certainly did fill some of those gaps. I took a lot of knowledge away from it. But it was a slog at times due to dull repetitive analysis and poor structure. Early on the author admitted that three of his fundamental lenses of analysis were not novel ideas but that he felt he made them novel in grouping them together. Which was an odd tone to take that I felt persisted throughout the book. Other reviewers have done more justice to looking at the times the authors voice injected into the analysis too strongly, so I will leave it there.
What I will say is the book is a net gain. Especially if you’re reading it in conjunction with a book like Oscar Wars that didn’t show the full picture.
This book certainly did fill some of those gaps. I took a lot of knowledge away from it. But it was a slog at times due to dull repetitive analysis and poor structure. Early on the author admitted that three of his fundamental lenses of analysis were not novel ideas but that he felt he made them novel in grouping them together. Which was an odd tone to take that I felt persisted throughout the book. Other reviewers have done more justice to looking at the times the authors voice injected into the analysis too strongly, so I will leave it there.
What I will say is the book is a net gain. Especially if you’re reading it in conjunction with a book like Oscar Wars that didn’t show the full picture.
March 6, 2022
I thought this book was really good. I learned A LOT and was able to think about not only the context of Black Oscars in society but specially the impact that it ha had on ME. The actual analysis of each movie was boring and repetitive but that’s to be expected given that this is a scholarly piece of work and reads more like a research paper. You could easily skim through each movie. The good stuff comes before and after. I really enjoyed learning about the different themes and how they have change (or not) over time. Great work. I’m curious to see how things will change in the next 50 years. Should we just get rid of the Oscars given the historical roots? Would it be better to start with a fresh perspective? It leaves me wondering if the other awards shows has a similar pattern. I’m also wondering if we’ll see similar patterns in the Emmys? Grammys? Tonys? So many questions!!
March 29, 2024
Dry, repetitive, and very academic, the book read more like a dissertation--I wish it were more engaging. More quantitative than qualitative, it establishes a thesis statement and then argues the merits of whether black Oscar nominees/winners (the book focuses on the acting categories) were lauded for their artistry or whether the recognition appeased white/Academy anxieties and perpetuated institutional racism. I found myself nodding in agreement a few times. Solid work, but I wish the presentation went another way.
This entire review has been hidden because of spoilers.
December 29, 2021
I chose to read this book after hearing the author speak on this topic at a TCU alumni event. This is a scholarly work. Dr. Gooding goes through each decade and the Academy Awards for the 4 acting awards and the nominations for the portrayals of African-Americans. He sets up how he will evaluate each part.
It is a thought-provoking look at the Academy Awards and how African-Americans are portrayed, leaving me to wonder about what I missed or misunderstood when I saw the films.
It is a thought-provoking look at the Academy Awards and how African-Americans are portrayed, leaving me to wonder about what I missed or misunderstood when I saw the films.
June 22, 2021
I'm a huge Academy Awards fan. This book gave me a lot to ponder about the roles African American actors and actresses play in films.
Displaying 1 - 6 of 6 reviews