Precious in the Cultural Context of Race and Sexuality - Movie Review Example

Sexual cultures Sexual Cultures The issue of race, gender and sex is not new to the world, ever since these terms have arrived and understood as a common element of societies; the issue of race and sexuality has changed several shapes and is tackled differently at different parts of the world. Several theorists, moralists and particularly feminists have done a lot of work in this regard. In today’s ultra-modernize and technology world, where sex (other than spouses) have become very common in most societies, media, internet and educational institutes are spreading great awareness amongst the masses. It is not a hidden fact that due to severe colonialism over the Africans, Blacks are imagined and considered to be immoral, illiterates, inhumane, hypersexual and evil. All such definitions of blacks were based on false assumptions and propositions so as to suppress them in front of the colonial powers, particularly Whites. That is why Blacks always remain inferior and even when several of them migrated to places like America; they never attain a social position due to their own ambiguities and great social and ethnical differences (FOUCAULT 1978). In this essay, the discourses of race, gender and sexuality are discussed in the context of theory and culture. It will examine the effects of colonialism over the sexual aspects of different races, particularly its effects on African Blacks who move to different parts of the world. To get a better understanding of what is going to be discussed, a glimpse of American drama film “Precious” shown in the year 2009 would be very helpful in the cultural context of race and sexuality. The film was actually based on a 1996 novel “Push”, which is a story of African American Family which explores the discourse of sexuality in terms of race, particularly the culture of sex in African Blacks. The story is about a teenage illiterate and obese girl “Precious”, who was continuously sexually abused by her own father, from whom she got pregnant twice. This is a great misery of black culture that sex is important for them in any case, no matter who is the mate. Precious lived with her family and her mother was too, a physical and mental abuser for her. The small teenage girl imagines herself in a world of love, in contrast to which she was actually living, a traumatic, miserable life. As her mother continues physical violence over Precious and her two children, she ran away from home and found peace in a church. There she also continued her studies which were left long ago. There one day, her cruel mother arrived to tell her that her father died as he had AIDS, so due to excessive sexual abuse by him Precious was also HIV Positive. She remain in-touch with an earlier friend and social worker who called her mother to get insight into Precious’s past and all those physical and sexual abuses she faced. She found startling facts and was very sympathetic to Precious. In the end, Precious was surviving with her education going on and with her children (FLETCHER & SAPPHIRE 2007). This novel and film is a clear depiction of the racial issue that relates to sexual aspects of life. Also, it shows that colonial discourses have been rooted deeply into the Black literature and cinema. The western concept of “otherness” is shown as West considers the entire outside world the “others”, particularly those upon who they made their colonies. They consider them non-whites, treated harsh with them and forced them to consider themselves the inferior ones. Along with otherness and colonialism, West imagined and introduced the concept of Orientilism, according to which they are the most superior and all other nations, particularly colonizers inspired from their knowledge and their modes of living (Said 1979). Being a white is supposed to be of supremacy and extreme adequacy, thus they introduce and fantasize such concepts by which they can force themselves over other people. Blacks were initially slaves of them, and even when they start living with them in the same society, they were never treated equally. Whites used science and techniques to rule over them and consider them to be established by scientific evidences, thus they made even science a racial biased thing. Hence there always remain a racial unbalanced hierarchy between blacks and whites (Dyer 1997). When we match the above description with the film “Precious”, we see the clear depiction of social imbalance produced by abnormality and frustration with the feelings of being inferior. This is the main reason why there are much gender and sexual differences amongst Blacks. Precious’s family was poor, they lived on welfare and were illiterate so that they cannot earn for themselves. Due to these circumstances, the family become frustrated and the father used his own daughter for sexual purposes, and they both suffer from AIDS. On the other hand, those who were White have a better social status like that social worker who met Precious. That is why Precious always remains in a world of fantasy and imagine herself to be a white woman, this depicts the value of whiteness amongst blacks. All those things and phenomena which are related to adequacy, civilization and education are bounded to whites only and blacks always remain deprived of these things. The females of blacks were never considered beautiful as compare to white women as the beauty was only associated with them (Hooks 1981, JACKSON & SCOTT 1996). Black men were considered of extreme masculinity which repelled white community as they do not admire lethal structures. But this was one of the sexual and social politics by whites as if any of them have lethal and strong built, he was considered to be at heavens. Black men were only associated with sex that they do nothing but sexual abuses and rapes in their homes and fail to accommodate themselves in a proper civilization and thus they remain dysfunctional, as that of Precious’s family (Mercer 1994). Due to this image of black women, it was supposed that they are hypersexual and always available for such tasks while white women were considered pure and pious. In black societies, males are considered sexually dominant just like precious’s father; they are thought to be out of control by their physical desire which is why he becomes a rapist of her own daughter. They are considered sexual predators due to which whites remain abstain of them and never thought to have sex with them. As in the novel and in the movie, Precious’s father’s face or character is not shown; only his body is shown in order to depict the high level of sexual and physical dominance. Thus African blacks are thought to be a mindless thing with only bodies what they have all to use over females (Edwards 2006). Hence to conclude, the novel and the film Precious is an ideal example of those western ideologies that are associated with black race about sex and related issues. The film clearly depicts those images which were deliberately made by whites in order to reinforce blacks so that they remain inferior of them. That is why they introduced the concept of otherness by which they treat blacks like aliens and avoid them as much as possible so as to make them naturally deviant. It is the moral duty of the society to eliminate all such elements if it really wants to be a civilized and cultured one. Such portraying of blacks and the inhumane behaviour with them must be condemned at every level and at every part of the world. They are not colonizers anymore!! Bibliography MERCER, K. (1994). Welcome to the jungle: new positions in Black cultural studies. New York, Routledge. SAID, E. W. (1979). Orientalism. New York, Vintage Books. EDWARDS, T. (2006). Cultures of masculinity. London, Routledge. HOOKS, B. (1981). Aint I a woman: Black women and feminism. Boston, MA, South End Press. JACKSON, S., & SCOTT, S. (1996). Feminism and sexuality: a reader. New York, Columbia University Pres. FLETCHER, G., & SAPPHIRE. (2007). Precious (based on the novel Push by Sapphire) DYER, R. (1997). White. London, Routledge. FOUCAULT, M. (1978). The history of sexuality. New York, Pantheon Books. Read More