"There Can't be Two"

When looking at television and movies within the last 20 years, minorities are not always depicted accurately or represented well. In an episode of Netflix's show Master of None, Aziz Ansari's character Dev faces these types of controlling images head-on. He interviews for a role where he is asked to do an Indian accent. He later receives a leaked email saying the producer wants Dev to "curry his favor" and that "there can’t be two" referring to two main Indian characters. The episode draws attention to how Indians are usually represented on television. Often we see men with heavy accents running grocery stores or as taxi drivers. These controlling images are very predominant and even the writers of the office included this stereotype in the episode Diversity Training in The Office.

Dev also noted that there is a fair of Indian roles that are played by white men in brown face. In Short Circuit, the Indian scientist was played by the white actor Fisher Stevens. While Ben Kingsly is of Indian descent, he did an accent in the film Gandhi. Dev’s friend used that accent to justify the director's request for an accent.

Realistically, minorities like Indian Americans are hardly represented in the first place, let alone accurately. In a recent study from the University of Southern California's Annenberg Media, Diversity And Social Change Initiative, they analyzed the representation of minorities in films. Not surprisingly, American Indians had <1%representation across the top 100 films in 2014.

With the few stereotypical roles Indians’ have in film and television, they discredit the individuals of Indians which can be a negative long term affect. These controlling images are what American Indian children look up to and aspire to be. What if we could break that cycle and accurately represent American Indians as main characters without the prejudice thinking of “there can’t be two.”

Course Concept Citation: Vasquez-Tokos, J. & Norton-Smith, K. (2017). "Talking back to controlling images: Latinos' changing responses to racism over the life course." Ethnic and Racial Studies, 40(6). 912-930. https://doi.org/10.1080/01419870.2016.1201583