Final Assignment Description – Kobi White

My topic is:

Toxic masculinity with African American males through the music industry and how that bleeds over into the lives of every day African American males

I chose it because:

I thought about “Charlene” by Anthony Hamilton and I noticed the emotion that was evident in his music video. I figured that I could make a topic out of this because I notice that it’s not just with Anthony Hamilton, but with a lot of the male R&B singers within the music industry.

The pieces of media I am using are:

Anthony Hamilton’s “Charlene” music video

Tyrese’s “Stay” music video

Maxwell – “This Woman’s Work”

The 3 keywords I will be applying are:

• Stereotype
• Representation
• Intersectionality

How does this topic speak to media, culture, and identity?

This topic speaks to media, culture, and identity due to the fact that African American men are always portrayed in a negative light but these artists with their music have shown that men can indeed be emotional human beings. At the end of the day, we are all human regardless of our race or gender. This is a culture that has been shaped through the media portrayal of the stereotypes of African American men being lazy, thugs, or uneducated.

In-class readings/media and scholarly sources I plan to cite are (identify at least 5):

• Kimberle Crenshaw’s TED talk regarding intersectionality
• Stereotype reading from Ellen Seiter in Keywords for Media Studies book
• Representation reading from Lisa Henderson in Keywords for Media Studies book
• Two scholarly articles