In Dakota Johnson’s second crack at hosting SNL after nine years, there was an important theme of appropriation – that is sampling minority culture without context and losing the original meaning of the artifact in the interest of the majority’s amusement. We talk about socioeconomic- and race-based othering in Home Movies, black friends and black-up bands with Justin Timberlake’s musical performance of Sanctified, and the long history of the Dozens in Roast, a film by Please Don’t Destroy.
Listen at Libsyn: https://directory.libsyn.com/episode/index/id/29713968
Listen at Apple Podcasts: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/episode-10-dakota-johnson-s49e10/id1712886779
Notes
Black Up: The use of a Black back-up dancer or singer by a non-Black artist to demonstrate authenticity or street cred. See Miley Cyrus or Justin Timberlake. https://charisseiscool.com/post/59583966238/black-up
Vanilla Ice on Arsenio Hall (February 1991): https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=C39MIzv-HjY
Dozens (game) on Wikipedia: https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dozens_(game)
Readings
Abrahams, R. D. (1962). Playing the dozens. The Journal of American Folklore, 75(297), 209-220. https://www.jstor.org/stable/537723
Brown, H. R. (2002). Die Nigger Die!: A Political Autobiography of Jamil Abdullah al-Amin. Chicago Review Press. https://www.chicagoreviewpress.com/die-nigger-die–products-9781556524523.php
Chimezie, A. (1976). The dozens: An African-heritage theory. Journal of Black Studies, 6(4), 401-420. https://www.jstor.org/stable/2783770
Corsbie-Massay, C.L. (in press). Mediated Socioeconomic Injustice: Representations of Poor and Working Class People. In Ramasubramanian, S. & Banjo, O.O. (Eds). Handbook of Media and Social Justice. Oxford University Press.
hooks, b. (1992). Eating the other: Desire and resistance, Black Looks. South End Press Boston. https://sites.evergreen.edu/comalt/wp-content/uploads/sites/253/2016/11/eating-the-other.pdf
Morrison, T. (2004). Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination. Harvard University Press. https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Playing_in_the_Dark
Rourke, C. (1931). American humor: a study of the national character. https://www.nyrb.com/products/american-humor
SNL101 
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