Reflection post: Amos and Andy

This short YouTube clip was a very interesting depiction of African Americans at this time. It was made in 1934, and it is clear that racism and the color line (as mentioned in lecture) is in full force. After watching this clip, I felt like it was a depiction of white peoples feelings towards African Americans during this time. As you can tell, all of the characters in the clip were African American, which means that it was probably aimed at a white audience. There is no way an audience of African Americans would be happy with a cartoon like this. All of the characters have monkey-like features, which is obviously an exaggeration of what African Americans looked like. The cartoon shows the characters with very big lips, which makes them look like monkeys. The writers of the cartoon also portrays the characters as southern, and almost makes them look unintelligent. All of the characters in the cartoon say "rassling" and not wrestling, which shows the southern slang.
I found it interesting with the way they portrayed Andy when he was wrestling his shadow. They make him look dumb, which is probably what the writers wanted to do. When Andy is wresting his shadow he runs into the wall and also continuously swings and misses when swinging at his shadow. What I took from this was that the writers wanted to portray the fact that African Americans are worthless. Andy can't even beat his own shadow, which makes him look like he is worth less than his own shadow. Andy even says "Can't even beat my own shadow". When Andy finally gets into the ring, they make moose look like a very ugly animal, and they even show him turning into a moose at one point. At one point in the cartoon, Andy rides moose like some sort of animal. One last thing that I found interesting was when Andy's friend gave him the wreath to put around his neck and Andy says that they want him to hang the wreath around his neck "like I was race horse" With this line the writers are trying to predict African Americans as horses and animals all together.
Overall, this is an extreme exaggeration of African American lifestyle during this period. They were looked down upon, and white audiences got a laugh with cartoons like this. These cartoons were a way to keep African American morale down, and to also entertain the white community. The color line is clearly in place. There is not even any white characters in this cartoon. The writers could use cartoons as a symbol of how they viewed African Americans.