Performing Disidentification and Disrupting Neoliberal Multiculturalism in HBO’s Random Acts of Flyness
Bibliographic Data
| ID | 21687601 |
|---|---|
| Authors | Nimalan Yoganathan (corresponding author) |
| Year | 2022 |
| Volume | 27 |
| Issue | 1 |
| Pages | 38-47 |
| Publication date | 2022-01-02 |
| Peer Reviewed | Yes |
| Open Access | No |
| Type | ARTICLE |
| Venue | Performance Research (JOURNAL) |
| Journal identifiers | ISSN: 1352-8165 • E-ISSN: 1469-9990 |
| Publisher | Informa UK Limited (PUBLISHER • GB) |
| DOI | 10.1080/13528165.2022.2091847 |
| OpenAlex | W4315745070 |
| Language | EN |
| References cited | 19 |
The HBO television series Random Acts of Flyness (2018) created, written and directed by Terence Nance along with a collective of young black filmmakers reconfigures tropes of the variety sketch comedy genre to critique dominant representations of blackness. This article examines how Nance and his team adopt novel and creative approaches to decentring the white gaze in order to hone in on the nuances and multi-faceted nature of blackness, thus challenging essentialist notions of fixed identities. I argue the show’s anti-essentialist approach can be understood through what José Muñoz (Citation1999) conceptualizes as a performed disidentification on screen. In particular, Random Acts works on, with, and against the hegemonic representational economies and discourses of corporate media as a creative tactic of disidentifying with racist forms of misrecognition such as blackface minstrelsy as well as received ideas about heteronormative black masculinity and gender. Finally, I examine how the show employs intersectional politics and a black counter-gaze to challenge neoliberal and co-opted models of diversity within the television industry that fail to seriously engage with the subjugated knowledges and lived experiences of racialized groups
Aesthetics · Art · Comedy · Essentialism · Gaze · Hegemonic masculinity · Hegemony · Heteronormativity · Intersectionality · Masculinity · Multiculturalism · Political science · Politics · Psychoanalysis · Queer · Sociology · Visual arts · Cinema and Media Studies · Gender Studies · Gender, Feminism, and Media · Law · Media Studies and Communication · Psychology
Mapping multiculturalism
The Sovereignty of Quiet
Framing News Stories
In the Time of Plastic Representation
Discipline and Punish
Sexual Discretion
The Black Image in the White Mind
We Real Cool
Stuart Hall
Listening to Images
Biopower Is the New Black, Again. Queer Bodies “Beyond Bars”
There Is No Such Thing as a Post-racial Prison
Visualizing Critique
Pedagogies of Hope
"Dust to Cleanse Themselves," A Survivor's Ethos
Black Masculinity and Visual Culture
Color-Blind Ideology and the Cultural Appropriation of Hip-Hop
| Citation velocity | historical |
|---|---|
| Highly cited | No |