Max minghella social network indian7/30/2023 ![]() “Jessie” reduced him to just his ethnicity Ravi only wore traditional Indian clothes on the show and played the sitar, a traditional Indian instrument. ![]() On “Jessie,” Ravi displayed every possible stereotype of an Indian person - his entire character arc was based on having the best grades and a non-existent social life, an exaggerated accent, and never being good enough for girls or love. Little did I know that Ravi would turn out to be a mix of watered-down racism and Disney-friendly distortions of South Asian culture. I had wished for so long to see someone of a similar age to me, who looked like me, go through everyday life on TV, so I was over the moon when I first saw the promos. I was constantly yearning for someone to share my perspectives, a character I saw myself in and to whom I could relate.Īs I got a little older, Ravi Ross arrived on the Disney Channel show “Jessie,” and for the first time, I saw a South Asian actor play a main character on a major TV show. But the lack of real representation of South Asians on TV for my age-group audience made me feel a deep sense of shame about my skin. I’d received the standard talks growing up: what to do if someone treated me differently because of my Brown skin, how to love the brownness of my skin, how to be proud of where I come from, and how I might need to stand my ground in the future. Subscribe to Assembly by the Malala Fund to learn about the next generation of female leaders.Īs a girl of colour, I struggled to resonate with the lack of representation I’d see on the big screen.Listen to podcasts such as The Nila Extract, Brown Girls Do It Too, and Sarees on Screen.Follow and support Instagram pages such as Brown Girl Magazine, Crown the Brown, and Indian Feminist.Marvel,” “Never Have I Ever,” “Master of None,” and “Midnight Mass” are good starts. Watch, read, and listen to media that is created by and captures the lived experiences of South Asian people without reverting to stereotypical portrayals.As Aziz Ansari says in his show “Master of None”: “They managed to get a fake Indian, but a real robot.” Little did I know that the Indian scientist was played by Fisher Stevens, a white actor in Brownface. I thought that movie was incredible because the main character was a scientist and he was inventing new things. ![]() But I didn’t realise just how bad the representation of Brown people was until I learned the truth about the movie “Short Circuit 2.” When I was younger, we had an old cassette of this movie which tells the story of an Indian scientist and his robot. ![]() My whole life, society has expected me to relate to stereotypically represented characters like Apu from the Simpsons, who was voiced by a Caucasian man with the most exaggerated Indian accent and an inauthentic surname that even Indian people struggle to pronounce. Sometimes, they weren’t even played by a South Asian actor - like when Max Minghella played Divya Narendra, an Indian American character (and real-life person!) in “The Social Network” or when Ashton Kutcher wore Brownface to play a Bollywood reporter in an advertisement for Popchips. They were sadly just a side character with stereotypical characteristics like a fake or overexaggerated accent, purposefully long and complicated names, and highly conservative, nerdy, naive, “exotic,” and “mystical” personas who were either the supporting characters or the root of an ongoing joke. Whenever a film or an episode on TV came out with a South Asian character in it, my initial excitement would be drowned by waves of disappointment when I realised that this character - whom I wanted to relate to - would not be the main focus of the show. as a young Brown, Tamil girl, I quickly noticed that there was never anyone on TV, in movies, or even in books and magazines who looked like me.
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