Books of the Times;
Pop Culture Conjures a Transracial American Dream
Michiko Kakutani
The New York Times
September 9, 2002
AMERICAN SKIN
Pop Culture, Big Business and the End of White America
By Leon E. Wynter
Anyone who's been watching television the last couple of years will be familiar
with what Leon E. Wynter calls "the browning of mainstream commercial
culture" in America. It's not just the high profile of black superstars
like Michael Jordan and Oprah, and mixed-race celebrities like Tiger Woods (and
the "American Idol" runner-up Justin Guarini). It's ads like
the 2000 Budweiser "Whassup?!" commercials, featuring four
little-known black men talking black street talk, and the 1999 Pepsi ad starring
a little white girl who can channel Aretha Franklin. It's Brandy playing
Cinderella (with Whitney Houston as her Fairy Godmother) in Disney's 1997
television remake, and Eddie Murphy succeeding Rex Harrison in the role of
Doctor Dolittle. It's black women going blond, and white women wearing
dreadlocks, and suburban kids grooving to hip-hop.
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