This week in lecture we watched the movie Cedar Boys. Cedar Boys was a film about Middle Eastern boys who fall into the world of crime and drug dealing for some quick money. This film fit both the genre of last week (crime) as well as this week, which was multiculturalism. Up until this point, we have not seen many films that included any race besides white Australians. It was very interesting to see how the movie painted a picture of how these Lebanese boys were accepted into society. For example, they were not allowed into the club the first time they tried. They had to drop names to the bouncer in order to be let in. It was just interesting that the film used Lebanese boys as the culprits in this film instead of white Australians, and it gave me an understanding of the frustration Lebanese kids may have to go through growing up in the western suburbs of Sydney.
The first article that we read for this week had to do with SBS Minority TV. We discussed this article a lot in tutorial. I found this article very interesting because SBS (Special Broadcasting Service) is “a small public television channel in Australia.. and it’s mandate is to be both multicultural and multipurpose. The channel has to service various cultural communities, reflect multiculturalism to all Australian and add diversity to the broadcasting system.” It has put all of these ethnicities, cultures, sexualities, and races into one channel. It allows Australians to see programs outside of their typical Anglo-American TV shows.
There have been many arguments about this television show because some like it while others do not. For example, some believe it as a voice of multiculturalism that needs to be protected, while others look at it as problematic. Multiculturalism has not been huge in Australia. In the other articles we read we learned how their stereotyped different races. Khoo’s article talked about how “Asians do not fit comfortably into any of the film’s categories such as ‘the bushman’, ‘the convict’, ‘the digger’, ‘gays’, ‘wogs’, or ‘blackfellas’.” Instead Asians have often been looked at in film as almost a structure of sacrifice. As Khoo states again, “that is, the deaths function symbolically in the creation of a coherent self-identity for those who witness it.” Another article by Dolgopolov that states, “Russian have endured negative, politicized typecasting and concomitant portrayals as mad and excessive.” Basically he is saying Russians are often looked at as crazy in Australian film.
Going back to the different arguments that are discussed about SBS TV, I see both sides but I think that overall, SBS is just trying to raise awareness of the different cultures and broaden Australia’s awareness. However, people against SBS do raise some very valid points. Some look at this issue in the perspective that we are treating multiculturalism like something we have power over and it stages power relationships this way. They also make the point that they are containing these cultures into such a small space: “A notion of multiculturalism whereby minority identities are managed in a sphere separate from the non-multicultural ‘majority’ (Smaill)”
As I said, overall I think that SBS is doing what they can to give Australia a broader range of multiculturalism than they’ve ever had before. SBS started out as a small radio show and has grown into a quite popular TV show. Maybe as the years go on, it can grow into something even larger that does not keep multiculturalism in such a defined small space.
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