As a child, whenever I watched TV, I never saw somebody who looked like me. It was hard to dress up as my favourite character from a movie. Tiana was great but I loved Belle’s dress the most. It was only when I started watching Disney Channel that I got to see Zendaya in Shake It Up and I could think that maybe I looked a bit like her. So many kids grow up not being able to see themselves in their favourite characters from the shows they watch every day. I couldn’t picture what it would be like to look at those characters and see what I saw in the mirror, especially growing up as a mixed child, I never got to see characters that looked even remotely like me.
Why is representation so important? Growing up, but also sometimes as an adult, it’s important to have people to look up to. Someone to represent who you could be one day, where you want to go and to be a role model for who you might become. If there is no role model you can look up to and aspire to be, it can feel as though you are not worthy in becoming someone as great and as inspiring as some of the great role models out there. Halle Bailey (the actor for the new Little Mermaid film) said, in an interview talking about the reactions of young black children all over the world to her new Ariel barbie doll, that representation is so important because “they’re able to see themselves in a character like Ariel. – We deserve to have representation where we can look and be like ‘Wow I’m worthy too, she looks like me, I have a doll that looks like me.’”. Although race is not necessarily the first thing that someone looks for in an idol, it is important to be able to see yourself in the people you look up to. To be able to imagine yourself one day becoming as amazing and powerful as the people you idolise it makes a difference if you can really picture yourself in that person, inside but also out.
I was talking to my friend about representation in cinema and television, it was nice to share opinions on this topic with someone who is also black. We got onto the topic of the new Little Mermaid movie, and I vividly remember when the teaser trailer first came out and lots of people were complaining about the fact that they had made Ariel black and used a black actress. They said things like ‘mermaids can’t be black, ariel can’t be a black person, she just isn’t black’ but… since when have mermaids existed? Aren’t they mythical creatures? My friend he said that although it’s great that young children can look at Halle Bailey’s Ariel and see someone that looks like them, why are they only making remakes of old movies and changing the characters race. Is it so hard to write a new story with an even better black princess with an even better storyline. Though I know these new diverse movie remakes are made with some good intentions, when it’s just a recycled story and recycled characters, it can come across as just not caring. Does diversity really matter to you if you can’t even take time to write new movies with new great black characters? On the other hand, there are a lot of new children’s movies with black protagonists like Strange World and The Sea Beast –
I had to watch this movie with my younger sisters, and I really enjoyed it, and I might have even cried at the end…
It’s obvious that we are (slowly but surely) moving forward, and I know that young black children today can see someone on the television that looks like them. I’m so happy that I can see the change happening and I’d like to think that we can only progress in the future, so that children everywhere can have someone to look up to.
