[Orin Kerr, January 22, 2007 at 11:58pm] Trackbacks
"A Good Week for Blacks in Popular Culture":
Over at BlackProf, my colleague Paul Butler has a very interesting post noting black achievement in popular culture right now:
Three of the top five movies feature predominately African-American casts. Three of the top five songs are by black artists (and the remaining two artists- Fergie and Nelly Furtado - would be nowhere without African-American producers). Barack Obama has the best selling hardcover non-fiction book in the country. Three of the top ten paperback non-fiction best sellers are by blacks (and a fourth- the Freedom Writers Diary - is an anthology that prominently features African-American writers). And two African-American coaches are going to the Big Dance.
  And perhaps most interesting of all, most of these achievements aren't considered newsworthy.
M. Simon (mail) (www):
Rex IS our quarterback.
1.23.2007 1:13am
Tom9239:
the "Big Dance" is the NCAA tournament, to which more than two black coaches will be going. Dungy and Smith are going to the Super Bowl.
1.23.2007 1:31am
Constantin:
The last one's considered newsworthy. I know, because I've seen it mentioned on the news approximately two hundred times in the past twenty-eight hours. But, as I've been assured by the mentioners, they'd like nothing more than not to have to mention it any more.
1.23.2007 1:51am
SimonD (www):
Yes, and a mainstream media reporter has written a book that goes out of its way to demolish in the public mind the (MSM-created) myth that the only black member of the Supreme Court shouldn't really be there. Of course, that's technically outside of the criteria for Paul's list, but it's still a positive development.
1.23.2007 8:05am
magoo (mail):
Bears' coach Lovie Smith is the lowest paid coach in the NFL (1.2M), nothwithstanding the fact that he was Coach of the Year last year. Happily, that will change soon. But I hope Dan Snyder has many sleepless nights over this.
1.23.2007 8:48am
DNL (mail):
Yep, not newsworthy at all.
1.23.2007 9:23am
Pol Mordreth (mail):
And, of course, while we celebrate all these "accomplishments", we are still reminded of the persistant racism we have to endure..... heh

1.23.2007 9:55am
Pol Mordreth (mail):
http://www.politico.com/news/stories/0107/2389.html

this was supposed to be a link in my first post, sorry...
1.23.2007 9:56am
WHOI Jacket:
But which one of them will be the first black coach to LOSE the Super Bowl?

My votes on Lovie....
1.23.2007 10:00am
George Barnes (mail):
What I think is most interesting of all is that we still have to put up with claims that black discrimination is just as bad as it always has been.
1.23.2007 11:08am
asdfjkl; (mail):
"The dance" can be a generic phrase for the highest level in any sport. Minor league baseball players talk about getting to the dance - meaning the big leagues.
1.23.2007 11:19am
Mongoose388:
Obama's timing stinks, he should have waited until February, otherwise known as BLACK HISTORY MONTH to make his anouncement.
1.23.2007 12:25pm
HLSbertarian (mail):

"The dance" can be a generic phrase for the highest level in any sport. Minor league baseball players talk about getting to the dance - meaning the big leagues.


But they're quickly corrected that it's called "the show."
1.23.2007 3:12pm
Aaron:
Whereas Dungy and Smith made it to the "Big Game!"

It's noteworthy because there have only been 10 black head coaches in the NFL since the merger.
1.23.2007 3:48pm
Mark Field (mail):

Obama's timing stinks, he should have waited until February, otherwise known as BLACK HISTORY MONTH to make his anouncement.


He did. The January announcement was preliminary. The official announcement will be in February.
1.23.2007 4:23pm
Bob in SeaTac (mail):
The Big Game is the Cal Stanford football rivalry game. Go (California) Bears!!!
1.23.2007 8:19pm
Deoxy (mail):
"And perhaps most interesting of all, most of these achievements aren't considered newsworthy."

That's because non of them ARE nwsworthy... unless you are a racist. Note that w hear about that last thing INCESSANTLY.

I DON'T CARE what race thos people are. Only racists do (or people having to contend with racists, possibly).
1.24.2007 3:33pm
Chuck (mail):
And there best achievement to date is the three city with top black populations all hold title as the murder capitals of America with new Orleans taking the lead in the first month of 2007.
2.3.2007 12:08pm