By Samantha Brant ’19, Contributor
The Oscars, a formal ceremony that gives awards and honors people from every aspect of filmmaking for amazing achievements, occurs annually towards the end of February. Some of the awards include Best Actress/Actor in a Leading Role, Best Costume Design, Best Visual Effects, and Best Director. It is a wonderful thing to honor all of these people, so why are many people not going?
The Oscars definitely are not lacking in talent, but they do have a lack of diversity. For example, all of the actors and actresses nominated for their leading and supporting roles are Caucasian. Not a single one of them is African-American or Latino. Oscar nominee Charlotte Rampling disagrees with that belief that the Oscars are not diverse. She believes that the Oscars are “racist against whites,” and that “black actors did not deserve to make the final list.”
In total, there have been 66 African American actors/actresses nominated for an Oscar in leading or supporting roles out of 1,760 total nominees over the years, which is 3.75% of the nominees. Only 15 of those nominates actors have won, and that number will not increase, because this year, no African American actors/actresses are nominated. There have been many movies with African-American actors in them that have gotten positive reviews from many communities in other years, but almost all of those movies are about slavery. For example The Help, and 12 Years a Slave are both very well-liked movies, but the roles for African Americans in both of those movies are slaves.
Looking back at the Oscars over the years and seeing how few nominations and awards African-Americans have been receiving, it is easy to see how little recognition this ethnic group is getting, and these numbers are even less for other minorities like Latinos and Asians. Many viewers and actors/actresses alike have decided to boycott the Oscars this year in protest of this lack of diversity.
Sources:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_black_Academy_Award_winners_and_nominees
http://variety.com/2016/film/news/charlotte-rampling-oscar-boycott-racist-to-whites-1201686158/
http://oscar.go.com/news/nominations/best-actor-nominations-2016-oscars
http://www.dummies.com/how-to/content/a-brief-history-of-the-oscars.html
