Soc. 3251W Race, Class, and Gender

I totally agree with your opinion. The whole setup, especially the lack of speech and yet the presence of sound effects in the video inflict mindboggling slew of thoughts to the audience. The beginning with the white person playing with the controls which give him the power to change setting of environments of people. Even though unintentional, the change in controls brings about undesirable noise in the environment of the black person, however, the similar looking controls bring light music to one white man. At the same time there always remains a white person who does not feel the effect of any change. The changes bring a mixed feeling among all the people, but as knowledge in the form of a book appears, people look at it and feelings in the background subsides and curiousity takes over. On pushing the limits of the controls, the curiosity forces the white man with higher consciousness to go out of his boundaries to look for something and on his way out, he reaches the controls(with knowledge). I believe it represents a holistic picture of the society as it stands with people suffering, people being apathetic, and people gaining consciousness to gain control and hopefully steer the society into equality and a better future.

Although I did not get a chance to view it, this sounds like an excellent video. It would probably be a great visual learning piece in any classroom. The simulation of the white man getting the path of a circle and the black man only getting the choice of a straight line is a great comparison of the inequalities between different races. I veiw the path of a circle as more options and freedom, and the path of a straight line as restricted and limited. I also found the sound to obstacle analogy very smart. A white man could associate an obstacle with harmoinc music because he has the options in most instances to overcome his struggle. He can remain calm and relaxed, like harmonic music does to a person, because he knows he can overcome the obstacle. On the otherhand, a black man, especially in this scenario, does not have the options that the white man does to overcome a problem. He does not always have the support and encougagement like the white man. The fact that he heard a loud unpleasant noise just goes to show the roughness of their life sometimes. I also think that the way the video ended is a clear statement of the unfairness between races.

I completely agree with the first commenter’s analysis. I found this movie extremely interesting in its distinct view of race. I was a bit disappointed that the opening scene portrays a middle-aged white male in a suit controlling the paths and experiences given to the three other individuals, although this is reality in many cases. In addition, I found it a bit disappointing that this movie was very “black-and-white� in that it portrayed no other races. It seems to me that the majority of media coverage/movies/articles/etc. focuses on issues as “black-and-white� issues which make segregation embedded into our culture through the media. Furthermore, it is unfortunate that other races are completely disregarded within media coverage. Although minorities are not being segregated in this way, they are being completely IGNORED!

Back on track… In the conclusion of this movie, we see all three individuals gaining “knowledge� in the form of a book. Although all of them open the book, only the young white male takes in the knowledge and “steps out of his box.� Once he does, however, we find that he gains power to control all other individuals once he has simply stepped out of his box. It is only then that viewers understand that the other individuals had limited ability to step outside of their “boxes� (really a line and a circle) in order to gain this power.

**On a side note, did anyone find it interesting that no women were pictured in this movie? As a woman, I feel that a great deal is lost by ignoring a woman’s perspective from this analysis. I question if this movie would have been different if there was a white woman controlling 3 individual white and black women.**

***Also, I regret that I failed to analyze the sound aspect of this movie. Although I understood that the sounds were different for each individual, I didn’t really understand the reasoning behind the sound choices. ***