Quiz time!

When was the last time you saw a series that starred (not as a featured player, but the series protagonist) a young woman of color (Black, Arab, API American, Desi, Latina, Native American, multiracial) who

  • wasn’t the sidekick-BFF of a white person; and
  • wasn’t the girlfriend of a white person; and
  • is starring in a comedy-drama or dramatic series?

That’s So Raven satisfies the first two points, I know, as did Taina and Moesha. I’m racking my brain trying to think of just one that scores on all three bullet points, and I’m lost. Especially when it comes to Asian American and Native American representation - for the former, being recognized as American in mainstream TV series (without exoticization at play) is a relatively recent (and rare) development, and for the latter, well, TV writers stay acting like there aren’t any more Native Americans left, unless they’re tragic or a quick joke about casino money.

I’m not posting this just to be like, “wow, this sucks” (although obviously it does); I’m posting it because Youtube, Vimeo and the like have been giving me a lot of hope when it comes to independent distribution of programming. I feel like I’ll have to start looking there more and more to see the people missing from the big networks’ agendas. I wonder how many people have to do that kind of a switch before anyone starts paying (non-lip-service) attention.

9 Notes/ Hide

  1. thefavoredson reblogged this from humanformat and added:
    Ugly Betty (Latina) has the first and third points - her love interests were mostly white, though. The Parkers (Black)...
  2. humanformat reblogged this from crankyskirt
  3. sdotmarymartha said: Girlfriends. I miss that show.
  4. shana--e said: Being Human UK almost fits the bill with Annie.
  5. readnfight said: A Different World! So last time was almost 20 years ago.
  6. delicatetbone said: sister sister also maybe? but yeah.
  7. crankyskirt posted this