Do African Americans Direct Science Fiction or Blockbuster Franchise Movies? Race, Genre, and Contemporary Hollywood

Abstract

While scholars have long considered the relationship between genre and Black film production, less is known about African American directors’ participation in contemporary Hollywood film genres, especially the spaces where they are least included. An examination of post-2000 Hollywood films reveals that Black directors are routinely underrepresented in the most financially lucrative film genre, science fiction, and are therefore denied the success that comes with it. The underrepresentation of Black directors in the science fiction genre operates in dialogue with racialized ideological discourses about the place of African Americans in U.S. society—stereotyping them out of intellectual cultures. Race-bound practices of marginalization in science fiction films, and thereby top franchises, also impedes Black directors’ ability to attain the highest levels of economic success in the Hollywood film industry. Both outcomes present material and symbolic barriers for the complete inclusion of African Americans in contemporary media institutions and in U.S. society.

Transmediating difference: Fictional filter bubbles and transmedia storytelling

“…Therefore, for Erigha (2016), the growing prominence of transmedia and convergence culture implicitly promised that transformations in distribution, technology, and participation would also engender changes in the ideological content of the mass media. Approaching television and films as just one component in an overall storyworld wherein numerous individual stories and narrative elements might unfold greatly multiplied the number of characters who could provide their own perspective on the narrative's events, and even tell their own separate stories, offering audiences multiple vectors for identification.…”

Valuations of diversity: The role of marquee quotas in creative industries (Working Paper)

“…Integration into artistic communities is not simply a demographic issue of recruitment or retention. Symbolic boundaries and colorblind racism operate in ways that make entry into certain communities more difficult for people of colour than it might otherwise appear (Berrey 2015;Bonilla-Silva 2006;Erigha 2016;Hall 2006;Li 1994;Saha 2017Saha , 2018.…”

Race in the Marketplace

“…11. There is also evidence of racial inequality among creators in other cultural fields such as literature (Corse and Griffin 1997) and film (Erigha 2016).…”