#CHIMNEY SWEEP MARY POPPINS MOVIE#

Travers have input into the script and film production? For this I turn to the Internet Movie Database, specifically the page listing the writers of the screenplay. Were Travers a scriptwriter on the film, I could consider that it was intentional. The question then, as to whether the same racism was reflected in the film on which the books were based, is debatable. Was everyone else? You can put money on it. Was Travers explicitly racist? Sure, even by 1934 standards. Travers used language of the time (as Pollack-Pelzner points out in his article) reflective of racist stereotypes. If the intention in 1934, when the book was first published, was to reflect racial caricatures in chimney sweeps, I could easily get behind that notion. The British Empire committed so many egregious acts against non-white people that it would take several lifetimes to list, let alone atone for. America especially has relied on slavery to build the nation.

Also, white people are hella racist generally speaking. This is where I am going to split hairs a little, but I have a point that I am trying to make, so bear with me. Instead, she adds more soot to her face using a compact mirror, then cavorts some more with Bert and the children, spreading racism throughout the empire. In the movie starring Julie Andrews, Pollack-Pelzner tells us how Mary Poppins, Bert, and the two kids get dirtied by soot, as is bound to happen when you hang around a man who cleans out coal- and wood-fire chimneys. Where I disagree with the writer is that the characterisation in the film, even though it came from a racist origin, is also racist in the context of the film. Nevertheless, the argument put forth in the article is that this racist association was intentional in the books (I agree with this premise), and because the films are based on the books, this characterisation is carried forward into the films (again, this is a good argument and I agree with the premise).

It’s what we comedians these days would call “on the nose” and steer clear of the association because it’s too bleedin’ obvious, guv, aside from how offensive it is. This is, you see, on account of the chief ingredient of chimneys being carbon, your honour.Īlong with the British class system, that’s more than enough raw material if I was of a racist disposition (and considering that I grew up in South Africa in the 1980s, I’m sure I could think of a bunch of things right now) to associate chimney sweeps with black people. On the other hand, chimney sweeps are always depicted as covered in soot. These are facts in evidence, and Pollack-Pelzner lists them handily. It is also true that Disney (the man and the company he founded) created and took advantage of racist conventions and ideology to produce entertainment. America’s entertainment industry (as Pollack-Pelzner points out) is built on the back of minstrel shows. The books on which the two Mary Poppins films are based (and most Western literature for that matter) is racist. This is what we’re dealing with in this case. However, it’s possible to miss the point and come to the wrong conclusion even if the entire body of your argument is correct. On the face of it, he may know a thing or two about racist representation in literature. This is in reference to an article written in the New York Times this week by Daniel Pollack-Pelzner, an American professor who lectures on Shakespeare. Twitter Disputes Claim That ‘Mary Poppins’ Is Racist Because Of Characters’ Coal-Blackened Faces This is the most ridiculous headline I’ve read today, and I’ve been awake a bunch of hours already.

Chimney sweep mary poppins