When the “good one” is “baaad”: Modern racism in john singleton’s shaft

John Singleton's 2001 version of the blaxploitation film Shaft reinterprets this iconic representation of Black masculinity within an explicit and self-conscious treatment of the problem of racism. The film moves from a powerfully counter-stereotypical opening scene into a nominal indictment of racism that ultimately reinstates overtly racist stereotypes and privileges racist viewpoints. This paradoxical, multivalent representation of race marks an expansion of the trope of “modern racism”: an expansion that articulates with neo-liberal discourses of race. © 2008 The Trustees of Columbia University in the City of New York.

Duke Scholars

Author Lee D. Baker Cultural Anthropology