The Sociology of 'Color-Coded' Image Manipulation in Euro-American Culture has been a work in progress for more than 30 years. The purpose is to convince Americans to stop deluding themselves about race relations getting better: the language that is used is a reflection that the fear, envy and hatred of that which is black and dark remains, as does the mythical belief that all that is good, clean, pure and universal is white. Sociology, for the most part, is "the study of human interaction." Humans communicate based on how they think, and that is why the image manipulation and "color-coding that is endemic to the English language paves the way for and perpetuates a fear, envy and hatred of that which is "non-white" - which means, as Dr. Frances Cress Welsing correctly contended - "the absence of whiteness." The language is evidence of how white folks view anyone who is not white. And for this reason I should note that some of the examples that I use on the following pages are as "symbolic" as they are verbal, written or otherwise tele-communicated. That is because the source of all of this is the human mind, one that transplants its fears, hatreds and jealousies into what leads to its creations. From the color of costumes, set design or reaction to the ocean or the skies, color-coding exists throughout every aspect of American life and has effectively contaminated the world. This book is written to stimulate thought. On-going documentation provides evidence that color-coded beliefs that in turn, impact on imagery and how people view the world, continues on unabated. In this book, I cover issues from newspapers, magazines, television and movies to literature, comic book super heroes, videogames and even children's cartoons. It has been said that, "He who controls images controls minds, and he who controls minds has little, if anything, to worry about from bodies." Euroamerican imagery promotes anti-color stigma and the glorification of all that is Anglo. To state this is one thing - to prove it is quite another. Dr. Molefi Asante wrote in 1988, "An ideology for liberation must find its existence in ourselves, it cannot be external to us, and it cannot be imposed by those other than ourselves; it must be derived from our particular historical and cultural experience. Our liberation from captivity of racist language is the first order of the intellectual. There can be no freedom until there is freedom of the mind (Asante, 1988: 31-emphasis added). This is my contribution to that much needed intellectual liberation.
Matthew C. Stelly is a doctoral student at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee working on a degree in Urban Education and Community Policy. He holds three Master's degrees: Urban Studies (1982), Urban Education (1983) and Political Science (2000). He is working toward his doctorate in Community Policy/Urban Education at the University of Wisconsin-Milwaukee. He is the former editor of the Milwaukee Courier newspaper, former director of the Great Plains Black Museum and the Plano (TX) African American Museum, and lead archivist for The Black Academy of Arts and Letters (TBAAL) in Dallas, Texas. Stelly has more than 2,500 articles in print and has won two national essay competitions. He is the founding director of the largest African-American neighborhood group in Nebraska, the Triple One Neighborhood Association and Parents Union. He is publisher and editor of the Triple One News, a two-time nationally recognized newsletter. He is the father of five children - Mandla, Malik, Clariece, Charisse and Shannon -- and remains actively involved in community organizing and neighborhood development in several cities, including Milwaukee and Omaha.
