An Analysis racial practices the Film mississippi burning by alan parker

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AN ANALYSIS OF RACIAL PRACTICES IN THE FILM

MISSISSIPPI BURNING

_{BY ALAN PARKER}

A Thesis

Submitted to Letters and Humanities Faculty in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for

the Strata I Degree

Mustika Dendy No. 102026024567

ENGLISH LETTERS DEPARTMENT

LETTERS AND HUMANITIES FACULTY

STATE ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY

SYARIF HIDAYATULLAH

JAKARTA

2009

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APPROVEMENT

AN ANALYSIS OF RACIAL PRACTICES IN THE FILM

MISSISSIPPI BURNING

_{BY ALAN PARKER}

A Thesis

Submitted to Letters and Humanities Faculty in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for

the Strata I Degree

Mustika Dendy No. 102026024567

Approved by Advisor

Elve Oktafiyani, SS. M.Hum. NIP. 150 317 725

ENGLISH LETTERS DEPARTMENT

LETTERS AND HUMANITIES FACULTY

STATE ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY

SYARIF HIDAYATULLAH

JAKARTA

2009

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DECLARATION

I hereby declare that this submission is my own work and that, to the best of my knowledge and belief, it contains no material previously published or written by another person nor material which to a substantial extent has been accepted for the award of any other degree or diploma of the university or the other institute of higher learning, Except where due acknowledgment has been made in the text.

Jakarta, December, 2009

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LEGALIZATION

The thesis entitled “An Analysis of Racist Practices in the Film “Mississippi Burning by Alan Parker” has been defended before the Letters and Humanities Faculty’s Examination committee on December, 2009. The thesis has already been accepted as a partial fulfillment of the requirements for the strata I degree.

Jakarta, December, 2009

Examination Committee

Chair Person, Secretary,

Dr. Muhammad Farkhan, M.Pd. Drs. A. Saefuddin, M.Pd.

NIP. 150 299 480 NIP. 150 261 902

Members:

Examiner I Examiner II

Innayatul Chusna, M.Hum. Drs. Abdul Hamid, M.Ed

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ABSTRACT

MUSTIKA DENDY, an Analysis of Racial Practices in the Film Mississippi Burning by Alan Parker. English Letters Department, Faculty of Letters and Humanities, Syarif Hidayatulllah State Islamic University, Jakarta 2009.

This research is aimed to know, the Racial Practices in Mississippi Burning Film, especially in how racial discrimination most heated during 60’s in daily American life. The writer uses qualitative method and uses descriptive analysis, where he describes per scene that related to racial practices. To support the analysis, the writer uses James M. Blaut theory to explain the scene.

The result of this study is the author knew that acts of racial practices since long bloom occurred on American soil, especially in the southern part of Mississippi. Hostility between the white and colored very thick in southern areas of Mississippi that many people-oppressed people of color.

As the conclusion, the writer finds the scenes that describe the including of discrimination like: violence, burning, kidnapping, lynching, and intimidation in

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ACKNOWLEDGEMENT

The writer would like to thank to Allah the one for divine gift of grace. He alone we ask for help, for guidance and everything. He has given the writer many favors and he has allowed the writer to finish this thesis. Praise and peace be upon the Master of the Messengers, the prophet Muhammad SAW. May we always he in straight way until the end of the world.

The writer also absolutely deserves to thank to his advisor, Elve Oktafiyani, SS. M.Hum for guiding him by counseling and advising the writer until this thesis finished. Without her guidance, this thesis will never be completed.

The writer also wants to thank to:

1. Dr. Abdul Chair, MA, the Dean of Faculty of Adab and Humanities. 2. Dr. Muhammad Farkhan, M.Pd, the Head of English Letters Department. 3. Drs. A. Saefuddin, M.Pd, the Secretary of English Letters Department.

4. Best regarded must be expressed to his beloved parents (Kasman. T & Evi Ziarni), they have supported him much morally and materially, their merits and sacrifice will never paid.

5. All of lecturers in English Department for having taught and educated him during his study at UIN.

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6. All staff of Syarif Hidayatullah State Islamic University Main library, all staff of English Department library, all staff of Cultural Science Faculty of Indonesia University library, and all staff of Atmajaya library, South Jakarta.

Finally, the writer hopes this thesis will be useful for the writer himself and for those who are interested in literary research.

Jakarta, December, 2009

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TABLE OF CONTENTS

APPROVEMENT………...…….. i

DECLARATION……….. ii

LEGALIZATION……….……… iii

ABSTRACT……….. iv

ACKNOWLEDGMENT……….. v

TABLE OF CONTENTS... vii

CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION A. Background of Study……… 1

B. Focus of Study……….. 5

C. Research Question……… 5

D. Significance of the Research……… 5

E. Research Methodology………. 6

1. Objective of the Research………. 6

2. Method of the Research………. 6

3. Data Analysis………. 6

4. Unit of Data Analysis………. 6

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CHAPTER II THEORITICAL FRAMEWORK

A. Definition of Racism………. 8

B. Racism in Mississippi……… 12

1. Historical Racism of Mississippi……….. 12 C. Reflection Theory of Cultural Racism………… 19

CHAPTER III RESEARCH FINDINGS

A. Data Description……… 25

B. Data Analysis………. 27

C. Further discussion of Data Analysis………….... 37

CHAPTER IV CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION

A. Conclusion………... 41

B. Suggestion……… 43

BIBLIOGRAPHY……….. 44

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CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION

A. Background of Study

The United States of America was established as a white society, founded upon the genocide of another race and then the enslavement of colored people. This enslavement happened for long time ago. In short the history of the United States is the history of enslavement. From this point of view, we may see how American life, claimed to be the most democratic country in the world, started his history by enslavement.

Many historians argue that 1451 as the starting date for Atlantic slave trade, for that was when substantial numbers of African slaves, perhaps 700 to 800 a year, began to reach Portugal. The Atlantic slave trade therefore was generally seen as running from 1451 to 1870, roughly the effective end of the slave trade to American.1 In 1619, the first Africans arrived at Jameskrwn, Virginia, consisting of twenty people with the status of “indentured” servants with the growth of slavery, many thousand of Negroes were brought to the cogaporelonies.2

David M Brownstone and M, Frank Irene, Facts about America Immigration. (New York: The H.W. Wilson Company, 2001), p. 321.

Everett D. Dyer. The American Family: Variety and Change, (New York: McGraw–Hill Book Company, 1979), p. 60.

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For a long time period, American slavery under the white supremacist must go on until the end of 19 century. Finally, slavery period disappeared when Abraham Lincoln’s Emancipation proclaimed, but the end of slavery came only with Union victory in the Civil War. In reality, however, Negro families were under white people’s shadows. For many years forward, the black people’s lives have to become under the shadow of white people.

This subordination makes the fate of Black people into racial discrimination in every field of life such as in education, political, social life, occupation, etc. There is no right for black people to get equality as well as white people get. But the time change and the fate of black people also change. In the early of 20 century African American has little chance to gain their dream. One by one Black society has the raising stars just for his community in every formal or informal field such as preacher, politician, labor, literary figures, etc. They born not to be slave anymore but born to be fighter against intimidation, hatred, cruelty of white people in America. Slowly but sure during 1960s they were able to make American history more colorful with their mob most well known by the Civil Rights Movement.

The struggle of African Americans for equality reached its climax in the mid-1960s. During this time, the Civil Right movements spread in the rest of America soil, especially in the South, the bases of African American stay in. Since that time groups that previously had been submerged or subordinate began more forcefully and successfully to assert themselves: African Americans, Native Americans, women, the

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white ethnic offspring of the "new immigration," and Latinos. Much of the support they received came from a young population larger than ever. They realize their future by making the mob possible through a college and university system, street long march, community gathering in various place and etc. They presented the "countercultural" life styles and radical politics, many of the young people of the World War II generation emerged as advocates of a new America characterized by a cultural and ethnic pluralism that their parents often viewed with discomfort.

According to Leon E. Wynter, essayist and columnist for the Wall Street Journal, that the 1950s set up the social political and technological disorders of the 1960s and 1970s. This decade also became much more representative of the long-term pattern of American identity formation and thus perhaps is more important in understanding the meaning of the 1980s.3

But America still remains the same before. Racial practices such as prejudice, discrimination, and personal abuse still haunted the colored people. In short, racism as cultural practice of white people became dominant theme during American history even today. Richard T. Ford, the George E. Osborne Professor of Law at Stanford Law School, argue that the day-to-day manifestations of group difference – folk beliefs, stories, and narratives, subjective identifications, outward expression of group affiliation and performances of “group culture” – are not reflections of intrinsic

Leon E. Wynter, American Skin, Pop Culture, Big Business & the End of White America, (New York: Crown Publisher, 2002), p. 72.

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human differences but rather are effects of social, political and legal institutions that produces and group difference.4

The explanations above give us understanding what racial practices actually are happened in America history. Thus, from the study above, the writer is interested to make study about it as far as reflected in the movie Mississippi Burning, a movie by Alan Parker, outline the disappearances of Chaney, Goodman and Schwerner, three young civil rights workers who were part of a voter registration drive in Mississippi. And then this case tries to reveal by two FBI Agents: Willem Defoe as Alan Ward and Gene Hackman as Rupert Anderson starred in this movie. Both of them met some difficulties while searching some clues and asking information from civilian whether the white or the black people.

In fact, this investigation makes Jessup County’s public life most exposed by the news and television. For some group of white young men the fanatic’s followers of Ku Klux Klan of this county feel not comfortable. They intimidated who ever give information to two FBI agents. It is not surprisingly if they take any effort to make both of the agent go away from Jessup County. They are creating terror, burning house, making horrible kidnapping, vandalism etc.

The majority of the movie takes place during 1964 in towns, exactly Jessup County of Mississippi. This movie surveys the geography of racism, segregation; discrimination, social hatred, bullying, etc., which caused the victim of three human

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right workers. In addition, this movie was inspired by actual events which took place in the South during the 1960’s. The characters, however, are fictitious and do not depict real people either living or dead.

B. Focus of Study

In doing the research, the writer would like to limit the discussion on the racial practices which happened in the movie Mississippi Burning. The research is referred to the theory of cultural racism of James M. Blaut and other relevant theory to the study.

C. Research Question

Due to the focus of study above, the research question is formulated as follow:

• What kinds of Racial Practices are showed in the Mississippi Burning film?

D. Significance of the Research

The writer hopes the result of the research will be advantageous to him specifically and the reader generally, in order to know how racial discrimination most heated during 60’s in daily American life.

In addition, the writer hopes that this research give more or less contribution especially for the Department of English Studies in State Islamic University (UIN) of

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Syarif Hidayatullah Jakarta. Many things can be found in this research that racial practices could happen to everyone: whether white of non-white people. The last, the writer hopes the results of this research make us deeply consciousness on that issue.

E. Research Methodology 1. Objective of the Research

The objectives of the research are to find out the kinds of racial practices as reflected in the movie Mississippi Burning.

2. Method of the Research

This research applies qualitative method and descriptive analysis about the

Mississippi Burning. Of course this research also discusses the main theme of the movie about racial practices happened to colored people in the Mississippi Burning.

3. Data Analysis

The writer analyzes the data using descriptive analysis technique. The collected data such as the script, whether it is dialogue (conversation among characters), monologue (broadly speech by one person), or the actions of its characters will be analyzed to find out the events or cases that show the theory of cultural racism which also compared with the relevant theories. In this

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description, the writer notes and explains the relevant data related to the research object.

4. Unit of Data Analysis

The study is conducted by analyzing the movie script of Mississippi Burning directed by Alan Parker which published premier was on December 9, 1988 and released by Orion Pictures, USA.

5. Research Instrument

The instrument of this research is the writer himself by watching the movie Mississippi Burning, reading the movie script, and signing the intended data related to racial practices that support of the research correlated with the relevant theory. In addition, American history references in 1960s, and other racial references also supported the data above.

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CHAPTER II

THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK

A. The Definitions of Racism

Before discussing about racial practices it is better to know what racism really is. For that study this chapter will describe the definition of racism, racism in Mississippi, and reflection theory of racism point by point. This division used to make comprehensive understanding about the Mississippi Burning movie discussed in the next chapter. For every section the writer will give general explanation about the point below with no detail.

In general, racism has many definitions. The most common view of racism widely accepted as the belief that humans are divided into more than one race, with members of some races being intrinsically superior or inferior to members of other races. The term of racism it self has much definition. In so far there is no definitely term of racism. It is due to many people with variety and different background who see racism as something bias to concept about. There is no one single term for this racism.

For the most common view explain that racism always refers to race-based prejudice, discrimination, violence, or oppression. Racialism is a related term intended to avoid these negative meanings. According to the Oxford English

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Dictionary,5 racism is a belief or ideology that all members of each race possess characteristics or abilities specific to that race, especially to distinguish it as being either superior or inferior to another race or races. The Merriam-Webster's Webster's Dictionary6 defines racism as a belief that race is the primary determinant of human traits and capacities and that racial differences produce an inherent superiority of a particular race, and that it is also the prejudice based on such a belief. The Macquarie Dictionary7 defines racism thus: the belief that human races have distinctive characteristics which determine their respective cultures, usually involving the idea that one's own race is superior and has the right to rule or dominate others.

Racism not only local problem but also has rooted for long time ago as old as human history. That is why racism considered as one of the most important issues in twentieth century. In 1966 United Nations held world conventions discussed about racism. As the result, this forum makes good comprehension about the term of racism as follow.

“The term "racial discrimination" shall mean any distinction, exclusion, restriction or preference based on race, color, descent, or national or ethnic origin which has the purpose or effect of nullifying or impairing the recognition, enjoyment or exercise, on an equal footing, of human rights and fundamental freedoms in the political, economic, social, cultural or any other field of public life."8

5_{Oxford English Dictionary.} 6

The Merriam-Webster's Webster's Dictionary. 7

Macquarie Dictionary. 8

See. UN International Convention on the Elimination of All of Racial Discrimination, New York 7 March 1966.

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This legal definition does not make any difference between prosecutions based on ethnicity and race, in part because the distinction between the ethnicity and race remains debatable among anthropologists. According to British law, racial group means "any group of people who are defined by reference to their race, color, nationality (including citizenship) or ethnic or national origin".9

Racism as practices happened in society also become interest of social scientist or sociologist. Some sociologists have defined racism as a system of group privilege. According to David Wellman, American sociology, in his book Portraits of White Racism has defined racism as culturally sanctioned beliefs, which, regardless of intentions involved, defend the advantages whites have because of the subordinated position of racial minorities.10

Sociologist and former American Sociological Association president Joe Feagin argues that the United States can be characterized as a "total racist society" because racism is used to organize every social institution.11 More recently, Feagin has articulated a comprehensive theory of racial oppression in the U.S. in his book

Systemic Racism: A Theory of Oppression. Feagin examines how major institutions have been built upon racial oppression which was not an accident of history, but was

http://www.cps.gov.uk/publications/prosecution/rrpbcrbook.html accessed on December 20, 2008.

David T. Wellman, Portraits of White Racism (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1993), p. x.

Joe R. Feagin, Racist America: Roots, Current Realities, and Future Reparations (New York: Routledge, 2000).

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created intentionally by white Americans.12 This example can be traced in court practice as the black people prohibited become jury or witness.

In Feagin's view, white Americans labored hard to create a system of racial oppression in the 17th century and have worked diligently to maintain the system ever since. While Feagin acknowledges that changes have occurred in this racist system over the centuries, he contends that key and fundamental elements have been reproduced over nearly four centuries, and that U.S. institutions today reflect the racialized hierarchy created in the 17th century. Today, as in the past, racial oppression is not just a surface-level feature of this society, but rather pervades, permeates, and interconnects all major social groups, networks, and institutions across the society. Feagin's definition stands in sharp contrast to psychological definitions that assume racism is an "attitude" or an irrational form of bigotry that exists apart from the organization of social structure.

From many explanation about racism viewed by many scholar give us rich understanding that racism consist of belief, organized system of race-based group privilege that at every level of society and is held together by a sophisticated ideology of color race supremacy. According to Cazenave and Maddern, American sociologist,

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those racist systems include, but cannot be reduced to, racial bigotry.13 And we know better at glance that slavery as the rooted of racism existed in the United States.

B. Racism in Mississippi

1. Historical Racism of Mississippi

There is plus minus between north State and South state in America. For the northern states, economically grow up by establishment of center of American industry. And socially they are more open and more liberal in daily life. The north’s also become the center of American political activity. The most of the north states such as New York and Washington D.C.

In contrary, the South State most well known as the center of American agricultural economy. The south’s also export big commodity for US consumption in agriculture. But socially, almost the south states fulfilled hatred and racial discrimination by white people to the colored people. The sentiment of race also happened in political activity which supported by government powered by the white. In this region white supremacist is the rule.

Mississippi is one of the South States that have bad reputation on racism. This problem has rooted when the white people lose their benefit from the new system on cotton sharing benefit. As we know that Mississippi's major crop, became highly

13_{Noel A. Cazenave and Darlene Alvarez Maddern, “Defending the White Race: White Male} Faculty Opposition to a White Racism Course,” in Race and Society 2, 1999, pp. 25-50.

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profitable in the 19th century, with steamboats as the principal means of shipping. The bank of the Mississippi filled rapidly with river towns and luxurious plantation homes. The cotton economy was based on the use of slave labor. When the conflict over slavery came to a crisis, Mississippi was the second state to secede from the Union (January, 1861). Jefferson Davis, Mississippi soldier-statesman became President of the Confederate States.14

But this situation comes to change in the twentieth century when the sharecropping system applied and practiced to all white landlords. Since that time cotton no longer made Mississippi prosperous. In the hill country the white farmers, derisively called “rednecks" or “peckerwoods," became as impoverished as the black sharecroppers. In addition, in the early 1900's more than half of Mississippi's population was black, but blacks were denied the vote by rigid application of a literacy-test requirement in the 1890 constitution.

By mid twentieth, exactly in the early 1960s, Mississippi was the poorest state in the nation. 86% of all non-white families lived below the national poverty line.15 In addition, the state had a terrible record of black voting rights violations. In the 1950s, Mississippi was 45% black, but only 5% of voting age blacks were registered to vote.16 Some counties did not have a single registered black voter. Whites insisted

http://history.howstuffworks.com/american-history/history-of-mississippi.htm accessed on December 25, 2008.

Steven Kasher, The Civil Rights Movement: A Photographic History, 1954-68 (New York: Abbeville Press, 1996), pp. 132-135.

Juan Williams, Eyes on the Prize: America's Civil Rights Years, 1954-1965 (New York: Viking Penguin Inc., 1987), p. 208.

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that blacks did not want to vote, but this was not true. Many blacks wanted to vote, but they worried, and rightfully so, that they might lose their job.

In 1962, over 260 blacks in Madison County overcame this fear and waited in line to register. 50 more came the next day. Only seven got in to take the test over the two days, walking past a sticker on the registrar's office door that bore a Confederate battle flag next to the message "Support Your Citizens' Council."17 Once they got in, they had to take a test designed to prevent them from becoming registered. In 1954, in response to increasing literacy among blacks, the test, which originally asked applicants to "read or interpret" a section of the state constitution, was changed to ask applicants to "read and interpret" that document.18 This allowed white registrars to decide whether or not a person passed the test. Most blacks, even those with doctoral degrees, "failed." In contrast, most whites passed, no matter what their education level.

By 1960 blacks no longer made up the majority of adults of voting age, but a movement to register blacks for voting met with uniform resistance. In 1962 a federal court ordered the University of Mississippi to enroll James Meredith as its first black student. Defiance of the order was led by Governor Ross Barnett, and serious rioting broke out at the university. Federal troops were needed to help Meredith enter the

Anthony Lewis, Portrait of a Decade: The Second American Revolution (New York: Random House, 1964), p. 135.

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university. Other racial violence included the murder in 1963 of civil rights leader Medgar Evers, and in 1964 of three civil rights workers.19

In the mid-1960's, the participation of blacks in politics increased. In 1969 Charles Evers, Medgar's brother, was elected mayor of Fayette - the first black mayor of a biracial Mississippi town since Reconstruction. Also in the late 1960's, white opposition to public school integration led to racial disturbances. By the early 1970's, court-ordered desegregation of public schools at all levels was under way.

During sixties the black people faced some serious difficulty to determine their life for social economy domain as well as in political participation. It is not surprisingly if black people make a mob to demand their civil right as well as the whites. Approximately, there are 5.000 of black people of Mississippi out of the list of register to vote. The white people, who joined in some community based color like Ku Klux Klan, fraternal organization, make intimidation, kidnapping, and lynching the black who try to register.

For this reason NAACP (National Association for the Advancement of Coloured People) went to Mississippi in an effort to register more blacks in the late 1950s. Amzie Moore, a local NAACP leader in Mississippi, met with SNCC (Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee) worker Robert Parris Moses when Moses

http://history.howstuffworks.com/american-history/history-of-mississippi.htm accessed on December 25, 2008.

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traveled through the state in July 1960, recruiting people for a SNCC conference. Moore encouraged Moses to bring more SNCC workers to the state, and the following summer he did, beginning a month-long voter registration campaign in the town of McComb, in conjunction with C.C. Bryant of the NAACP. SNCC organized a voter registration education program, teaching a weekly class that showed people how to register.20

SNCC worker Marion Barry arrived on August 18 and started workshops to teach young blacks nonviolent protest methods. Many of the blacks, too young to vote, jumped at the opportunity to join the movement. They began holding sit-ins. Some were arrested and expelled from school. More were expelled when they held a protest march after the murder of Herbert Lee, who had helped SNCC workers, on September 25. In response to these expulsions, Moses and Chuck McDew started Nonviolent High School to teach the expelled students. They were arrested and sentenced to four months in jail for "contributing to the delinquency of minors."21

Other protests by blacks were met with violence. At sit-ins which began on May 28, 1963, participants were sprayed with paint and had peppered thrown in their eyes. Students who sang movement songs during lunch after the bombing of NAACP field director Medgar Evers' home were beaten. Evers himself was the most visible target for violence. He was a native of Mississippi and World War II veteran who was

http://www.watson.org/~lisa/blackhistory/civilrights-55-65/missippi.html accessed on December, 25, 2008.

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greeted by a mob of gun-wielding whites when he attempted to register after the war in his hometown of Decatur. He later said, "We fought during the war for America, Mississippi included. Now, after the Germans and Japanese hadn't killed us, it looked as though the white Mississippians would." After he was denied admission to the University of Mississippi law school, he went to work for the NAACP. By 1963, Evers was aware that, in the words of his wife Myrlie Evers,

. . . Medgar was a target because he was the leader. The whole mood of white Mississippi was that if Medgar Evers were eliminated, the problem would be solved. . . . And we came to realize, in those last few days, last few months that our time was short; it was simply in the air. You knew that something was going to happen, and the logical person for it to happen to was Medgar.22

In next program, after succeed for Freedom Vote, SNCC also decided to send volunteers into Mississippi during the summer of 1964, a presidential election year, for a voter registration drive. It became known as Freedom Summer. Bob Moses outlined the goals of Freedom Summer to prospective volunteers at Stanford University: (1). to expand black voter registration in the state; (2). to organize a legally constituted "Freedom Democratic Party" that would challenge the whites-only Mississippi Democratic party; (3). to establish "freedom schools" to teach reading and math to black children; (4). to open community centers where indigent blacks could obtain legal and medical assistance.23

800 students gathered for a week-long orientation session at Western College for Women in Oxford, Ohio, that June. They were mostly white and young, with an

The murder of Medgar Ever was filmed by some American director. The Ghost of Mississippi by Rob Reiner is one of the film describe a courtroom drama.

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average age of 21. They were also from well-to-do families, as the volunteers had to bring $500 for bail as well as money for living expenses, medical bills, and transportation home. SNCC's James Forman told them to be prepared for death. "I may be killed. You may be killed. The whole staff may go." He also told them to go quietly to jail if arrested, because "Mississippi is not the place to start conducting constitutional law classes for the policemen, many of whom don't have a fifth-grade education."24

On June 21, the day after the first 200 recruits left for Mississippi from Ohio, three workers, including one volunteer, disappeared. Michael Schwerner, Andrew Goodman, and James Chaney had been taken to jail for speeding charges but were later released. What happened next is not known. Local police were called when the men failed to perform a required check-in with Freedom Summer headquarters, but Sheriff Lawrence Rainey was convinced the men were hiding to gain publicity. The FBI did not get involved for a full day. During the search for the missing workers, the FBI uncovered the bodies of three lynched blacks who had been missing for some time. The black community noted wryly that these murders received nowhere near the same nationwide media attention as the murders of the three workers, two of whom were white.

The murder case of three workers above for more detail wills discuses in the following chapter.

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C. Reflection Theory of Cultural Racism

The movie script of Mississippi Burning by Alan Parker describes the Mississippian social life fulfilled by segregation, racial discrimination and etc. during 1964. Before discussing the movie the writer will discuses the theory of cultural racism. This theory used to analyze and explain about racism happened in the Mississippi Burning movie. It is important for the writer to give perspective more colorful.

There is the essential difference between racist theory and racist practice. According to James M. Blaut racism most fundamentally is practice: the practice of discrimination, at all levels, from personal abuse to colonial oppression. Racism is a form of practice which has been tremendously important in European society for several hundred years, important in the sense that it is an essential part of the way the European capitalist system maintains itself.25

Racist practice, like all practice, is cognized, rationalized, justified, by a theory, a belief system about the nature of reality and the behavior which is appropriate to this cognized reality. Since racism as practice, that is discrimination, is an essential part of the system, we should not be surprised to discover that it has been supported by a historical sequence of different theories, each consistent with the

See James M. Blaut, “The Theory of Cultural Racism,” in Antipode: A Radical Journal of Geography, Volume 23 (1992), pp. 289.

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intellectual environment of a given era. Nor should we be surprised to find that the sequent theories are so different from one another that the racist theory of one epoch is in part a refutation of the racist theory of the preceding epoch.

Blaut is not special one who gives comprehensive theory of cultural racism. It was already noted by W.E.B. DuBois, Africa American scholar, that in making the difference between races, it is not race that we think about, but culture: “…a common history, common laws and religion, similar habits of thought and a conscious striving together for certain ideals of life.”26 But DuBois didn’t make culture comprehensively as theory used to explain racism.

There were preceding intellectual and scholar offered the theory of racism. The dominant racist theory of the early nineteenth century was a biblical argument, grounded in religion; the dominant racist theory of the period from about 1850 to 1950 was a biological argument, grounded in natural science; the racist theory of today is mainly a historical argument, grounded in the idea of culture history or simply culture. Today's racism is cultural racism. For the purpose of the research, the writer only discusses the last three theory of cultural racism. The one and the second theory, the writer just explains it at glance.

What make culture so important to explain racism it is due to that cultural racism substitutes the cultural category "European" for the racial category "white." Samir Amin gives us understanding that we no longer have a superior race; we have,

W.E.B. DuBois, The Conservation of Races (1897), p. 21. quoted from http://www.bookrags.com/wiki/racism accessed on December, 25, 2008.

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instead, a superior culture. It is "European culture," or "Western culture," "the West".27 What counts is culture, not color.

The term of Eurocentrism is as well as and ideology of Europeans that denote to their cultural superiority over the other culture. The rest of cultures absolutely nothing and this is not a new one. This notion existed in the beginning of the 19th century, where Europeans considered themselves to be superior because they are Christians and a Christian god must naturally favor His own followers, particularly those who worship Him according to the proper sacrament. He will take care of such matters as hereditary abilities, thus making it easier for His followers to thrive, multiply, progress, conquer the world. In a word: it was believed that the people of Europe, traditional Christendom, possess cultural superiority, biological superiority, even environmental superiority, but all of this flows from a supernatural cause. This was the theory which, in the period up to roughly the middle of the 19th century, underlay most racist practice.28

But the end of the 19th century, the theological argument replaced by naturalistic arguments in most scholarly discourse. But it should not be thought that religious racism as theory had entirely disappeared. In many contexts thereafter, this theory was and still is used to justify racist practice in which people of one religion oppress people of another on grounds of this or some very similar, theory.

Samir Amin, “Eurocentrism,” in Monthly Review Press, 1989. This article quoted by James M. Blaut in Theory of Cultural Racism.

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It is important to note that even the theological argument considered as continuation basis for biological argument set for biological theory of racism. Religious racism had already established the causality by which God gives better heredity to Christians, and this argument could now be adapted to assert the genetic superiority of the so-called white race. The genetic superiority of the so-called white race was now believed in axiomatically by nearly all social theorists. Cultural superiority was mainly, though not entirely, considered to be an effect of racial superiority.

Like the religious theory of racism, the genetic theory of racism is over and obsolete in scholarly communities discourse. As the growth of intellectual progress who give better comprehensive theory use the culture as the foundation of theory (e.g., Boas, Radin), psychological theory (e.g., Lewin), philosophies grounded in experience rather than the Cartesian-Kantian a priori (e.g., Dewey, Whitehead, Mead). In addition, there are two reason why either theological or biological theory of racism out of mode. Firstly, the rise of egalitarian values, notably socialism, which counter attacked against theories of innate superiority and inferiority. Secondly, there is a very powerful one, was opposition to Nazism, which almost necessarily meant opposition to doctrines of biological superiority and inferiority.29

Cultural racism, as a theory, needs to prove the superiority of Europeans, and needs to do so without recourse to the older arguments from religion and from

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biology. How does it do this? According to Blaut what we need is by recourse to history - by constructing a characteristic theory of cultural (and intellectual) history.30 The claim is simply made that nearly all of the important cultural innovations which historically generate cultural progress occurred first in Europe, then, later, diffused to the non-European peoples.31

Therefore, at each moment in history Europeans are more advanced than non- Europeans in overall cultural development (though not necessarily in each particular culture trait), and they are more progressive than non-Europeans. This is asserted as a great bundle of apparently empirical facts about invention and innovation, not only of material and technological traits but of political and social traits like the state, the market, the family. The tellers of this tale saturate history with European inventions, European progressiveness, and European progress.

This massive package of supposedly empirical, factual statements was woven together by means of a modern form of the 19th-century theory of Eurocentric diffusionism.32 This theory evolved as a justification and rationalization for classical colonialism. It asserted, in essence, the following propositions about the world as a whole and throughout all of history. (1) The world has a permanent center, or core, and a permanent periphery. The center is Greater Europe, that is, the continent of

Ibid, p. 293.

James M. Blaut, Fourteen Ninety-Two, in Political Geography Quarterly, 1992, vol. 11, no. 3.

James M. Blaut, “Diffusionism: A Uniformitarian Critique,” in Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 1977, p. 33.

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Europe plus, for ancient times, the Bible Lands and, for modern times, the countries of European settlement overseas. The core sector, Greater Europe, is naturally inventive, innovative, and progressive. (2) The periphery, the non-European world, naturally remains traditional, culturally sluggish or stagnant. (3) The basic reason why Europe is progressive, innovative, etc. is some quality of mind or spirit, some "rationality," peculiar to Europeans. (4) Progress occurs in the periphery as a result of the diffusion, the outward spread, of new and innovative traits from the core to the periphery.

Modern diffusionism therefore describes a world in which Europeans have always been the most progressive people, and non-Europeans are backward, and permanently the recipients of progressive ideas, things, and people from Europe. It follows that progress for the periphery, today as always in the past, must consist of the continued diffusion of European "rationality" and institutions, European culture and control. The periphery, today, includes the Third World, along with Third World minorities embedded in the European-dominated countries like the United States, in ghettos, reservations, prisons, migrant-labor camps.

All American whites are the origin of European white who theologically puritan; biologically superior race and culturally more progressive than color people such Africa America, native people, Hispanic people, Asians, Arabic and etc., This belief culminated in their consciousness as well as practices. That is why cultural theory of racism gives us more advantage to see racism comprehensively.

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CHAPTER III RESEARCH FINDINGS

In this chapter, the writer will discuss the racial practices in Mississippi Burning. The discussion will be divided into several descriptions based on the event that shows racial practices in the film Mississippi Burning. The writer uses pictures, dialogues and the discussion that refer to racial practices. This chapter consists of Data Description and Data Analysis.

A. Data Description

The selected data will be tabulated as follow:

The table of Racial Practices in the film “Mississippi Burning”.

Racial practices Explain the situation Picture

• Burning In the beginning of the film, a burning church

showed by the activists of Ku Klux Klan

• Intimidation In the middle of night, three civil right

workers, two young Jews and one Negro, go out of the police office. While driving the car, they followed by the Activist of Ku Klux Klan and interrogated by.

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• Violence to the

black people

In the middle of pig cage.

The activists of Ku Klux Klan caught, stroke and threaten the black kid.

4 - 5

• Violence to the

black people

Out of the church. 6 - 7

• Discrimination

and unfair-treatment

In the court. The judge helped the activists of Ku Klux Klan who did burning the ghetto of a blacks’ home.

• Racialist Clayton Townley interview. 9 - 10

• Lynching and

Burning

The Ku Klux Klan activists burn a black home who gives some information to the FBI agents. One of their extreme actions was lynching the black on the tree.

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B. Data Analysis

For detail explanation of the table above, the writer will analysis and elaborate the data with further discussion.

B1. Analysis

• Burning

In the beginning of the film, a burning church showed by the activists of Ku Klux Klan

Picture 1

The opening scenes of the movie were some of the most traumatic ever seen in any film of the 1980s. An Apostolic church was the first building seen in the film, burn with the Ku Klux Klan because they hatred to the blacks people. In the Mississippi Burning Film, the blacks’ people are just quite and receive what the activists of KKK done.

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• Intimidation

In the middle of night, three civil right workers, two young Jews and one Negro, go out of the police office. While driving the car, they followed by the Activist of KKK and interrogated by.

Picture 2 Picture 3

Frank (K. K. K) :Y'all think you can drive any speed you want around here?

Jew boy :You had us scared to death, man.

Frank :Don't you call me "man", Jew-boy.

Jew boy :No, sir. What should I call you?

Frank _{:You don't call me nothin', nigger-lovin' Jew-boy. You}

just listen.

Jew boy :Yes, sir.

Frank :Hell, you even startin' to smell like a nigger, Jew-boy.

Jew boy :Take it easy. We'll be all right.

Frank :Sure you will, nigger-Iover.

Deputy Pell (K. K. K) :He's seen your face. That ain't good. You don't want him seein' your face.

Frank :Oh, it don't make no difference no more. [shooting the civil rights workers]

Deputy Pell :Whoa, shit! We into it now, boys.

You only left me a nigger, but at least I shot me a nigger.

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After describing the pictures of the racial practices in Mississippi Burning Film, the writer knows the factors why American white people did the discrimination towards the blacks and other ethnics like Jews, Turks, Mongols, Tartars, Orientals nor Negroes. In the history, the oppressing towards the color ethnics especially to the blacks had been exist as slave since 17 century, and written in the bible of Christian.

In the middle of 1960s, America will be facing the president election. But not all the citizen of America follows the election. Like the Blacks people in the south. To solve this problem the government sent three Civil Right Workers to select the Blacks rights in the south in giving their contribution in president election. The three Civil Right Workers are two Jews boy and one of them was black.

But, the coming of the Civil Right Workers to Mississippi county smelled by KKK activists who the Anglo-Saxon followers. They don’t want the Blacks get their rights in presidential election. The KKK activists try everything to protect their democracy even that by intimidation and murdered.

The dialogue above happened when the three Civil Right Workers stopped their car because the KKK activists caught and ordered them to stop their car. The KKK activists interrogated them didn’t let them out from their car. That time, the KKK activists oppress the Civil Right Workers (Y'all think you can drive any speed you want around here?). They talk rough to the Civil Right Workers with “Jew boy and nigger”. This is a form of racism.

The dialogue above shows that the KKK activists didn’t want the Civil Right Workers done something they didn’t like in their county. They will do

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everything to block and do the intimidation to their enemies. The KKK are the followers of Anglo-Saxon democracy and they didn’t want other races reject their democracy and their superiority.

The white people, who joined in some community based color like Ku Klux Klan, fraternal organization, make intimidation, kidnapping, and lynching the black

who try to register. This case related with the theory which the writer choose for. The intimidation was one of KKK way to scare and to threaten the African-American.

Based on the dialogue above, the writer concludes that there is the deep hatred to the color races. Combining between white American race and colored race will make their superiority in threatened. They believe the white American race is more superiority than colored people.

• Violence

In the middle of pig stable

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The violence, intimidation and kidnapping show in picture 5 and 6. Begin when two FBI agents came to a restaurant which has segregation. The separation chairs between white American race and colored race. When they into the restaurant they saw there is no an empty chair except in color side. One of them get the empty chair then began talk with a Negro child.

After the agent get closer and ask some questions to him, the black boy look around him to the white’s chair then they look to him with unlike scene. The white thought that the black boy talked and give the FBI agent the information about the Civil Right Workers.

At night, the KKK activists came to the black’s home. They caught until the pig cage, stroked, and did the violence to him. After finished with their toy (the black boy) they intimidated him and talked” We better not catch you talkin' to the FBI. Or you'll be dead, boy. Real dead”. Afterward they brought him to cotton cage and get him in (picture 4), until the morning they throw the black in the middle of town.

Based on the dialogue and the pictures above, the writer find the discrimination and the violence that referred to James M. Blaut theory on this scene.

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• Violence to the black people

Out of the black church

Picture 6 Picture 7

The hatred has been root in the heart of white people. The discrimination toward black people continues this time. This event can be seen in picture 5 and picture 6. There is a lot of Klan activists came to the church. They waited until the blacks finished their pray. After the blacks finish, all the Ku Klux Klan members directly rush upon the blacks, kicked and stroked them. On the pictures above we can see a child was attacked and stroked by one of the KKK members.

Religious racism had already established the causality by which God gives better heredity to Christians, and this argument could now be adapted to assert the genetic superiority of the so-called white race. The genetic superiority of the so-called white race was now believed in axiomatically by nearly all social theorists. The cultural superiority of Europeans white automatically consists of. Cultural superiority was mainly, though not entirely, considered to be an effect of racial superiority.

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These racial violence acts based on the blacks reported what they did to the blacks who burned the ghetto of the blacks until the FBI agents got and brought them to the court session. They hated very much to the black people even though the blacks did not do anything to them.

• Discrimination and unfair treatment

In the court

Picture 8

Judge : But I want you to know that the court understands... that the crimes you have committed have been, to some extent at least... brought about by... outside influences. Outsiders have come into Jessup County... and they've

been people of low morality... and unhygienic.

And their presence here has provoked a lot of people. So the court understands... without condoning them,

mind you... that the crimes to which you men have pled guilty... were, to some extent at least, provoked by these outside influences.

So, with all this, I'm gonna make your punishment light. I'm gonna sentence you each to five years'

imprisonment.

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The dialogue took in the court session when the defendants of burning the ghetto of the blacks found by help of a child who saw the event. After burning the ghetto of the black people, the defendants who mixed up in the burning are caught with the FBI agents, and then, they were got to the court session. Because the judge was a member of Ku Klux Klan, of course the defendants got the protection from the judge. The judge gave the punishment to the defendants with five years in jail, but he suspends the sentences.

After heard the decision form the judge the blacks who show the court session just quiet and sat on the balcony without do their equal to ask the justice from the court. The blacks who sat on the balcony because the white people don’t want to sit in the same row with the black. They don’t want because the blacks are not in same level with them, and it can make down their superiority. So, in the court the practice discrimination and unfair-treatment to the black people go on even it in the court.

• Racialist

Clayton Townley Interview

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Clayton Townley :I am sick and tired of the way many of us Mississippians...are havin' our views distorted by your newspapers and on TV.

So let's get this straight.

We do not accept Jews because they reject Christ. Their control of the international banking cartels are at the root of communism.

We do not accept Papists because they bow to a Roman dictator.

We do not accept Turks, Mongols, Tartars, Orientals nor Negroes... because we're here to protect Anglo-Saxon democracy...and the American way.

Picture 7 and 8 shows us Clayton Townley as the Ku Klux Klan activist interviewed when out from his office. He talked his feeling why he didn’t accept Jews because they reject Christ, they control of the international banking cartels are at the root of communism. And why he didn’t accept Papists because they bow to a Roman dictator, and he said he didn’t accept Turks, Mongols, Tartars, Orientals, nor Negroes because he wants to protect Anglo-Saxon democracy and the American way.

These countries which Townley said are not believe in Anglo-Saxon democracy and the countries will be supposed to falling down the superiority of white American.

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• Lynching

The KKK activists burn a black home who gives some information to the FBI agents. One of their extreme actions was lynching the black on the tree.

Picture 11

The picture 9 shows us how the violence towards the blacks continues this time, combustion and lynching toward the black until death. The happened took in the outside of a black’s home when they were sleeping; suddenly from the outside of their home the KKK activists burned their animal’s cage and home. The father who knows this event ordered his son to evacuate their family to the save place. The father out from his home with a gun then got some kicks and strikes. The KKK activists did some violence to the father then bind him until him dead.

According to the writer this violence was a great action than the others. The murdered is the end of everything.

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C. Further Discussion of Data Analysis

After describing the scenes of the racial practices in Mississippi Burning Film, the writer knows the factors why American white people did the discrimination towards the blacks and other ethnics like Jews, Turks, Mongols, Tartars, Orientals nor Negroes. In the history, the oppressing towards the color ethnics especially to the blacks had been exist as slave since 17 century, and written in the bible of Christian.

The first scene is talked about intimidation by KKK activists toward the Civil Rights Workers when they finished their job to collect the data of Blacks for President Election. On the road, the KKK activists tried to stop the Civil Rights Workers. They intimidated the Civil Rights Workers on their car without let them out from their car. The intimidation continues and the Klan doesn’t want the Civil Rights Workers see their face then shot them all.

The white people, who joined in some community based color like Ku Klux Klan, fraternal organization, make intimidation, kidnapping, and lynching the black

who try to register. This case related with the theory which the writer choose for. The intimidation was one of KKK way to scare and to threaten the African-American.

The second scene is showed the intimidation and violence towards a Negro kid by the Klan activists. The Klan caught, kicked and threatens the kid because the Klan guesses he give the information to the FBI agent which sat with him in the restaurant. After that, they kidnap him and get into cotton cage until the morning.

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The third scene shows us the racial practice continues toward a kid. The violence can get in everywhere, even that in front of the church. In picture 5 and 6 we can see the Klan activists attacked the Negroes when they out from the church. All people get the violence even a kid. But the kid just shows his patient and prays God when he got some kicks from a Klan.

The fourth scene shows us the atmosphere in the court session. Three of KKK activists who mixed up of the burning the Blacks ghetto arrested and sit on the court. But the defendants got protected from the judge because he guesses this all because of the provoked by outside influences. And the judge punishes them with five years in jail, but the judge will suspend the sentences. From this case the discrimination seen in this scene, because the judge help the white race even them did wrong, and ignore the Blacks who wants the justice from the court.

The next scene showed the interview with Clayton Townley as the entrepreneur and the chief of KKK. He hated Jews because they reject Christ. The mean of the first sentence, is Jews and other colored ethnics reject the Anglo-Saxon Christian because this system were not fair according to the colored people. The bible

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said: God had created white people, in a region which Europeans considered to be their own cultural hearth: the "Bible Lands.”

And these countries which Townley said are not believe in Anglo-Saxon democracy and the countries will be supposed to falling down the superiority of white American as Anglo-Saxon followers.

After a brief scuffle with Ward, the two FBI agree that they will work together and bring down the Klan using both men's approach to the investigation. The ending shows several scenes of the takedown of the Klan heads:

• The new tactics begin when an African American man abducts the mayor. The

abductor threatens the mayor with castration and tells a story about a man who was castrated by the Klan for the color of his skin. Using information from the mayor, the agents get more detailed information on the murders. It is revealed that the African American abductor is a special operative for the FBI.

• Next, Anderson pays a visit to the barber shop and gives the Deputy Sheriff

an enormous beating and thereby punishes him for abusing his wife.

• Following this, some FBI members disguise themselves as Klan members and

chase another Klan head, before cornering him and pretending to lynch him. The FBI suddenly shows up and "chases" them away, before offering the head protection from the Klan if he co-operates.

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Related with the scenes above, in the scene sixth is the last scene and the writer thinks this is the extreme action than the others. Lynching till the dead. From the picture 9 above we can see a people lynch on the tree with the KKK activists. This case related with the James M. Blaut Theory, Cultural Racism.

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CHAPTER IV

CONCLUSION AND SUGGESTION

A. Conclusion

The writer concludes that film Mississippi Burning is the story about violence discrimination in Mississippi Jessup County and the struggle to equal in law of Blacks rights. The film

backgrounds take setting in Mississippi Jessup County, South America in 1964. The great racial acts in Mississippi Burning film in 1964 in which politic, and culture are important things looked here.

In the beginning of the film the writer sees the three boys (Civil Rights Workers) who drive a car down a long road, they are chased of what they think are the police. But in reality it’s some members of the Ku Klux Klan and the deputy, who also is a member of the KKK. The boys are stopped out on a field and the men kill the three young boys and hide their bodies.

Two FBI agents are sent down to Jessup County where the boys were helping the colored people to vote. The Sheriff’s office does not helping the FBI agents. They say they think that the civil right workers have just played them a trick and are sitting up in New York laughing of them, although they know that they are dead. One of the FBI agents is an older man from the south (Mr. Anderson), and the other one is a young city boy (Mr. Ward). The two agents have extremely different ways of

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working to solve the case. The young boy is a doctrinaire and wants to follow bureau procedure, but the older man wants to follow his own rules.

Mr. Ward gets over a hundred men down helping him solve the case. They combed the swamps but found nothing. After a while Mr. Ward realizes that his methods aren’t working out and that they don’t help on the black people’s situation. It’s just making bad matters worse so he agrees to try out Mr. Anderson’s tactic. Mr. Anderson gets on a good dialog with the deputy’s wife and he understands that she is the key to the mystery. She tells Mr. Anderson, despite that she is married to the deputy, where the bodies are. The FBI finds the dead bodies in a big mound out on a farm. All of the suspects were condemned except from the sheriff who became acquitted, but later on hang himself in the basement because of quilt.

This is a film which brings out strong feelings. The writer sees the situation for the blacks in the 1960’s, how they are depressed and treated like dogs. This is a subject which always will be inflamed. The maker of this movie wants to inform the viewers about how the situation was for the colored people in the South in the 60’s, and tell us that it is important to remember the past so the people of the future want do the same mistakes. The writer can feels how detail their hatred feels to the racists in this movie, how it replaces other entertainments, how it compensates for their sense of worthlessness.

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B. Suggestion

Mississippi Burning film is an interesting subject to be studied or analyzed. Racial practices with all of their points also become exciting subject to be explored especially in the Mississippi Burning Film. The writer suggests to the reader to concern on Racial Practices in the Mississippi Burning Film. The suggestion issue has been analyzing in this paper and the writer hopes next researcher can eliminate the weakness of this paper and find another interest issues that emerges in this film. He believes, by focusing on this studying it will help the readers to do the similar research.

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BIBLIOGRAPHY Books:

Blaut, James M. “Diffusionism: A Uniformitarian Critique,” in Annals of the Association of American Geographers, 1977, p. 33.

Blaut, James M. Fourteen Ninety-Two, in Political Geography Quarterly, 1992, vol. 11, no. 3.

Blaut, James M. “The Theory of Cultural Racism,” in Antipode: A Radical Journal of Geography, Volume 23 (1992), pp. 289.

Brownstone, David M and Irene, M. Frank, Facts about America Immigration. (New York: The H.W. Wilson Company, 2001), p. 321.

Cazenave, Noel A. and Maddern, Darlene Alvarez, “Defending the White Race: White Male Faculty Opposition to a White Racism Course,” in Race and Society 2, 1999, pp. 25-50.

Dyer, Everett D. The American Family: Variety and Change, (New York: McGraw– Hill Book Company, 1979), p. 60.

Feagin, Joe R. Racist America: Roots, Current Realities, and Future Reparations

(New York: Routledge, 2000).

Feagin, Joe R. Systemic Racism: A Theory of Oppression (New York” Routledge, 2006).

Ford, Richard T. Racial Culture, Princeton:Princeton University Press, 2005, p. 169. Lewis, Anthony Portrait of a Decade: The Second American Revolution (New York:

Random House, 1964), p. 135.

Kasher, Steven The Civil Rights Movement: A Photographic History, 1954-68 (New York: Abbeville Press, 1996), pp. 132-135.

Wellman, David T. Portraits of White Racism (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1993), p. x.

Williams, Juan Eyes on the Prize: America's Civil Rights Years, 1954-1965 (New York: Viking Penguin Inc., 1987), p. 208.

Wynter Leon E. American Skin, Pop Culture, Big Business & the End of White America, (New York: Crown Publisher, 2002), p. 72.

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Websites:

http://www.bookrags.com/wiki/racism accessed on December, 25, 2008.

http://wikipedia.org/wiki/Mississippi_Burning+mississippi+burning accessed on December, 25, 2008.

http://www.watson.org/~lisa/blackhistory/civilrights-55-65/missippi.html, accessed on November, 25, 2008

http://www.cps.gov.uk/publications/prosecution/rrpbcrbook.html,

http://history.howstuffworks.com/american-history/history-of-mississippi.htm accessed on November 25, 2008.

W.E.B. DuBois, The Conservation of Races (1897), p. 21. quoted from http://www.bookrags.com/wiki/racism, accessed on December 25, 2008

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Mississippi Burning Script –

Dialogue Transcript

Appendix

Mississippi Burning Script: What is it?

What do they want? I don't know.

Just pass me. Pass me. Is it a cop?

I can't see.

What the fuck joke are they playin' at? They ain't playin'. You better believe it. What are we gonna do?

I don't know.

OK. Hold on, you guys. There's a truck too. Shit. It is a cop. You better stop.

OK. Sit tight, you guys.

Don't say anything. Let me talk.

All right? All right, we'll be all right. Just relax.

Y'all think you can drive any speed you want around here? You had us scared to death, man.

Don't you call me "man", Jew-boy. No, sir. What should I call you?

You don't call me nothin', nigger-lovin' Jew-boy. You just listen. Yes, sir.

Hell, you even startin' to smell like a nigger, Jew-boy. Take it easy. We'll be all right.

Sure you will, nigger-Iover.

He's seen your face. That ain't good. You don't want him seein' your face. Oh, it don't make no difference no more. Whoa, shit! We into it now, boys.

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You only left me a nigger, but at least I shot me a nigger. Yes, indeed.

Now listen, you communists and niggers and Jews Tell all your buddies to spread the news

Your Day of Judgment will soon be nigh

As the Lord in his wisdom looks down from on high Will his battle be lost by mixin' the races?

We want beautiful babies, not ones with brown faces Never, never, never, I say

For the Ku Klux Klan is here to stay Never, never, never, I say

Cos the Ku Klux Klan is here to stay

These Ku Kluxers are better with lynchings than with lyrics. Just read the file, Mr Anderson.

I can do without the cabaret.

You don't like me much, do you, boss? Sure I like you.

I just don't share your sense of humour. Sometimes that's all you got left. How long you been in the Bureau? Three years.

Right outta college, huh?

No. From the Justice Department. Kennedy boy. Now I see.

No. I don't think you do see. Let's get this thing straight. I haven't had a pimple in years. I shave every morning.

I even go to the bathroom by myself. So you can quit this "boss" stuff. I'm in charge because

I've been through this before. Birmingham? Montgomery?

Oxford. I was with Meredith at Old Miss. Oh. You got hit in the head with a brick, so they gave you a promotion.

No. Shot in the shoulder.

Well, at least you lived. That's important. Meredith lived. That's what's important. What's got four eyes and can't see? What?

Mississippi.

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Cos the Ku Klux Klan is here to...

Big building for a small town. Yeah.

Howdy.

Good morning. My name's Alan Ward. I'm with the FBI.

Federal Bureau of Integration? In that get-up, you ain't undercover. We're here to see Sheriff Stuckey. Sheriff's right busy now.

You'll have to wait or come back some other time. We'll wait.

Listen to me, you backwoods shit-ass, you.

You got two seconds to get the sheriff out here or I'll kick the goddamn door in. OK? Well, hell.

Looks like we got some company. Some Hoover boys come down to visit. How ya doin'?

Good.

I'm Sheriff Stuckey. Rupert Anderson.

Rupert, we've been expectin' you. I assume you met my deputy, Mr Pell. Sure did.

You down here to help us solve our nigger problems? No. It's just a missing-person case.

Well, come on.

You gonna want your boy in on this? Sheriff...

I'm Special Agent Ward and I'm in charge of this case.

We think it might be a little more serious than missing persons. I don't think so, boy.

Know what I think it is?

It's a publicity stunt cooked up by that Martin Luther King fella. Come on.

At around 15.00 pm, Deputy Pell says he arrested the three boys for speeding. He held them in jail until 22.00 pm and then released them.

They drove off. He says he followed them as far as the county line...and never saw them again.

Why didn't they make a phone call? Why should they?

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They're taught to check in every hour and, if arrested, the moment they're released from custody.

The hotel is two minute from the jail. They could've phoned from the lobby. It doesn't follow.

Maybe they had a beer. Not these boys.

The civil rights office in Rossville started making calls when they didn't check in. The sheriff's office here said they had no idea where the boys were.

First lie. By who?

Sheriff's office or civil rights office? Who would you believe?

Mr Ward, I was a sheriff in a little Mississippi town just like this. Yes, I'm aware of that.

Well, lyin' just don't come into it.

We were ten miles from Memphis, a million miles from the rest of the worid. If a sheriff in a town like this says that's what happened, that's what happened. Let's go eat.

We're full up, honey. Y'all wanna wait a while? Is the wait worth it?

We're not full for nothin', sugar.

Y'all wanna look at a menu while you wait? Thank you.

Well, what y'all gonna do? Wait or leave? We're gonna wait cos we wanna be near you. There are some empty seats down there. Uh, Mr Ward...

That's coloured down there. Don't even think about it.

People here are gettin' ready to leave. Aren't you hungry, Mr Anderson? Good afternoon. Looks good.

Do you mind if I ask you a few questions? I'm looking for some information.

I ain't got nothin' to say to you, sir. Just a few questions.

I ain't got nothin' to say to you, sir.

The civil rights boys came to propose setting up a voter registration clinic. Before the locals got a chance to say yes, the Klan burned 'em down. You give a man a vote but he can't use it.

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What did their office in Rossville say?

That the boys came back here to apologise to the congregation.

"Sorry you folks didn't get to vote."

"I suppose most of you never knew you even had one."

"Now you got no place to go on Sunday."

Apparently, after they came back here, they talked to some locals down the road. I think that's where we should start.

Oh, they won't talk to you.

These people have to live here long after we're gone. They'd rather bite their tongue off than talk to us. Bureau procedure, Mr Anderson.

The church caught fire and you ran home. Is that correct? Yes, sir.

And then the four white men stopped you? Yes, sir.

And these four white men attacked your husband? Yes, sir.

But you can't identify them. No, sir.

Did you report this to the police? No, sir.

But you told the civil rights boys what happened? Yes, sir.

Ma'am, did they tell you where they were going after that? No, sir.

Nothing? No, sir.

All right. Thank you, ma'am. You're welcome.

Come on, boy. Open up.

Your brother Hollis here, Fennis? Yes, sir.

Well, wake his ass up. We wanna see him. Why?

Just wake him up, boy. What is it?

There you are, nigger trash! Come here, boy!

Hollis! Hollis!

Get your ass back here, you fuckin' nigger! Hollis! Hollis!

(60)

Or you'll be dead, boy. Real dead. You admire these kids, don't you? Don't you?

I think they're bein' used.

They're sent here in their Volkswagens and sneakers...just to get their heads cracked open.

Did it ever occur to you that maybe they believed in what they were doing? Did it occur to them they'd end up dead?

Maybe.

In Washington they sure as hell knew, didn't they? Some things are worth dying for.

Well, down here they see things a little differently. People down here feel some things are worth killin' for. Where does it come from, all this hatred?

You know, when I was a little boy...

...there was an old Negro farmer lived down the road from us, name of Monroe. And he was... Well, I guess he was just a little luckier than my daddy was. He bought himself a mule.

That was a big deal around that town. My daddy hated that mule.

His friends kidded him that they saw Monroe ploughin' with his new mule...and Monroe was gonna rent another field now that he had a mule.

One morning that mule just showed up dead. They poisoned the water.

After that there was never any mention about that mule around my daddy. One time we were drivin' past Monroe's place and we saw it was empty. He'd just packed up and left, I guess.

Gone up North or somethin'.

I looked over at my daddy's face... and I knew he'd done it. And he saw that I knew.

He was ashamed.

I guess he was ashamed.

He looked at me and he said... "If you ain't better than a nigger, son, who are you better than?"

Do you think that's an excuse? No, it's not an excuse.

It's just a story about my daddy. Where does that leave you?

With an old man who was so full of hate...

...that he didn't know that bein' poor was what was killin' him. Get the light! Get the light!

You all right?

(61)

Now you know what you're gettin' into. I'm gonna call Washington.

I need more agents.

Would it change your mind if I say that's exactly the wrong thing to do? No.

The whole place for 75 a month. It's private. It's central. It's perfect. There's room for a hundred more agents. Two hundred, maybe.

An Analysis racial practices the Film mississippi burning by alan parker

AN ANALYSIS OF RACIAL PRACTICES IN THE FILM

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_{BY ALAN PARKER}

ENGLISH LETTERS DEPARTMENT

LETTERS AND HUMANITIES FACULTY

STATE ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY

SYARIF HIDAYATULLAH

JAKARTA

2009

AN ANALYSIS OF RACIAL PRACTICES IN THE FILM

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_{BY ALAN PARKER}

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LETTERS AND HUMANITIES FACULTY

STATE ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY

SYARIF HIDAYATULLAH

JAKARTA

2009

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An Analysis racial practices the Film mississippi burning by alan parker

AN ANALYSIS OF RACIAL PRACTICES IN THE FILM

MISSISSIPPI BURNING

BY ALAN PARKER

ENGLISH LETTERS DEPARTMENT

LETTERS AND HUMANITIES FACULTY

STATE ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY

SYARIF HIDAYATULLAH

JAKARTA

2009

AN ANALYSIS OF RACIAL PRACTICES IN THE FILM

MISSISSIPPI BURNING

BY ALAN PARKER

ENGLISH LETTERS DEPARTMENT

LETTERS AND HUMANITIES FACULTY

STATE ISLAMIC UNIVERSITY

SYARIF HIDAYATULLAH

JAKARTA

2009

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