Four key themes in racial representation
Exotic - character who is racially different to the main characters is done because it is unusual - exotic
Dangerous
Humorous
Pitied - evoke sympathy from fellow characters and the audience
Changes in Representation over time:
Slave - Blaxploitation - Clown - Rising Middle-Class Figure
The attitudes towards the involvement of ethnic minorities as changed a lot over time. This is partially due to the fear of being accused of falsely representing the ethnic minority concerned. This causes awkward situations when people recognise that producers fear to create storylines for characters of ethnic minorities.
'Albert Square's previous Asian family, the Ferreiras, were criticised as boring and unrealistic - their first names were a mixture of Muslim and Hindu, their surname was Portuguese. "We admittedly came under the spotlight with the Ferreiras," says John Yorke, the BBC's controller of drama production. "We played safe with them and ultimately didn't give them good story lines. We're certainly not doing that with the Masoods, but the devil is in the detail and now pretty much everything we write for them that has a cultural or religious aspect is checked."' http://www.guardian.co.uk/media/2009/jun/22/masoods-eastenders-bbc
Current Ethnic Representation
An example of a humorous character whom is of a different ethnic group to the majority of the other characters is Fat Boy from EastEnders.
http://www.bbc.co.uk/eastenders/characters/
A character who is racially different to the main characters is Neil Cooper from Hollyoaks. This is an example of the key theme of a character being 'exotic'.
http://www.e4.com/hollyoaks/cast/boys/index.html
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