If culture is understood as an aspect of life which is ever-present, then one must also understand that media, in all of its forms, is responsible for displays of culture. Whether they are represented in magazines or on film, aspects of Black culture are displayed in ways which seek to illustrate the greater Black experience. Movies are illustrative of Black strife and triumphs; confronting issues of racism while also being cognizant of a class of upwardly mobile Black people who are, many times, less involved with the underrepresented, disenfranchised Black community.
Crooklyn is one movie that delves into the Black experience, that same experience which was shaped greatly by the times. The 70’s were a period of Black self-love and community; the 70’s found a pre-Crack era Black community which did not yet know the devastation that is drug abuse, on a large scale. Author Donald Bogle calls Crooklyn Lee’s most tender-hearted film, noting that it was enhanced by a woman’s point of view. In essence, the movie is about growing up. As always, Spike Lee incorporates a reflection of himself into the film with Clinton, the Carmichael family’s resident New York Knicks fanatic. Crooklyn, the movie by Spike Lee which is based on his own childhood growing up in Brooklyn, NY, provides a scope for discussion of the Black experience. There are elements of communal values which have been known to hold Black communities together, as well as representations of the Black family. Elements of Black surface level culture are also present, as one can relate much of the imagery, language, style, and clothing to African-Americans’ greater sense of culture and cultural pride.
Crooklyn chronicles the Black experience as lived by the Carmichael family. The man character, Troy Carmichael, grows up throughout the film; almost morphing, Troy starts out in the beginning as a younger girl who has little worries and develops both physically and emotionally as a result of experience. Her character is illustrative, in many ways, of the survivalist nature of Black womanhood. Although she is young, there were many times that Troy could have been less than resilient, crumbling under the pressures of maintaining her sanity in a house with a large, rambunctious group of young men or striving to become a woman in a man’s world, her household. Throughout the movie are many elements of Black culture which provide a working framework to understand not only the Carmichaels” experience but that of a collective Black community.
With Crooklyn, Spike Lee does something which many filmmakers have yet to do, in making films about Black people that attempt to show positive representations of the African-American familial unit. Lee uses his own experiences as a child, to bring life to a discussion of a Black family that experiences many of life’s pitfalls. The most important aspect of the Black family that is chronicled in Crooklyn is the family’s commitment to each other at all costs. Kwame Gyekye, in “African Cultural Values: An Introduction”, asserts that the family is recognized in African societies as a fundamental and a highly valued institution (Gyekye, 90). The same rings true for African-American families. Though the Black family unit, in its current state, is more segmented because of internal problems and some outside forces, there is still a widely accepted understanding of the Black family that sees it as an extension of African values of kinship and greater community. No matter how intense the struggle, the children and parents know their place in not only helping themselves, but in helping the entire family move forward. This sort of connectedness is not something many filmmakers depict on film, although it tends to be something that to this day is present in the lives of Black people.
Another element of Black culture that is present throughout culture is the character’s creation of and appreciation for music. To merely state that Music is part of all activities among African people would be doing a vast injustice, by downplaying the important role that music has and will continue play in the lives of African people, on the continent and in the United States. In terms of the continent, the objective of African music is not to make sounds which are pleasing to the ear but rather to “express life in all of its aspects through medium of sound” (http://trumpet.sdsu.edu/m345/). It is with this in mind that I am able to understand the continuity of music and how it has shaped the experience of all African people. In the United States, the music of African people is known for withstanding the barbaric struggle of slavery, then the equally oppressive system of Southern and Northern defacto segregation.
The best music seems to be born out of some sort of struggle. In the United States, it was the struggle, by Africans, for collective freedom and equality that gave birth to some of the most inspirational music ever. While some films act as stereotypical representations of Black people’s relationship to and understanding of music, Crooklyn uses music as the backdrop of the main character’s experiences. Troy Carmichael experiences pre-teen angst in a household where she is the only girl, and walks the streets of her neighborhood with Curtis Mayfield’s “Pusher Man” as part of the soundtrack to her very own life. Not to be cast into the shadows of Black films that show Black art as working caricatures, the aspects of music in Crooklyn speak to the greater Black experience. Because the 70’s were a time of great creativity, the movie’s soundtrack is one that truly speaks to the film’s plot and target audience. Those who could relate to the experiences of the Carmichael family were many times children themselves during the 1970’s. They could best remember the sizzling New York summers when songs like “The Thin Line between Love and Hate” by The Persuaders were heard throughout the city’s five boroughs.
On a smaller scale, conceptions of Black spirituality work in Crooklyn as the Carmichaels deal with the loss of their matriarch. Troy emerges as a little woman, adding to ideals about strong Black female presence. Additionally, the family is show support by friends who come to them in their time of mourning, preparing food and ensuring that the children are provided for. Both of these examples work to explain the ways in which many Black families deal with death. As the dead are many times still revered, there is a part of Troy and all of her brothers that will not allow themselves to cry immediately, for their mother’s presence is still felt and she would not have wanted them to be crying.
An element of Black culture which is also present in Crooklyn is shared participation. Shared participation is an agent used by African people to show strength in numbers, even at times when the odds are not in their collective favor. It is through acts of shared participation, like call-and-response, that Africans are able to express themselves and their triumphs or frustrations. It is also this collective response that allows African people to find a voice, even in situations where a collective voice is frowned upon. Throughout Crooklyn, much of the yelling between the Carmichael siblings is indicative of call-and-response that has long permeated the Black existence, and Black people’s experiences.
One of the most captivating elements of both African-American culture and the African worldview is the social-affiliative nature of African people, which often leads to impromptu groupings. The tendency to adapt communal-like properties to all situations is evident throughout Crooklyn as each member of the family, in some way or another creates a community all their own with people in their Brooklyn neighborhood. Troy does this with the little girls in her neighborhood, learning some of life’s toughest lessons about boys, crime, and drug use from them. The boy children also create their own little communities, running freely around the neighborhood as they wage war against a less than friendly neighbor, Tony Eyes. In these and other situations that unfold during Crooklyn, the social-affiliative nature of African-Americans shines through, reinforcing beliefs about community and kinship.
Crooklyn is one Spike Lee Joint that shows the Black family at its highest and lowest points. Through the eyes of the family’s only girl, the movie explores aspects of Black culture that come together to create a film that is not bound by anything. Spike Lee tackles a number of issues, fair looking into both the hardships of keeping Black relationships together, and struggle that exists when parents are working to raise intelligent, socially adjusted children.
The film allowed for all people, regardless of race or socio-economic background, to understand the racial and socio-economic climate of early 1970’s Brooklyn, NY. Audiences were able to bear witness to the strength of a Black family, and the amount of confidence and positive qualities an enduring familial relationship could provide for all people involved.
Works Cited
Gyekye, Kwame. African Cultural Values: An Introduction. Sankofa Publishing Company. 1996. Philadelphia, PA/Accra, Ghana
Bogle, Donald. Toms, Coons, Mulattoes, Mammies, and Bucks. The Continuum International Publishing Group. 2003. New York, NY.
http://trumpet.sdsu.edu/m345/African_Music1.html
