How does the use of anachronism and counter-narratives in “Boycott” challenge traditional narratives of the Bus Boycotts and the Civil Rights Movement as a whole?
To me, the film does this from the very beginning through the depictions of Jesus, the start of the boycotts, the use of modern songs in the historical narrative, visuals, and telling the story in a new way. We often think of racial progress as this one linear movement and use the Post-Civil Rights era in our language to describe the progress that the United States has made in regard to race and discrimination, which can reduce the issues and steps back that happened and continue over time in the search for social justice. In addition to this, we see a different depiction of important symbols to the movement, with Rosa Parks being depicted as a willing and knowledgeable and strategic participant to the movement, but not as the sole catalyst to the bus boycotts. These two differences in the film challenge the dominant narratives I’ve learned previously about the Montgomery Bus Boycotts.
I appreciate the informative aspect of including key figures, especially women other than Rosa Parks, who meaningfully contributed to the bus boycott’s success. I obtained this knowledge through the film but never had more than a superficial grasp of the situation from all my years of education. I think this is interesting considering the persistent teaching of the civil rights movement and key figures. I learned about the court cases, marches, and speeches, but never about the figures working in the large shadow cast by the sizable persona of MLK. Implicit bias informed my perception of the civil rights movement as a male-led effort. Of course, I knew about the significance of Rosa Parks, but the two figureheads synonymous with the movement, per my inaccurate understanding of things, would be MLK and Malcolm X. Early in the film the influence of women is spelled out in a meeting calling men to act. It is women leading the charge, at least to that point, acting courageously in the face of adversity while men watch idly. I was unaware of the depth of female involvement in the civil rights movement, ignorantly. Further, your mention of a linear progress narrative in race relations got me thinking. There have been numerous interruptions that would challenge such a concept. Even outside of white-black relations, at present there is tremendous tension between Jewish Americans and a pro-Palestine faction. While I don’t think I know enough about the situation to effectively offer an informed opinion of what is right and what is wrong, it is simply the latest instance of othering plaguing American society. Certain groups of people are always being subverted below another group of people, sometimes there is a mutual subversion effort. Systemic racism is still an issue in the United States and black people are perennial victims of those systems. So while there is the symbolic victory of everyone drinking at the same water fountain and sitting in the same section of a bus, markings of segregation and subjugation persist in modern America. Where are certain people getting on the bus? This simple question could inform an understanding of segregation’s lasting effects. I’ve definitely strayed from focusing on the film so I’ll digress here.
I like how you mention that the use of the anachronisms provide a new interpretation of the Montgomery bus boycotts and a starting point of the Civil Rights Movement because I thought this was interesting in the Valerie Smith article. Another example of an anachronistic event in the film that relates to what you are discussing is how the film “places Parks’s act of civil disobedience in the context of earlier acts of resistance” (Smith, 530). By referencing both Mary Louise Smith and Claudette Colvin, Parks’s actions are now becoming compared with those of another time period. Additionally, I was wondering if the way in which the film “undercuts the notion of the boycott as an originary moment…[and] suggests that the boycott’s legacy and repercussions are to be felt into the present” could also be an example of an anachronism because it is taking things that happened in the past and bringing them to the present in a way that affects viewers and the audience alike (Smith, 530).
Also, as mentioned above, this film “undercuts the notion of the boycott as an originary moment” which challenges the “linear movement” of the Civil Rights Movement and historical progress that you touch on (Smith, 530).
I also like how you mention that the music adds to the differences the film has from other interpretations of these events because I found this to be particularly interesting. Along the same vein, the color changes within the film serve the same purpose and ask viewers to think deeply about why the producers and editors made such visual choices and what information they are conveying about the film content.