{"id":1391,"date":"2014-04-21T08:55:08","date_gmt":"2014-04-21T15:55:08","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391"},"modified":"2014-04-21T08:55:08","modified_gmt":"2014-04-21T15:55:08","slug":"racial-politics-and-the-amazing-race","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391","title":{"rendered":"Racial Politics and the Amazing Race"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>Last night I went on a mini (by Twitter standards) rant about the Amazing Race. Here&#8217;s a Storify recap:<\/p>\n<div class=\"storify\"><iframe loading=\"lazy\" src=\"\/\/storify.com\/anterobot\/racializing-the-amazing-race\/embed\" height=\"750\" width=\"100%\" frameborder=\"no\"><\/iframe><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"\/\/storify.com\/anterobot\/racializing-the-amazing-race.js\"><\/script><noscript>[<a href=\"\/\/storify.com\/anterobot\/racializing-the-amazing-race\" target=\"_blank\">View the story &#8220;Racializing The Amazing Race&#8221; on Storify<\/a>]<\/noscript><\/div>\n<p>The thing is, I\u00a0<em>like<\/em> this show. It&#8217;s been an early player in shaping many of today&#8217;s reality TV tropes. And frankly, aside from a year or two as an undergrad, I&#8217;ve probably seen nearly every season of this show. I get the transmedia heroism of Boston Rob as he ventured from Survivor to the Amazing Race and back to Survivor to claim the prize over there. I get how Fast Forwards and U-Turns have been added and the pacing of the show has become more savvy from season to season. But I also get how terrible the racial politics on major network TV get emphasized when we think about what we&#8217;re watching as &#8220;real&#8221; in comparison to more clearly scripted television programs. Couple this with the essentializing of culture as foods, dances, and dangerous taxi drivers in the show and you&#8217;ve got something of a critical nightmare.<\/p>\n<p>Again, more to come with regards to this (as always).<\/p>\n<div class=\"sharedaddy sd-sharing-enabled\"><div class=\"robots-nocontent sd-block sd-social sd-social-icon-text sd-sharing\"><h3 class=\"sd-title\">Tell people this is awesome:<\/h3><div class=\"sd-content\"><ul><li class=\"share-email\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"\" class=\"share-email sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391&amp;share=email\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to email this to a friend\"><span>Email<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-facebook\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-facebook-1391\" class=\"share-facebook sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391&amp;share=facebook\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Facebook\"><span>Facebook<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-twitter\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-twitter-1391\" class=\"share-twitter sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391&amp;share=twitter\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Twitter\"><span>Twitter<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-print\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"\" class=\"share-print sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to print\"><span>Print<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-pinterest\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-pinterest-1391\" class=\"share-pinterest sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391&amp;share=pinterest\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Pinterest\"><span>Pinterest<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-tumblr\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"\" class=\"share-tumblr sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391&amp;share=tumblr\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Tumblr\"><span>Tumblr<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-reddit\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"\" class=\"share-reddit sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391&amp;share=reddit\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Reddit\"><span>Reddit<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-linkedin\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-linkedin-1391\" class=\"share-linkedin sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391&amp;share=linkedin\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on LinkedIn\"><span>LinkedIn<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-pocket\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"\" class=\"share-pocket sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391&amp;share=pocket\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Pocket\"><span>Pocket<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-end\"><\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Last night I went on a mini (by Twitter standards) rant about the Amazing Race. Here&#8217;s a Storify recap: [View the story &#8220;Racializing The Amazing Race&#8221; on Storify] The thing is, I\u00a0like this show. It&#8217;s been an early player in shaping many of today&#8217;s reality TV tropes. And frankly, aside from a year or two [&hellip;]<\/p>\n<div class=\"sharedaddy sd-sharing-enabled\"><div class=\"robots-nocontent sd-block sd-social sd-social-icon-text sd-sharing\"><h3 class=\"sd-title\">Tell people this is awesome:<\/h3><div class=\"sd-content\"><ul><li class=\"share-email\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"\" class=\"share-email sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391&amp;share=email\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to email this to a friend\"><span>Email<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-facebook\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-facebook-1391\" class=\"share-facebook sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391&amp;share=facebook\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Facebook\"><span>Facebook<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-twitter\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-twitter-1391\" class=\"share-twitter sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391&amp;share=twitter\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Twitter\"><span>Twitter<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-print\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"\" class=\"share-print sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to print\"><span>Print<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-pinterest\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-pinterest-1391\" class=\"share-pinterest sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391&amp;share=pinterest\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Pinterest\"><span>Pinterest<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-tumblr\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"\" class=\"share-tumblr sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391&amp;share=tumblr\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Tumblr\"><span>Tumblr<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-reddit\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"\" class=\"share-reddit sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391&amp;share=reddit\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Reddit\"><span>Reddit<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-linkedin\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"sharing-linkedin-1391\" class=\"share-linkedin sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391&amp;share=linkedin\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on LinkedIn\"><span>LinkedIn<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-pocket\"><a rel=\"nofollow noopener noreferrer\" data-shared=\"\" class=\"share-pocket sd-button share-icon\" href=\"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/?p=1391&amp;share=pocket\" target=\"_blank\" title=\"Click to share on Pocket\"><span>Pocket<\/span><\/a><\/li><li class=\"share-end\"><\/li><\/ul><\/div><\/div><\/div>","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_exactmetrics_skip_tracking":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_active":false,"_exactmetrics_sitenote_note":"","_exactmetrics_sitenote_category":0,"spay_email":"","footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false},"categories":[8,18],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-1391","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-film","category-literacy"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/pe04s-mr","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1391","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=1391"}],"version-history":[{"count":2,"href":"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1391\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":1393,"href":"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/1391\/revisions\/1393"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=1391"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=1391"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.theamericancrawl.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=1391"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}