About Me

Throughout the 20th and 21st centuries, the United States has seen a steady increase in the prominence and pervasiveness of the media in all aspects of American life. From film to television to novels, the omnipresence of the media is an undeniable influence in our lives. As race has become a common theme to write about and demonstrate on screen, it is imperative to analyze the ways in which various racial identities are portrayed. Our goal is to explore the way race is portrayed in multimedia outlets, and examine the ways in which these illustrations contribute to our understanding of the multiculturalworld we live in. Through specific works we've come across in our daily lives, we hope to reveal what you may not readily notice upon consuming products of the media; that is, the ubiquity of race representations and how these undoubtedly shape and influence our notions of the diverse population that exists within and around us. by pointing out faults or positive representations of race relations in these arenas, we have the aim of becoming more active, analytical, and critical consumers of popular media as it portrays race.

Saturday, December 11, 2010

Transnational Adoption and Modern Family



                                 
            This blog will discuss the racial aspects depicted in the hit comedy Modern 
Family. The story follows the families of Jay Pritchett, his daughter’s family and his son’s family. Jay’s daughter Claire Dunphy is married to Phil Dunphy and they have three children. Jay’s son Mitchell Pritchett is in a relationship with his partner, Cameron Tucker. Jay is remarried to a much younger Colombian woman, Gloria who has a son, Manny. Mitchell and his partner Cameron on the show adopted a Vietnamese baby girl, Lily. The show displays the challenges that Mitchell and Cameron face while raising a baby of a different race; both parents happen to be Caucasian. Also the show depicts the challenges faced by Jay and his wife Gloria who are in an interracial marriage and a top of being from different culture their ages are very far apart.

    The show does not make it clear whether or not the newly parents, Mitchell and Cameron, are having a difficulty with raising Lily because of her nationality. Overall the show mostly focuses on the normal challenges that face new parents such as different parenting techniques and getting her into a prestige preschool.
     One episode revolved around the process of applying to preschools for Lily. It is made clear that choosing a preschool is a very important issue for Cameron and Mitchell. Cameron wants to try to get into the most prestige school and Mitchell is looking at the situation on a more realistic level and believes the chances of getting into other lower schools are more likely. While waiting for one interview the couple begins talking about the concerns they have because of the waitlists that many schools have and that they are scared Lily won’t be able to get into a school. The reception overhears their conversation and reassures them that the couple could get their daughter into any school of their desire because of the fact that they are a gay couple with a Vietnamese adopted daughter. She claims that schools love diversity and they are a shoe-in in any school. The two take this to heart and try for the most difficult school to get into; they feel very confident going into the interview until right before them enters a bi-racial lesbian couple, one of the parents is disabled and their child is also adopted.Cameron and Mitchell then proceed to believe they are not diverse enough compared to the other couple and Cameron decides to pretend he is Cherokee to look more unique. They proceed to mess up the interview. This episode really touched on ideas that many believe to be true; the idea that being of a different race gives you an advantage when it comes to applying for schools and jobs. It will be interesting to see if the show goes deeper into the challenges of transnational adoption because right now they only just skim the surface. One issue of transnational adoption is the idea that the child will not receive a proper cultural upbringing and will lose their identity because the parents cannot teach them about their cultures. So far Modern Family has not examined this issue yet but possibly as Lily becomes older the show will go deeper into this issue.  
  <!--[if !vml]--><!--[endif]-->       Another aspect of the show is the interracial marriage between Jay and Gloria. The show does portray the challenges of understanding each other’s cultures in order to please each other. There are many episodes that introduce the different traditions of Gloria’s Colombian culture and many times Jay does not understand why they have these traditions. One episode Gloria used Jay being uneducated about the Colombian traditions against him in order for him to do something Gloria wanted done as well as make a fool of him. She made him do a variety of obnoxious things that she said were in her culture even though they weren’t to get back at him. Although there are culture barriers between the two the show always portrays the two as a loving couple and that these culture barriers can be overcome by any interracial couple.  
      Modern Family overall does a good job of introducing interracial marriages and transnational adoption. They could expand more on the challenges that such a couple would encounter as well as the challenges that a couple would face when adopting a baby transnationally. Also since the show is named Modern Family, is it giving a whole new image to what would be considered the “traditional” family? Would this be an example of the race becoming the new norm and is diversity being considered normal not unique? This blog was constructed in order to show racial aspects that can be depicted from the show and how people can look deeper at the show and consider how racial issues are 
                                  portrayed throughout each episode.




Works Cited:
Nelson, Kim. “Shopping for Children in the International Marketplace” 2006. South End Press: Cambridge, Massachusetts. Print. Pg (89-103).
Class Lecture: “Transnational Adoption” December 1, 2010
Wikipedia “Modern Family” <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Modern_Family>
Wikipedia “List of Modern Family Characters” <http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_Modern_Family_characters>

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