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Brown in the USA: Representations of South Asians in American Comedy

Brown in the USA: Representations of South Asians in American Comedy

Aditya Hans Prasad

Writing 3, Section 5

Professor Douglas Moody

March 2018.

Brown in the USA: Representations of South Asians in American Comedy

The second largest immigrant group in the of America, South Asians continue to emigrate in larger numbers than ever. This swell in immigration, and the resulting vast American Indian diaspora have had a deep sociocultural impact on America. However, this impact is solely characterized in popular media by the one-dimensional, inaccurate Indian stereotype- thick accents, nerds, convenience store owners, the IT guy. Traditionally, comedy has propagated these stereotypes, making Indians the targets of their jokes. Television shows like The Big Bang Theory and portray characters that embody these stereotypes.

Even of Indian origin such as Russel Peters perform jokes at the expense of their own race. In fact, this stereotyping has been extremely detrimental to the Indian diaspora and its culture. However, the recent generation of American comedy has recognized the harmful absurdity of this formulaic image of Indians and addresses issues of race in order to deconstruct these conventional patterns. The traction that this counter stereotyping movement has gained is testament to the great cultural power that comedy wields.

Since comedy in its most fundamental form is the art of creating something which is

‘funny’, one can easily visualize it as an economy of jokes and laughs between the comic and the audience. The comic creates the joke, and the audience’s response determines whether the joke was a good one. How the audience reacts also influences the comic’s and style, which in turn reinforces the audience’s own views and beliefs. Since its inception as a formal sector in entertainment, humour has been used as a medium to reflect the collective thought process of a society. If an audience is uncomfortable laughing at a joke, it is highly possible that it the subject of that joke is unacceptable comedic material in its culture. Similarly, if an audience laughs at a stale joke without thinking it through, it is equally likely that the topic is completely normalized in its culture. By analyzing the comedy of a society—what jokes it produces, and what jokes it laughs at, one can gain some deep insights into the issues that it faces. This is especially true with respect to topics such as race, religion, sexuality, and gender.

However, the comic ultimately leads a conversation, and therefore has an important role. As

Krefting puts it, “Jokesters unmask inequality by identifying the legal arrangements and cultural attitudes and beliefs contributing to their subordinated status—joking about it, challenging that which has become normalized and compulsory, and offering new solutions and strategies

“(Krefting 2). In a certain sense, comedians are the intellectuals and thinkers in our modern media obsessed society, and their jokes are meant to push the boundaries they are created within. As a result, they have a serious responsibility to the society they serve to entertain. The cultural weight of comedy is therefore no laughing matter.

Unfortunately, a large portion of material society considers to be humourous is not wit that challenges an issue, but regurgitated jokes at the expense of one or many targeted communities. There are many popular, successful comedians who have acts that centre around their race—Dave Chapelle, Gabriel ‘Fluffy’ Iglesias, . The first comic of South Asian heritage to make it big in the industry, Russel Peters rose to prominence with routines based mainly on thick Indian accents, arranged marriages, and other Indian stereotypes. His main act involves him going on long tirades about Indian parents, Indian food, Indian names, essentially anything that strikes him as different about Indian culture. Instead of celebrating or accepting these cultural differences, Peters crudely mocks them -- "Some Indian names are good, cool, but you've got to think, when you come here to America, that they won't sound so good. I knew a Sukhdeep and a Hardik. Who the hell names their kid Hardik?" (Tsering). He speaks with a caricaturized Indian accent and portrays Indian characters as overly generalized, unnaturally dull, loud, and conservative, quite unlike actual Indian people. Much of Russel’s audience is

South Asian, a fact which acknowledges in quite a damning fashion. "And look at you brown bastards! There are a lot of closed motels in town tonight” (Tsering). Nevertheless, South-Asian audiences flock to watch him as until fairly recently, he was the only to address the huge minority group. His jokes may sometimes be funny, but they inevitably serve to alienate

Indian culture from the cultures around it. In fact, Peters has expressed his views on how he views Indian culture quite explicitly, saying "I'm not a big fan of people saying, 'Come on, let's go out and be brown.' I'm all, okay, be brown, be as Indian as you wanna be. But understand that you are not in any more. And if it's that great, go back" (Tsering). It is this underlying bias in his humour that has led to many viewing him as a comedian who exploits race, rather than celebrating it.

It is certainly true that a fair portion of Peters work focuses on other immigrant groups including Chinese, Jamaican, and Arabs, but even these acts are laden with thick accents and blatant stereotyping. Discussing Peters act, Faiza Hirji writes, “As a Canadian of South Asian ancestry, I myself am amused by his jokes about Indian tendencies regarding matchmaking, strict parenting, and prejudices toward other ethnic groups. At the same time, I am sometimes aware of discomfort, of uncertainty as to whether there is really a difference between a comic routine and bigotry. When Peters adopts a strong Chinese accent to mimic a Chinese shopkeeper or martial arts expert, I am reminded of times when I have heard other individuals use such accents to mock Chinese Canadians and have felt, with utter conviction, that I was witnessing racist acts. How does one define the difference? “(Hirji). It is evident that an unavoidable consequence of race-targeting humour like Peters’ is a great blow to one’s racial identity, even to a supporter of Peters like Hirji, who later goes on to support him and justify his words. Despite her ultimate support of Peters work, Hirji’s own words are ideal to describe the negative effect that the comedic style of Peters has on cultural identity— “When audience members laugh at humour derived from a racialized parody, they validate any stereotypes embedded within” (Hirji). Peters’ humour provides constant validation to stereotypes about

Indians, usually in an incredibly tasteless and crude fashion.

However, Russel Peters is only one player in the overarching problem of South Asian misrepresentation in comedy and popular media. American television has been distorting the

Indian image for years. Brown characters are rare on-screen, and if present are stereotypes designed to be fodder for clichéd ‘Indian’ jokes. Television shows such as , Big Bang

Theory, The Simpsons, and Phineas and Ferb are all guilty of creating such formulaic brown characters. These characters seldom have any traits that run deeper than those that the brown stereotype attributes them. They have uncommonly long convoluted names, which are often made up, such as The Simpsons’ or The Big Bang Theory’s Rajesh Ramayan Koothrappali. They are taxi drivers, convenience store owners, IT service workers or high achieving science geniuses. They are all meek and powerless characters. More disturbingly, these roles are often portrayed by white actors in brownface. In an interview with NPR, Hari

Kondabolu, a popular comedian of Indian origin, takes on the famous Indian convenience store owner in the Simpsons’, “Apu, a character voiced by , a white guy. A white guy doing an impression of a white guy making fun of my father” (Kondabolu). Kondabolu goes on to highlight why he thinks such a characterization is dangerous to the identities of individuals of South Asian heritage:

I think something can be funny and it's not necessarily right. Like, I find Apu funny. He's

a really funny character. But he's based on this faulty foundation of, like, a caricature.

So, you know, fundamentally everything that he's going to do is based on a caricature.

And that's weird. Like, this whole character is what white writers thought of us 30 years

ago, thought of our community. This isn't how we represent ourselves. This is how they

view us. And that's a hell of a thing. And I remember watching "The Simpsons" as a kid.

And I still love "The Simpsons." And I would always be taken out of the show a little bit

when Apu would come on or there would be another racist stereotype 'cause it'd be

like, oh, this wasn't for us. This was meant for someone else. (Kondabolu)

Apu has been the poster boy for the Indian accent since his introduction to The Simpsons. Due to its constant reinforcement, this Apu accent is now expected from every brown character in all forms of popular media. Kal Penn, a famous actor of Indian origin, documented this expectation on , with a post that pictured a script he had auditioned to play an Indian character for, and the reaction his audition got— “Jeez I remember this one! They were awful. ‘Can you make his accent a little more AUTHENTIC?’ That usually meant they wanted Apu”

(Penn). Shilpa Dave has termed this ‘brown-voicing’, identifying the “specific racializing trait among in Hollywood productions, which simultaneously connotes both foreignness and familiarity because the accent is identified with an English-speaking identity and hence offers some cultural privileges of assimilating into American culture” (Dave 41). This heavily exaggerated accent has been used to mock Indian people for decades, in an attempt to put down and denigrate their ethnic background and culture. Apu’s brown-voicing gives us a keen insight into where American media places people of South Asian origin in society. Dave highlights this by writing “As a character, he represents many of the key themes from the 1990s to current times associated with in popular depictions, such as the model- minority image, subdued or hypomasculinity, and an informant on Indian culture and religion.

Apu, a fictional construction, helps us to revise theories of racial performance and, therefore, examine American racial hierarchies and the formations of Asian American communities in ” (Dave 42). The accent is merely a symptom of a larger problem. Its constant use has essentially created a criterion with which to separate South Asian immigrants from the

American society they are trying to integrate into. In Dave’s words, “this position does not allow the perception of Indian Americans to expand and, thereby, prevents Indian Americans

(immigrant or second- or third-generation Indian Americans) like other Asian American groups from establishing any kind of presence other than as outsiders and foreigners in American communities. If the image of Indian Americans and South Asians is continually that of immigrant foreigners, then how can Indian Americans ever be seen as movers and shakers, let alone stakeholders and cultural citizens, in American life?” (Dave 46). The brown-voiced accent is extremely damaging, and essentially serves to isolate and alienate South Asian people and their cultures.

Along with brown voicing, brownface is quite common in Hollywood productions. Films such as The Party and Short Circuit 2 have employed white actors to portray characters of South

Asian origin. Arguably the most successful Asian American actor and comedian of all time, Aziz

Ansari is outspoken in his criticism for this misrepresentation that is commonplace in

Hollywood productions. In his article for the Times, Ansari discusses his reaction when he realized that Short Circuit 2 employed brown-face:

One day in college, I decided to go on the television and film website IMDB to see what

happened to the Indian actor from “Short Circuit 2.” Turns out, the Indian guy was a

white guy. The character was played by Mr. Stevens, a Caucasian actor in brownface.

Rather than cast an Indian actor, the filmmakers had Mr. Stevens sit every morning in a

makeup chair and get painted an “Indian color” before going on set and doing his

“Indian voice.” As a child, I thought the villain of the film was Oscar Baldwin, the banker

who tricks Johnny 5 into helping him commit a jewel heist. As an adult, I thought the

bad guy was actually Mr. Stevens, who mocked my ethnicity. (Ansari)

While Ansari eventually accepts the film as a product of the culturally insensitive 1980s that it was created in, he points out that even recent films such as The Social Network and The

Martian have had Indian origin roles portrayed by actors of other ethnicities (Ansari). These observations highlight a serious problem in the entertainment industry—one that would not be acceptable if it involved or targeted any other ethnicity. Ansari’s experiences as a member of the audience are only compounded by his experiences as an actor. While as a viewer, he was quick to observe instances of misrepresentation, as a member of the industry he has observed a consistent lack of any representation whatsoever. In his article, Ansari highlights the homogeneity that leads nearly every Hollywood production:

When you look at posters for movies or TV shows, see if it makes sense to switch the

title to “What’s Gonna Happen to This White Guy?” (“Forrest Gump,” “The Martian,”

“Black Mass”) or if there’s a woman in the poster, too, “Are These White People Gonna

Have Sex With Each Other?” (“Casablanca,” “When Harry Met Sally,” “The Notebook”).

Even at a time when minorities account for almost 40 percent of the American

population, when Hollywood wants an “everyman,” what it really wants is a straight

white guy. But a straight white guy is not every man. The “everyman” is everybody.

(Ansari)

These insights lead to the extremely unsettling cultural void where misrepresentation is equivalent to no representation at all. The massive absence of brown characters in American media has two major consequences within the industry. Firstly, it reinforces the typecast portrayals we still see on screen today. Secondly, it shuts down alternative representations in favour of those cultivated stereotypical depictions. In his interview with NPR, Kondabolu addresses the issue of misrepresentation with relation to no representation at all. When asked whether he would be comfortable with the stereotypical Apu being voiced by an Indian actor instead of a white man, Kondabolu responds: Yeah, more acceptable doesn't mean acceptable. It just means less unacceptable. It still

has the same issues of there aren't that many representations. I mean, if you look at the

history of minstrelsy, you know, there are black characters played by black actors, you

know, in, like, the '20s. And they were awful roles. Like, yeah, we get to play ourselves

now, but not really. And we get to do these voices, but not really. And I think that's key

in here. Like, it's like if a brown person does the voice it's a paycheck, but it's also a lot

of, I think, pride that's swallowed. (Kondabolu)

It is evident that South Asian representations are trapped deep in a vicious cycle of production and demand. Breaking this cycle therefore requires a very specific effort to heal and counter the negative impacts of misrepresentation.

However, a few comedic productions have strived to represent South Asians as more real and less stereotyped. One of the first popular characters portrayed in such fashion was

Kumar from Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle, portrayed by Kal Penn. Kumar is not painted as an outsider in America, but the son of first generation immigrants who is American in every way. Dave recognizes the shift towards accurate representations in the film, writing that “South

Asian Americans no longer have a foreign accent and, instead, speak with American accents that are normalized in relation to the people around them. However, as the focus of the narrative, their racial position is not erased... but is emphasized as part of their everyday life”

(Dave 112). Harold and Kumar Go To White Castle is created as a of the stereotyping that minorities have to encounter daily. Describing the comedic success of the film, Dave writes that

“As a comedy, the film’s humor hinges on the contrast between the expectations of how Asian

American characters have previously acted in mainstream films and the antics of Harold and Kumar witnessed on screen. Brownface and brown-voice performances are exposed as theatrical constructs that the main characters encounter and contest in their everyday lives.

The juxtaposition of what is expected and how the actors play against those expectations is the basis for a lot of the humor in the film” (Dave 114). The film does not shy away from discussing race but addresses it by going against what the audience expects. Instead of mocking South

Asian cultures with a stereotype, the film mocks the stereotype and celebrates immigration and inclusivity.

In the past decade, several young comedians of South Asian origin have gained popularity with acts that focus not on their race, but on their own problems as human beings.

Mindy Kaling, a comedian, Dartmouth alum, and writer for the popular US The Office, starred in and produced her own sitcom, The Mindy Show. In the show, Mindy portrays Mindy, a typical middle-aged medical professional in New York. Her race has little effect on the character, and Mindy is depicted as a regular, unaffected person. The Mindy Show is notable as one of the only television productions to have a South Asian woman as the lead character. It is a considerable effort to diversify the subjects we view on screen. Interestingly, her show is unconcerned with the matter of race. However, ’s series, Master of None is active in its pursuit of racial diversity, representation, and inclusivity. Episode 4 of the 1st season, titled ‘Indians on TV’, takes on many of the films and television shows we have already discussed. It also shows us Ansari’s character Dev, a South Asian actor, struggle to find roles where he plays more than just a colour or an accent. The episode greatly spread the discussion about the need for accurate representations of South Asians in popular media. Ansari’s standup is interesting in that it never directly addresses race. In fact, Ansari has been quite explicit in his reasons for avoiding the subject:

"'It's funny because I made a clear choice in my stand-up not to make it about 'Here's what it's like to be an Indian guy, here's what it's like to be a white guy,'" says Ansari, who has three Netflix-exclusive stand-up specials to his name, the last being at .

"I feel like when you do that kind of humor, you tend to end up doing these kind of hack stereotype jokes. But to have this kind of conversation about race that I have in the show

[Master of None], I've never had a chance to do that.” (Ali)

Even so, Ansari is the primary advocate for equality in representation of South Asians in the media. He, along with a plethora of comedians and actors, is fighting to undo all the damage done by caricaturizing and stereotyping in the media, and striving to create more realistic, accurately portrayed South Asian roles. Kaling and Ansari’s healthy distance from race also adds strength to this movement, as it reinforces the notion that South Asians and their roles should involve far more than just their race, accent, and ethnic background.

Hasan Minhaj is another comedian of Indian origin who is unwavering in his pursuit for fair representation and rejection of the Indian-American stereotype. As a correspondent on The

Daily Show with , Minhaj has a unique opportunity to combine humour and politics in an effective way. In an article for The Guardian, Mahdawi provides an example of the quick wit that Minhaj uses to address issues close to his heart— “Entertainment has become one way of doing something. Minhaj, for example, did not mince his words at the White House correspondents’ dinner – something that clearly made the largely white crowd quite uncomfortable. A sample joke: ‘As a Muslim, I like to watch Fox News for the same reason I like to play Call of Duty. Sometimes, I like to turn my brain off and watch strangers insult my family and heritage’” (Mahdawi). Minhaj’s hour long Netflix stand-up special Homecoming King focuses on Minhaj growing up as the child of 2 Muslim Indian immigrants, in Davis, .

His comedic style is mainly anecdotal, and it is through these stories that we see the effect that and stereotyping had on his childhood. Minhaj weaves an emotional narrative—one that millions of immigrants and their families can relate to. Elizabeth Blair recounts the particularly heart wrenching story of how Minhaj’s race prevented him from going to prom with the girl he wanted:

Minhaj's dad was strict and fearful of American high school traditions. Minhaj says he

wasn't allowed to go to movies or football games. One of his good — a white girl

named Bethany Reed — asked him to the prom. In Homecoming King, Minhaj translates

his dad's response thusly: “Hasan I will break your face.” But, like a good, American

teenager, Hasan went anyway. He put on his JC Penney suit, snuck out and rode his bike

over to his date's house. “And I'm making sure I'm biking extra wide with my knees out.

That way my slacks don't get caught up in my bike chains.” With a genuine look of pride

on his face, Minhaj tells the audience he felt like he was ‘living the American Dream’ on

that bike ride. Until he got to his date's house. When the front door opened, another

boy was putting a corsage on Bethany. Her mother explained: "'See, we have a lot of

family back in Ohio, and we're going to be taking a lot of pictures tonight, and they're

going to see them. And we don't know if it would be a good fit for us. Do you need a ride

home? Mr. Reed can give you a ride home.' And I said, 'No, I'm OK. I have my bike.' And I biked home and I snuck back into my room and I just played Mario Kart for the rest of

the night. And that's the best I've ever been dressed playing Mario Kart.” (Blair)

It is easy to see why audiences connect with Minhaj. His friendly delivery and emotion driven accounts from his childhood have led him to be an increasingly popular comedian among teenagers and college students from immigrant families. These audiences have faced similar experiences, they relate with what he’s saying. In a sense, Ansari and Minhaj have become the role models whose absence they noticed while growing up. While much of Aziz Ansari’s standup focuses on the troubles he faces as a South Asian adult, actor, and comedian, Minhaj’s comedy is more personal and relatable in terms of an immigrant childhood. However, both serve their purpose brilliantly, and have opened a burgeoning discussion about stereotyping and representation of South Asians in America.

South Asians still have an arduously long journey till they are accurately and adequately depicted on screen, but the movement is gaining influence daily. The examples provided above have all exhibited a common thread—comedy being used as a tool to reverse the culturally insensitive and inaccurate notions that years of media brown-facing, brown-voicing, and caricaturizing has resulted in. Whether it is Minhaj’s style of sociopolitical but personal standup,

Ansari’s goal to highlight the absurdity of race affairs in popular media, Kaling’s focus on creating original, unique characters, or Kondabolu’s goal of undoing the damage that Apu has done to generations of Indian audiences, comedy is a powerful tool which can be extremely effective when directed properly. These comedians have done a great service to a diverse society by changing the state of comedy from the damaging acts of Russel Peters and the creators of Apu. After all, the goal of humour is to make people laugh, and a joke is funniest when everybody can laugh at it together.

Annotated Bibliography

Ali, Lorraine. “Aziz Ansari's Fight against 'Hacky Ethnic Jokes' Fires His New Netflix Show 'Master

of None'.” Times, 3 Nov. 2015, www.latimes.com/entertainment/tv/la-et-st-

aziz-ansari-master-of-none-20151103-story.html.

This article provided me some background on how Ansari approaches humour and race within his humour.

Ansari, Aziz. “Aziz Ansari on Acting, Race and Hollywood.” , 10 Nov. 2015,

www.nytimes.com/2015/11/15/arts/television/aziz-ansari-on-acting-race-and-

hollywood.html.

This essay by Ansari provided me a lot of material about issues of brownfacing and the lack of

South Asian diversity in Hollywood.

Blair, Elizabeth. “ Of 'Daily Show' On Prom, Indian Dads And White Folks At Desi

Weddings.” National Public Radio, 14 Oct. 2015.

This discussion of Hasan Minhaj and his Netflix special allowed me to easily present some of the anecdotes Minhaj shares on stage.

Dave, S. S..Indian Accents: Brown Voice and Racial Performance in American Television and Film.

Champaign: University of Illinois Press, 2013.

The most valuable source I found, this book really helped me contextualize my argument and provided me with both a lens to view my subject through, and a lot of arguments to build off regarding Harold and Kumar and Apu. The introduction and chapters 1, 2 and 5 were particularly valuable in my background reading and sourcing for the paper. Hirji, Faiza. ""Somebody Going to Get Hurt Real Bad": The Race-Based Comedy of Russell

Peters." Canadian Journal of Communication, vol. 34, no. 4, 2009, pp. 567-586.

I was unsure of how to discuss the problematic nature of Russel Peters’ comedy, and this article provided me with compelling arguments from two opposing sides. While my argument firmly sticks with one, it was extremely valuable to build off the “they say” that this article provides.

Kondabolu, Hari. “In ',' Discusses South Asian

Representation.” NPR, National Public Radio, 2017,

www..org/2017/11/17/564936511/in-the-problem-with-apu-hari-kondabolu-

discusses-south-asian-representation.

Hari Kondabolu is an outspoken critic of Apu and the cultural damage he does, and I felt my argument would be undeveloped if I did not include perspectives from a comedian who has made an entire documentary about the problem.

Krefting, R..All Joking Aside: American Humor and Its Discontents. Baltimore: Johns Hopkins

University Press, 2014.

This book helped me contextualize comedy and its powerful relationship with society.

Mahdawi, Arwa. “From Apu to Master of None: How US Pop Culture Tuned into the South Asian

Experience.” The Guardian, 9 May 2017, www.theguardian.com/tv-and-

radio/2017/may/09/from-apu-to-master-of-none-how-us-pop-culture-tuned-into-the-

south-asian-experience.

An article I found while reading about South Asian comedians that encapsulates a majority of the major players in the movement to diversify South Asian representations. Penn, Kal. @kalpenn. “Jeez I remember this one! They were awful. "Can you make his accent a

little more AUTHENTIC?" That usually meant they wanted Apu.” Twitter. 14 Mar. 2017,

9:44 a.m., https://twitter.com/kalpenn/status/841691596110348288.

An interesting but unfortunate series of tweets I came across.

Tsering, Lisa. "Comic Takes Aim at Racial Stereotypes." India - West, Jan 20, 2006.

This article provides interesting perspectives about race in Peters’ own words.

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