The Help - Tate Taylor

Society has changed and evolved throughout time. Perhaps one of the most significant changed in contemporary American society is the treatment towards African Americans. “The Help” a feature film directed by Tate Taylor is based on the non-fictional novel “The Help” written by author Kathryn Sockett. The feature film explores the life of African American maids of Jackson Mississippi, in the early 1960’s. The 1960’s displayed all African Americans to being left out of the “American dream” through neglect and racism. African Americans faced prejudice and discrimination in almost every aspect of their life, from jobs to housing and even their education. They were denied the right to sit at the same lunch counter or use the same public rest room as white people. They were deprived of equal voting rights until 1964. This was only the beginning of the change for this group of people. Taylor constructs the story of Aibileen Clark and Minny Jackson, two American maids who serve a white household. Through these two main characters Taylor identifies two specific groups in the world, that of the white citizens and the African American citizens. Through Aibileen and Minny’s characters, elements of racism, marginalisation, dehumanisation and discrimination have been explored to encourage me to see groups and/or individuals in the world. The world today consists of dynamic policies that enforce strong equality rights to all people, therefore differing substantially to the 1960’s America.
Racism is a belief that inherent differences among the various human races, that determines cultural or individual achievement, usually involving the idea that one’s own race is superior and has the right to rule others. In the film this has been evident through the scene where a long shot is used to depict the deliberate segregation of African Americans in relation to where their allowed to go to the toilet in public outside of a theatre. A street sign is used to direct African American’s to