The series "When they see us". Racism in the United States of America
Sandra Kostic
Seminar paper from the year 2021 in the subject American Studies - Miscellaneous, grade: 2,3, , course: Seminar, language: English, abstract: April 19th, 2019 marked 30 years since Patricia Meili, a 28-year old white investment banker, was attacked and raped in Central Park, New York. This criminal case is also known as the “Central Park Five Case” because five boys at the ages of fourteen to sixteen, were falsely accused and subsequently had to serve prison sentences ranging from six to twelve years. They were viewed by the media, the justice system, and the public not as five youths with names, a life, a family, and a future, but as a cumulative dangerous unit.The case of the five boys showed that even in 1989, almost thirty years after the civil rights movement, there was still a clear distinction between Black and white in America. The director Ava DuVernay portrays this in her four-part miniseries "When They See Us," produced in 2019. This paper argues that the series “When They See Us” (Ava DuVernay, 2019) demonstrates how the American system has failed to see five individuals instead of the Central Park Five by false accusation and agitation by justice, media and the public based on racism.
