Siblings in Sync: Black Sibling Relationships in African American Cinema 1970s-1990s

Abstract

This dissertation analyzes how siblingship operates in African American film narratives in the genres of Blaxploitation and New Black Realism. I am interested in siblingship as a lateral relationship (unlike vertical or hierarchical parent/child relationships) because of its relation to identification, similarity, and difference. This dissertation explores the psychological concepts of attachment-identification and individuation-deidentification as key siblingship themes, and it considers fictive kinship—relationships that are neither marital nor consanguineal—as an important mode of siblingship in these films. The sibling relationships in Blaxploitation emphasize likeness; this likeness and the genre in general offer a romanticized view of Black Power, which is comforting if illusory. Films analyzed extensively in this chapter are Coffy (Hill, 1973) and Brotherhood of Death (Berry, 1976). New Black Realism illustrates that the performativity of sibling and social relationships is often at odds with true depth of care or concern for individuals. Key films analyzed in this chapter are Boyz N the Hood (Singleton, 1991) and New Jack City (Van Peebles, 1991). Research questions include: How do African American sibling relationships manifest onscreen? How does film allow us to immerse ourselves in different realities that may be more appealing than our own? How might these different realities fulfill a need for respite from the challenges of everyday life, and also a model for real-world activism? What are the specific needs of African American communities and individuals in these respects? This study primarily uses the work of Gilles Deleuze but also draws on psychoanalysis, psychology and related disciplines, critical race theory, and historical materialism.