Higher Learning: Composition's racialized reflection [1999]

In John Singleton's 1995 film Higher Learning, central character Malik Williams is bombarded with racist imagery from the moment he steps onto the campus of Columbus University. Under cloak of the American flag — the movie's opening shot features Old Glory — all sorts of stereotyping and racialized discourse play out. White students make snide remarks about Mexicans on scholarship. Authorities suppress African American cultural expression. A woman of European extraction clutches her bag when alone in an elevator with Malik. Nothing is subtle in this collage of racialized metaphors and ironies. In fact, Malik is himself, at first blush, a stereotype. On a track scholarship, he is the Black athlete who has literally run his way into college.