#WAKANDAFOREVER
The Black Panther and Chadwick Boseman’s Legacy
Chadwick Boseman, 1976-2020, respected actor who achieved superstardom playing the lead role Marvel’s groundbreaking Black Panther movie.
Chadwick Boseman said that the Black Panther movie changed what it meant to be ‘young, gifted and black’. In his passing, Boseman’s legacy extends beyond the groundbreaking movie.
There are over 250 tribes in Nigeria and more genetic diversity between the ethnic groups within Africa, than the entire world.
Yet all are lumped into the overarching global identifier of ‘Black’, just as people of European descent are with ‘White’. Due to the lazy nature in which humans think, reinforced by media perceptions, this distinction often leads to collective judgement.
Decision-makers can rely on intuitive assumptions through simplified subconscious processes (heuristics), rather than rationality. The most striking example of this is in policing behaviours, where race is seen as a precursor to suspicion, resulting in heavy-handed treatment (collective judgement), whilst other more nuanced and valuable metrics are ignored.
One extreme by-product of this collective judgement is a sense of shared identity. The morning after Barack Obama’s successful 2008 election, an old lady congratulated me “on your President!” I was born in the United Kingdom, with grandparents from the Commonwealth of Dominica, Nigeria and Ghana (with nine names on the birth certificate to show for it) – yet this lady saw the 44th President of the United States of America in me.
When Usain Bolt won the sprint triple at multiple championships, for those few seconds we all became Jamaican. That sense of collective pride was also felt watching Black Panther.
A group of friends at an early screening of Black Panther.
For Black Panther afros were freed, headwraps worn as crowns and native dress dusted off. Parents took their children. Children took their grandparents.
In this world where black people are gunned down on camera each week, face daily microaggressions and battle so much more, there are few opportunities to publicly feel happy in your skin and revel in excellence. Black Panther gave us that, through a rare (albeit fictional) depiction of ourselves in a positive light on the big screen.
In his passing, Chadwick Boseman’s legacy extends far beyond his physical self. Black Panther has grossed over $1.3 billion and will open doors for countless other Hollywood stories that do not pander to tired stereotypes.
Boseman said that Black Panther changed what it meant to be ‘young, gifted and black’. King T’Challa says: “In my culture, death is not the end, it's more of a stepping off point.” #WakandaForever
