Stereotypes In Banksy's The Descent Of Man

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This picture by Banksy displays a gabble of pigeons picketing a migratory bird and demanding that it 'go home '. Darwin wrote about the strength of the migratory instinct in birds claiming that in some cases it is even greater than the maternal, that mothers flying south will leave fledglings behind in their nests to die. He describes, in The Descent of Man, the misery of caged birds that will beat their wings bloody against the bars when the seasons change.(1) Are we to infer that what Banksy depicts is the clash of two natural instincts? Where does prejudice come from? How old and deep are the roots of this conflict? In Genesis its written that God divided the world in two for the sons of Adam. He gave dominion over the land to Cain. That …show more content…

Malcolm X was unsurprisingly in the previous camp 'The media 's the most powerful entity on earth. They have the power to make the innocent guilty and to make the guilty innocent, and that 's power. Because they control the minds of the masses. '(12) Stuart Hall agreed 'questions of culture and ideology, and the scenarios of representation - subjectivity, identity, politics – a formative, not merely expressive, place in the constitution of social and political life '(13). Derogatory representations of nationalities has been a staple of theatre for along time. In Shakespeare 's 'The Tempest ' the monster Caliban (a rough anagram of cannibal) is a clear caricature possessing the projected animalism of 'savage ' people. He is part of a 'vile race ' not 'honoured with human form ' was littered rather than born and not even able to speak unto his white master taught him how. The play is a study of power relationships, between the servants and noblemen, between Prospero and Ariel and between Prospero and Caliban until Caliban attempts to rape his daughter in order to people the island with 'little Calibans '. After this incident