“I’m wary of any claim that ‘We’ are distracted from black violence,” he writes, “because who’s ‘we,’ really? Every other day of the week, America’s complaint is that the blacks doth protest too much.” Austin Collins takes issue with Glover’s critique of black America’s complicity in the violence that plagues it. ‘Donald Glover’s “This Is America” Is a Stylish, Ambitious Provocation - But What Is It Actually Selling?’ “It’s a tribute to the cultural dominance of trap music and a reflection on the ludicrous social logic that made the environment from which trap emerges, the logic where money makes the man, and every black man is a criminal.” “The incongruousness of Glover, raised middle-class and a NYU graduate, bragging about his Mexican drug supplier and threatening to have you gunned down, is intentional,” he writes. ‘What It Means When Childish Gambino Says “This Is America”’ įrank Guan analyzes the lyrics of “This Is America,” which draw heavily on trap music, a gritty rap subgenre with its origins in Atlanta.
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In an appreciative Twitter thread Sunday night, Justin Simien, the creator of Netflix’s “Dear White People,” analyzed the imagery of “This Is America” and concluded that the video asked black viewers, “How can those of us granted a moment in the proverbial spotlight just use it to entertain ourselves to death?” He continued: “It’s a challenge and a series of questions. Justin Simien Breaks Down ‘This Is America’ on Twitter Glover forces us to relive public traumas and barely gives us a second to breathe before he forces us to dance.” The truth is that this video, and what it suggests about its artist, is very difficult. She continues: “It is those things, but it also a fundamentally ambiguous document. Félix notes that “The video has already been rapturously described as a powerful rally cry against gun violence, a powerful portrait of black-American existentialism, a powerful indictment of a culture that circulates videos of black children dying as easily as it does videos of black children dancing in parking lots.” ‘The Carnage and Chaos of Childish Gambino’s “This Is America” Video’ ĭoreen St. Here are some of their sharpest insights. There’s plenty of messaging about race, violence and the entertainment industry in the song and video - which helps explain why fans and critics have devoted so much time to dissecting its references and debating its meaning. But Glover’s graceful moves aren’t exactly the point. The music video for one of those tracks, “This Is America,” appeared the same night, and it suggests that he is actually a quadruple threat: He can dance, too. But I kind of like to call myself just a threat.” As if to drive home the point that he’s scarily talented, Glover, who created and stars in the surreal FX comedy “ Atlanta” was also the episode’s musical guest, performing two new songs as his hip-hop alter ego, Childish Gambino. Some people have described me as a triple threat.
In his opening monologue as the host of “Saturday Night Live” last weekend, Donald Glover quipped: “I’m an actor, a writer and a singer.