Talking of Racism

Interesting review of the Ugly Betty television show by Yeidy M. Rivero on Alternet, the author compares it to its original from Columbia.

I am an avid Ugly Betty viewer, but initially I was partial to the telenovela. Yo soy Betty la fea has a harsher, more direct approach to women's self-esteem issues, and I appreciated the inclusion of Betty's six "ugly" girlfriends-a support network, who loved her and admired her deeply. Through Betty and the cuartel de las feas (the cartel of ugly women), the narrative created a space for gender and working-class solidarity.

That said, Ugly Betty is an important and timely show. It brings forth a complex assortment of U.S. women's issues, interconnecting gender, ethnicity, race, class and, of course, dominant beauty norms. Significantly, the show also addresses the thorny migration question, indirectly confronting the anti-Mexican sentiment that prevails in the U.S.

Indian actress Shilpa Shetty’s experience in U.K.’s big brother is also generating lots of news both in India, U.K. and around the world.

Here is a perspective from Outlook by Sanjay Suri.

She has been called a "dog" before, she has been accused of touching others' food with her hands ("you don't know where those hands have been"), taunted and provoked— "Shilpa wants to be white", she is "the Indian", and did she live in a house or a shack?

That question has also opened up the divide between the way Indians in India and Indians in Britain view the whole Shilpa episode. India is looking at the racist face of Britain that Big Brother has shown; British Indians are angry that Channel 4 is showing it.... Shilpa is wily, but she is no guttermouth. This show is not India's problem, or any Indian's. It is Britain's. Feel sorry not for Shilpa but for those poor white Brits, because Jade and her like are legion in the country.