[The 90’s raw: Black Memorabilia Trade Show]

Raw footage for the award-winning series The 90's. (Continuation of Tape #33, record 10904) Black Memorabilia Trade Show in Washington, D.C. Interviews with collectors and patrons, and an interview with Effi Barry (the wife of Marion Barry, mayor of Washington D.C.).

0:00Copy video clip URL Black memorabilia trade show in Washington, D.C. Videomaker Eddie Becker continues to talk to the black woman from the previous tape who sees positive images at the show.

01:02Copy video clip URL Becker speaks to Effi Barry (Marion Barry’s wife), who is presenting awards at a banquet associated with the show. She thinks this show will help to teach children about the historical struggles of African-Americans. Although these specific types of images are not common anymore, she sees a different kind of negative stereotype today on television shows and movies. More general shots of the show follow.

06:54Copy video clip URL Interview with a couple attending the show. They recognize many home items like cookie jars and salt shakers from their childhood.

10:46Copy video clip URL Interview with a white dealer who claims she only collects “positive” images (although her definition of positive is made highly questionable by viewing her collection, which includes many of the traditionally offensive black caricatures). She seems very uncomfortable talking about race and is completely unable to make any sort of historical analysis of the role of these items in our society.

15:38Copy video clip URL Interview with another collector. She is a graduate student in anthropology and she prefers to study the negative images and the issues of why these negative images are still being produced and collected. She felt that, historically, these images helped to normalize racism in our society. She then discusses a resurgence of negative images she sees on television today.

28:23Copy video clip URL Interview with an elderly man who discusses images that he remembers seeing during his childhood. He is relatively incoherent, however.

31:04Copy video clip URL Images of prints, and an interview with the black collector of these print images. She feels her parents sheltered her from these images as a child, so she is trying to do her best to educate her daughter about them. Surprisingly, she is not offended by caricatured images of African-Americans and seems shocked when Eddie Becker suggests it might be inappropriate for white people to own these items.

35:29Copy video clip URL Interview with a little girl whose mother makes dolls. She talks about helping her mother sew the dolls.

37:08Copy video clip URL Back to the same woman with the print images. She picks out an image of a child eating a watermelon and claims she loves it. She mainly collects watermelon images, but just doesn’t seem to have ever heard before that these images are offensive.

40:33Copy video clip URL Interview with an author, Fay Acker, who has edited a book about black memorabilia collecting (and is also the senior editor for Howard University Press). She has a very academic approach to the subject of collecting.

46:20Copy video clip URL A seller shows items for sale and tells Becker how much they are worth.

51:45Copy video clip URL White dealer from before shows Becker items and prices, which typically range from $30 up into the hundreds, or even thousands of dollars.

01:00:59Copy video clip URL Interview with a group of teenagers about why they are attending the show. They are looking at the merchandise, but think it’s too expensive.

01:03:26Copy video clip URL End of tape.