Saturday, February 25, 2017

Hidden Figures and civil rights

Hidden Figures is a new film that has been nominated for three academy awards including best picture, best actress in a supporting role, and best adapted screenplay. I'm sure some of you have already seen the film or have put it on your list of movies to see. The main characters in the film are all real women, and their stories are quite amazing.



The civil rights movement coincided in many ways with the space race in the beginning and the film shines a light on this rising tension between the two issues. Katherine Johnson was one of the first African American women to help NASA with calculations. And this crucial milestone also helped de-segregrate bathrooms at NASA.



I don't want to spoil the film so I will not play out each scene, but the overall message and story of the film is quite powerful. The space race was something all Americans thought about and cared for in this time period, and even though civil rights and segregation was also a huge issue, many Americans chose the space race over this. In the film time after time the space race starts to break the segregation (at NASA).



There were many women like Kathrine Johnson that have paved the way for civil and social rights; it is important now to remember them and cherish their memories like we do other historical figures. Hidden Figures is very much the title of the film; each of these women were a figure and a mark in civil rights history and yet they were still Hidden.
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3 comments:

  1. AnonymousFebruary 25, 2017 at 10:31 PM

    Interesting post about the movie Hidden Figures. I personally enjoyed the movie greatly; they depicted both the racism of the time and the sexism of the time very well while also showing the inspirational stories of these three women. It would be interesting to see how their advancements in their jobs had on the civil rights movements at the time. We never really hear about them when civil rights are discussed; were their advancements looked over because they were women? For more information, go to: http://www.vanityfair.com/culture/2016/08/katherine-johnson-the-nasa-mathematician-who-advanced-human-rights

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  2. AnonymousFebruary 27, 2017 at 11:05 AM

    I love that you connected a present day film with what we are learning with in the USHAP now. I know very little about the connections between NASA and the technology industry in general and the Civil Rights movement of the 60s. I find it interested how you note that the space race actually started to break segregation, and your post intrigues me to go and see the movie.

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  3. AnonymousMarch 8, 2017 at 9:45 AM

    The story of Hidden Figures was just one example of an entire history of how current events can change societies for the better. Another example would be the World Wars. When men were drafted into the army, women were left behind to take up jobs they normally wouldn't dream of. This spurred the women's movement, eventually giving women the right to vote.

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