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Elijah Bonds
English 5
Professor Melton
11/13/16
Documentary Outline
On the opening sequence, I want to illustrate an image that shows the
black man falling victim to police brutality. I want to generate a sense of
sadness within my audience from the very beginning in order to grab their
attention. I will accomplish this by giving multiple examples of African
Americans being killed by law enforcement. This will establish a sense of
credibility because I will have sufficient evidence to support my claim. My
claim that will be spoken throughout my documentary is that, the black man
is being killed because of fear, and by law enforcement taking action on that
fear that is created by stereotyping.
From that point I want to transition into what the stereotypical black
man is and how this has been shown repetitively through history. I will give
modern day examples of the stereotype and historical context. I will make a
linking between the recent shootings of African Americans and the Jim Crow
times lynchings. I will illustrate the image of a stereotypical black man by
using clips from music videos where guns, drugs, alcohol and women are

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present. I want to show that the stereotype presents Blacks as ignorant,

illiterate and dangerous.

From this point in my documentary I have addressed the issue my

discourse community is facing and I have addressed the reasons why we are
facing this issue. Now I want to transition the focus of the documentary
towards the solution. The solution to the to recent police brutality would not
be to segregate ourselves further from police, but to unite our communities
and reach a better understanding. I want the black man to understand the
fear that the police officer feels toward him and for him to not demonstrate
that stereotype. There needs to be unity in the police department to call
each other out when the officers decision making is questionable. There
needs to be unity between the communities and the police, including more
interaction at public events. Both sides need to understand we are not a
threat to each other. There needs to be better training in the police academy,
so the police aren't acting on the racial stereotype. The way I will incorporate
this thought will be from interviews of police officers explaining both sides
point of view.
From this point, I want there to be a call to action that will make the
audience feel a part of my discourse community. Not necessarily to be part
of the black lives matter movement but to make progress towards the
movements goal. I want people to understand that the black mans life

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matters and that we all need to unite and communicate that idea in any way
that we can. The way I can communicate this through the documentary
would be by having scenery shots while I narrate these ideas.
In conclusion, the goal I want my documentary to accomplish is to
make my audience aware of the problem. Inform why this problem exists and
how to solve it. I not only want my audience to know about the problem
facing my discourse community but to be part of the solution.