Dimitris Kouimtsidis
ANTONIO Banderas has been labelled as a ‘man of colour’.
Several US media outlets have been criticised for claiming that Banderas who has been nominated for an Oscar falls into the category of people of colour (POC).
The Academy Awards were already being criticised for lack of diversity in this year’s nominations.
People have quickly taken to social media to express their anger at the fact that Banderas, a native of Malaga, is considered a person of colour.
“Some of you think Spanish speaking = POC. I’m very happy Antonio Banderas got nominated. However, HE’S NOT A POC and he is NOT LATIN. He’s from Spain, which is white European”, said one twitter post.
Deadline, an online film industry publication has since deleted its tweet about ‘two actors of colour’ – Banderas and Cynthia Erivo – while Vanity Fair deleted a sentence that said: “While Spaniards are not technically considered people of colour, it should be noted that Antonio Banderas was nominated.”
The US has faced controversy in the past when classifying races as in the 1970s, the US census included a ‘Hispanic’ category to group people from Spanish-speaking countries.
Prior to that, Mexican-Americans had to describe themselves as white, with activists fighting to include a new category that would acknowledge their origins.
