Has Hollywood (see: white folks) culturally appropriated the talented and beautiful Lupita Nyong’o?
The Kenyan actress, who recently won the Oscar for Best Supporting Actress for her riveting turn in 12 Years A Slave, was an obscure talent before becoming a phenomenon. Every time you turned on the television, your computer or went to the store and saw a magazine cover, it was focusing on the “It” girl, Lupita.
Pop culture, as a whole, definitely has taken its fair share of trends that originated within the African diaspora, but co-opting Lupita is possibly the most painfully obvious. She has a beauty that is sensitive, yet strong, and a background that can fit in the barrios or the boardroom. With everything that Lupita has done (and will continue to do), her ubiquity points to the fact that we (see: the African diaspora) are not the only ones thirsting for a gorgeous, rooted-in-the-essence, African descended talent to champion.
As the Oscar award winner sits center stage, her adorning crowd in front of her — we take a look at the pageantry of acts who are also drooling over Lupita Nyong’o.
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Photo: WENN
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We start off with a fellow Best Supporting Actor award winner, and one Inglourious Basterd…
Christoph Waltz
Photo: WENN
