Magical negro

The magical negro is a common character trope for Black characters in films and TV with white protagonists. This character may be particularly wise or have access to deep wisdom and/or power; they are not always literally magical (but in SF quite often are). The character often acts in an advisory or sometimes service capacity to members of the white cast. In many instances, the character may be "special" in some other way: mentally retarded, mentally ill, a ghost.

The term may have been popularized by Spike Lee.

Examples:

• Guinan (played by Whoopi Goldberg) in Star Trek: The Next Generation (and two of the ST films). She is the bartender and like bartenders is a great listener; her people are sometimes called "listeners". She is a font of sage advice and it was intimated that she had mystical powers. Her people are long-lived and her past was mysterious.
• Oda Mae Brown (played by Whoopi Goldberg) in Ghost
• John Coffey in The Green Mile
• Morpheus (played by Laurence Fishburne) in The Matrix and sequels (The Matrix Reloaded and The Matrix Revolutions)
• Shepherd Book in Serenity (film)

Further reading, critiques, etc.

• Nnedi Okorafor-Mbachu. "Stephen King's Super-Duper Magical Negroes", Strange Horizons, 2004-10-25.

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