tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-86636244947410577202024-03-05T05:18:52.776-05:00Kori's CommentaryThis blog will be my outlet when I believe that something warrants thoughtful commentary. I will rarely make this about current events; there's plenty of commentary on that already. I'm more likely to tap into my areas of interest and expertise by focusing on artistic creations of various sorts. And because I understand that gender, race (including whiteness), sexuality, and class inflect all U.S. experiences, my analysis will often attend to that truth.Koritha Mitchellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09883710526813514536noreply@blogger.comBlogger17125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8663624494741057720.post-65888019962415424632014-10-12T09:02:00.000-04:002014-12-09T23:19:11.725-05:00Sunday Morning Thoughts<div class="_5pbx userContent" data-ft="{"tn":"K"}">
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;">It's
another day in the USA. Sunday, in fact. Among other things, that means
this is a day on which many lynchings occurred so that more people
could attend, including children who needed to learn what being a U.S.
citizen meant for them & their parents and what it meant for those
who aren't considered white. Because the USA is relentlessly consistent,
it remains the case that as long as the person you kill is not white,
you stand a good chance of not being held accountable. (Today = 65 days
since Darren Wilson shot Mike Brown at least 6 times, 2 in the head. Has
he been arrested? No; he's collecting a paycheck. If we were a more
honest country, we'd say outright that denigrating and/or destroying
non-whites is part of what American tax dollars are allocated for. As
tax payers, Mike Brown's devastated parents are literally funding the
salary of their son's murderer. And, have you ever noticed that
educating certain populations is too expensive, but there's always money
to denigrate and destroy them???) Yes, as long as you victimize people
who are not white (especially not white men), it doesn't much matter who
you are—cop or not, respected and educated or not. Also, killing
non-white people is simply an option; less lethal forms
of violence are also available.</span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;">The identity of those whom you
victimize matters more than who you are, but when you are the "right"
kind of person, you get even more latitude. It's the American way! So,
if you are a white man of wealth and position, you will have serious
support if you choose to become a predator. And, lucky you, you can make
that choice over and over again, and American institutions (and those
empowered within them) will respond by very literally MANUFACTURING your
innocence. [I am forever grateful to David J. Leonard for that
articulation.] The institution's "leaders" will insist that, though
there's no denying your guilt, you will suffer only the least
significant consequences. Indeed, those "leaders" will instruct everyone
to make sure that you feel at ease. Everyone is supposed to act as if
you didn't enact violence on people's psyches and disrupt their lives.
Everyone is supposed to act as if the violence and disruption aren't
still reverberating. It makes sense, then, that such a predator would
operate from a stance of innocence and entitlement, doesn't it? It makes
sense that, when back in the space where he did so much damage, he
would laugh loudly and go around to co-workers and tell them that he's
at a point where "I need to be able to say hello to you." Why should he
have any reason to think that what he "needs" isn't the only thing that
matters?? The institution has assured him—and everyone else, including
his victims—that the only thing that really matters is his comfort and
his position. Who cares about how comfortable or uncomfortable his
victims are? Who cares about the position it puts his non-victim
co-workers in? In fact, if you don't make him feel welcome, YOU are
suddenly the person who is "unprofessional" and "uncivil." His being a
perpetrator literally does not matter because if you say something, YOU
are the problem. YOU are making the workplace uncomfortable. Don't you
realize that what he did is in the past? It has no purchase on the
present because your "leaders" told you so, remember? It's magic! And
isn't magic delightful? Really and truly, it would be funny if it
weren't so foul. It would be funny if so many lives weren't unjustly
bent and disrupted to accommodate the space taken up by white male
perpetrators whom you must pretend are innocent, lest you pay a heavier
price than they ever will. </span><br />
<span style="font-size: large;"><br /></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;"> In environments like this (and make
no mistake, the USA is such an environment), COWARDICE is treated as a
cherished virtue. Even those with safety and stability in the system
take a perverse comfort in acting as if they are completely powerless.
It's disheartening, but I continue to have faith that "leaders" will
show actual leadership and that others (who don't see themselves as
leaders) will appreciate the injustice enough to pressure those deemed
leaders to do the right thing. Surely, options exist besides continued
injustice, continued complicity. Surely, folk will do better... Whether
it's the unjust killing of Mike Brown in Missouri or John Crawford in
Ohio, the lethal violence that Black & Brown women face from police
and other self-proclaimed authority figures; whether it's the everyday
humiliation and violence of stop-and-frisk and anti-LGBTQ surveillance,
bullying, and attacks; whether it's sexual harassment in the workplace,
at school, and on the streets, MAY WE ALL LOSE SLEEP UNTIL WE'VE GOTTEN
CREATIVE ABOUT DOING WHAT WE CAN, IN FACT, DO.</span></div>
Koritha Mitchellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09883710526813514536noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8663624494741057720.post-10817131773116390462014-04-28T23:17:00.001-04:002014-04-29T08:54:19.769-04:00Supreme Court Agrees with Michigan Voters: Affirmative Action Must Remain for Whites Only<div class="separator" style="clear: both; text-align: center;">
<a href="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSR84AqrnduBn8tb6K4v7wbdUIuOGaYRbFRbVCmeMBqm3wgMluUB7XafSqA6wD7k_AfJL7d7AnvWkn78j2WQZrHFWU4_K3aL8VhC5tTeEhLzL9n96BiywVMLbGUTgWY3EMzlmFSneX0bR_/s1600/n-SUPREME-COURT-JUSTICES-OFFICIAL-large570.jpg" imageanchor="1" style="margin-left: 1em; margin-right: 1em;"><img border="0" src="https://blogger.googleusercontent.com/img/b/R29vZ2xl/AVvXsEgSR84AqrnduBn8tb6K4v7wbdUIuOGaYRbFRbVCmeMBqm3wgMluUB7XafSqA6wD7k_AfJL7d7AnvWkn78j2WQZrHFWU4_K3aL8VhC5tTeEhLzL9n96BiywVMLbGUTgWY3EMzlmFSneX0bR_/s1600/n-SUPREME-COURT-JUSTICES-OFFICIAL-large570.jpg" height="133" width="320" /></a></div>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;">I have been silent on this cultural commentary blog longer than intended. However, I recently broke my silence on <i>Huffington Post</i>. On April 22, 2014, the Supreme Court issued its decision in the Michigan Proposal 2 case. The next day, I published <span style="color: black;">"<a href="http://huff.to/1hlK2d4" target="_blank">Supreme Court Agrees with Michigan Voters: Affirmativ</a><a href="http://huff.to/1hlK2d4" target="_blank">e Action Must Remain <i>for Whites Only</i></a>"</span></span><br />
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-size: large;"><br />
</span><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;"><span style="color: black;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif; font-size: large;">My brief commentary will now likely appear in other venues, not this blog, but I will continue to post updates about a broad range of my activities (including when I publish commentary like that above) on the blog I maintain about my book <i>Living with Lynching </i><a href="http://bit.ly/OGrNkj" target="_blank">HERE</a> and on its <a href="http://on.fb.me/O21Wjz" target="_blank">facebook page</a>.</span> </span></span></span>Koritha Mitchellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09883710526813514536noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8663624494741057720.post-79104773332515042752013-03-31T21:43:00.002-04:002014-01-14T12:08:24.722-05:00Marriage: The USA Loves Me. It Loves Me Not<span style="font-family: Georgia;">The Supreme Court is
preparing to rule on cases that will determine the direction of marriage rights
for same-sex couples.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Because so
much energy and money have been invested in the struggle for marriage equality—and
because it is such a basic</span><span style="font-family: Georgia;">
civil right—having the Supreme Court rule in these couples’ favor would be a
victory for most Americans.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It would
make this a slightly less hypocritical country; the nation’s deeds would better
match its creed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Also, if this legal
victory is secured, perhaps some of the resources dedicated to this
battle will be directed toward the much broader agenda that many lesbian, gay,
bisexual, and transgender (LGBT) activists have been passionately pursuing,
despite having a fraction of the support.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>What else have
LGBT activists been working toward?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>The fact that so many of us would have to ask demonstrates how much
mainstream LGBT platforms have drowned out other voices.</span>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Activists who see that
heterosexism, classism, and racism <i>converge </i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;">to limit the life chances of certain populations have long suggested
that their agenda does not necessarily match that of the Human Rights Campaign
(HRC) and other well-funded organizations that have made marriage equality
their top priority.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For instance,
these activists have long prioritized addressing the prison industrial complex,
the alarming rates of homelessness among LGBT youth, and the degree to which
LGBT youth (especially when not white and middle class) are vulnerable not only
to suicide but also to the school-to-juvenile justice pipeline<span style="color: black;">.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Likewise, many at the</span> 2013 LGBT Creating Change
conference concluded, “Now is the time for immigration reform and now is the time for
LGBT people to accept that immigration reform is part of </span><a href="http://www.thegavoice.com/news/national-news/5794-activists-lgbt-communities-must-ally-with-others-to-ensure-equality-for-all" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Georgia;">their movement as well</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia;">.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">In light of a broader
agenda, it becomes clear that marriage equality would be most life-altering for
people who feel the sting of being denied this right because they are otherwise
so well situated.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>That is, because
they do not struggle with “the most critical of needs (housing, food, gainful
employment), which are </span><a href="http://www.nathanielturner.com/isgaymarriageantiblack.htm" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Georgia;">not at all met by same-sex marriage</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia;">,” securing this unjustly withheld option would
dramatically improve their quality of life.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Of course, not being able to provide health insurance for
one’s partner, being charged more for coverage when it is available, being
denied visitation rights, and being cheated out of death benefits if
one’s partner passes away all constitute egregious insult and injury of which
the entire country should be ashamed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>This does not lessen the injustice of being vulnerable to racialized and
sexualized surveillance and being barred from employment, though, which are
some of the issues that can make marriage rights feel less urgent for most members of LGBT communities.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As
activist Joseph DeFilippis puts it, “</span><a href="http://sfonline.barnard.edu/a-new-queer-agenda/introduction/0/" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Georgia;">Despite the mainstream media depiction</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia;"> of gays and lesbians as white, middle-class people
… with plenty of disposable income, this is not an accurate depiction of the
LGBT population as a whole.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Yet, the power of this image is not limited to aesthetics; it has also been allowed to set the agenda, so marriage
equality has become <i>the </i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;">issue, leaving the concerns of the majority of LGBT people largely unaddressed.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>In fact, DeFilippis finds that “White,
middle-class leaders of national gay organizations set the agenda and then,
after the fact, they may hire people of color to ‘do outreach’ to sell that
agenda to minority communities.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Having drawn a similar conclusion, </span><i><a href="http://bit.ly/13IzUq1" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Georgia;">Black Girl Dangerous</span></a></i><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-style: normal;">
creator Mia McKenzie declares, “<span class="usercontent">Yes, you can care about
gay marriage. I don’t, but you can. But don’t fool yourselves into thinking
that ‘Marriage Equality’ is some kind of miracle trickle-down movement that’s
trying to bring everyone along. It’s not. It is a narrow, mainstream movement
that USES many of us in order to appear intersectional and inclusive. But it’s
not.”</span> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Though I believe marriage is a civil right and have long been an HRC member, I recognize the
validity of these critiques, so I sincerely hope that a diversity of voices
will gain the hearing they deserve now that more people have noticed the unjust circumstances
that LBGT people face.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Unfortunately,
there is no guarantee.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As author
and activist Kenyon Farrow has argued, “many of the gay donors who raise money,
even for LGBT equality organizations, are ‘progressives’ </span><a href="http://www.alternet.org/story/151444/gay_marriage_in_new_york%3A_progressive_victory_or_gop_roadmap" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Georgia;">only because of marriage</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia;">, and actually do not support most of what the rest
of us would call a left agenda (single-payer health care system, collective
bargaining, public education, an end to massive imprisonment, reproductive
justice, etc.).”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">If this broader agenda
continues to take a back seat to marriage equality, then whatever the Supreme
Court does this summer, it will not change something that desperately needs to
change, the fact that anyone who is not heterosexual stands a much greater
chance of experiencing violence of all kinds.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">In this country, certain
people are deemed essentially disposable, so they must try to prove their worth by conforming
to narrow conceptions of what a “good” person or “real” citizen is and
does.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>This is what marriage is
really about.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Will the USA care
about my well being and that of my loved ones or will it ignore us?<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>And there is nothing but violence in
the country’s willingness to disregard certain populations.</span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia;">Instead of recognizing that all people
deserve health care, for example, the United States has created a system in
which you deserve it only under certain conditions (including, if you get
married).<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>It is a truly ridiculous
premise, but Americans accept it, so too few of us question the logic.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">The more that marriage is allowed to
remain a way of determining whether the USA should care about its residents or
not, the fewer options people will have, because nothing else will be able to
compete with its perceived validity.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>As cultural historian Lisa Duggan reminds us, other statuses such as domestic partnership
and reciprocal beneficiary too often “are represented as second-class marriage
rather than as alternatives crucial to the lives of so many of us.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Instead of accepting this logic, </span><a href="http://sfonline.barnard.edu/a-new-queer-agenda/beyond-marriage-democracy-equality-and-kinship-for-a-new-century/0/" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Georgia;">Duggan rightly asks</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia;">, “Why not diversify and democratize the ways we
recognize interdependencies, rather than enshrine the right to marry as a
singular priority goal?” </span>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Underscoring the urgency
of taking this question seriously, Joseph DeFilippis asserts, “Whether we are
single or partnered, we have the right to basic economic security. Marriage
should be a personal choice based on cultural and religious preferences. It
should not be the way to secure economic benefits for yourself and your
family.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">With brutal
consequences, Americans unjustly allow marriage to determine who
we see as </span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"><span style="font-family: Georgia;">responsible citizens, </span>legitimate adults, and all-around decent
people.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As we do so, we leave
undisturbed the assumptions that have made marriage unavailable to same-sex
couples all this time.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thus, ensuring
that more people have access to marriage will not adequately counter the
assumption that anyone who is not straight is a potentially dangerous
deviant—or at least someone we need not respect.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>If a person is not interested in monogamous marriage, so the
logic goes, they must be entrenched in a questionable lifestyle.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Thus, <a href="http://nyupress.org/books/book-details.aspx?bookId=6382#.UViorhlAvrs" target="_blank">scholar</a> Martin Joseph Ponce </span><a href="http://bit.ly/1j5JI3E" target="_blank"><span style="font-family: Georgia;">predicts</span></a><span style="font-family: Georgia;"> that in the wake of marriage equality, “those
queer folk who do not marry…<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"></span>will
be stigmatized all over again, seen as incapable of maintaining a long-term
relationship, possessed by perverse desires, practicing all kinds of deviant
acts, attaching themselves to all the wrong sorts of people.”</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">It is this sexualized
stigma that marriage equality leaves untouched and that concerns me most</span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"><span style="font-family: Georgia;">—</span>because it has
always been used to justify violence, including the violence of the USA
not caring about people’s access to physical, social, and economic support.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Having studied
violence for the past 15 years, I understand that its main purpose is to mark
who belongs and who does not.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;">
</span>Whenever we accept the arbitrary standards that help justify violence of any kind,
we might extend tolerance but we withhold true acceptance and full inclusion.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Given this reality, the
silence around anti-LGBT violence, especially in comparison to the impassioned
conversations on same-sex marriage, is striking.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>The newsletter that comes with my HRC membership has not
addressed violence with nearly the passion and attention to detail that has
characterized its coverage of the struggle for marriage equality, but the
National Coalition of Anti-Violence Programs (NCAVP) consistently finds that
brutality may be the most common experience among members of LGBT
communities. L</span><span style="font-family: Georgia;">eaders of mainstream LGBT
organizations seem to believe that downplaying vulnerability—while spotlighting
those who seem best poised to enter the privileged institution of marriage—will
make people safer.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span> </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">It is a truly
seductive idea, and we have seen marginalized groups embrace it before.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>For instance, at the last turn of the
century, when lynching remained a palpable threat to African Americans, they
clung to the belief that if they became the perfect picture of respectable
citizenship, they would be less vulnerable to attack.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>After all, racial violence was said to occur because black men were often rapists who cared nothing for
stable domesticity and black women were whores incapable of creating domestic
havens.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>According to
widely accepted rhetoric, if more African Americans would form nuclear families led by
respectable men and virtuous women, the race would not encounter so much
discrimination and hostility.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span>
</div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Though many still believe
and preach this supposed gospel, the lie at the heart of this logic has been
revealed again and again.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>As I
demonstrate in <a href="http://bit.ly/t71jsz" target="_blank"><i>Living with Lynching</i></a>, when members of maligned groups achieve according to traditional
standards, their accomplishments inspire aggression as often as praise.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Therefore, violence often forms the
backdrop to their success.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I call this
deeply entrenched American tradition<i> know-your-place
aggression</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;">.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Very often, what turns members of
marginalized groups <a href="http://koritha.blogspot.com/2012/09/osu-haters-exposing-know-your-place.html" target="_blank">into targets</a> is the fact that they have succeeded in
becoming what dominant discourse claimed they <a href="http://koritha.blogspot.com/2012/06/never-ending-battles-require.html" target="_blank">could not become</a>. </span></div>
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">For this reason, I argue in a <a href="http://bit.ly/XkZ2QK">forthcoming article</a> that the violence
consistently directed toward LGBT people should be understood as a response to
success. The community’s accomplishments can be measured in many
ways—from the popularity and prominence of Ellen DeGeneres, Anderson Cooper,
Rachel Maddow, Don Lemon, Wanda Sykes, Ricky Martin, Sara Ramirez, Margaret Cho, George
Takei, and the gay couple on <i>Modern Family </i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;">to the fact that not every single non-conforming
person stays in the closet. In other words, I see anti-LGBT violence as
know-your-place aggression because it is based on the idea that “those” people
need to be reminded of their “proper place” in society. And let’s be
clear: the need for such reminders is greatest when maligned groups are
achieving in ways that cannot be ignored.</span><br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia;"> </span><span style="font-family: Georgia; font-size: 10.0pt;"><span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span></span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span>
<span style="font-family: Georgia;"> </span>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Given this country’s
pattern of progress for marginalized groups followed by harsh backlash, if the Supreme Court rules
in favor of marriage equality, especially in a sweeping way, then one result will be a rise in know-your-place
aggression.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>I therefore hope that
my work in identifying the parallels between lynching 100 years ago and anti-LGBT violence today will encourage more people to join the many activists
who have been pursuing an agenda that includes, but has never been limited to,
marriage equality.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>Only this
broader agenda will begin to highlight not just the disadvantages faced by LGBT
communities, but also the <i>unearned</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"> <i>privileges</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"> enjoyed by those who are deemed heterosexual.<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> W</span>e must push past questions of whether the USA can
learn to love presumably less desirable residents if they behave
“properly.”<span style="mso-spacerun: yes;"> </span>We must grapple with the country’s insistence upon caring for certain</span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"> people…whether they are well-behaved or not.</span></div>
Koritha Mitchellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09883710526813514536noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8663624494741057720.post-17775578224364779372012-12-17T21:49:00.001-05:002013-01-17T11:14:16.097-05:00Parenting in the USA<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Like everyone else, I have
cried many tears since Friday. The thought of 20 small children, ages 6
and 7, being gunned down boggles the mind and hurts the heart. But my
sobs have not kept me from noticing a refrain that deserves scrutiny: “as a
parent.” </span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span>
<br />
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;"> “As a parent,” countless people can
sympathize with the grief-stricken community of Newtown, Connecticut.
Therefore, while mass shootings are nothing new, many feel certain that the
outcry <i>this time </i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;">will be
intense and sustained enough to propel the nation toward gun control because
most victims were small children. The prediction is likely correct, but what
does that tell us about empathy and being a parent in the United States? </span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">For most Americans, being a good parent means protecting
<i>your</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"> child. It means
offering your child the best you can provide, without regard for whether other
parents have the same opportunities. In this context, it makes sense for
a homeless mother, who sent her child to school in a neighborhood where they
did not live, to be “charged with first-degree larceny for stealing $15,686 in
education funds from the Norwalk, Connecticut school district” (<a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2011/04/18/tanya-mcdowell-homeless-w_n_850571.html">April2011</a>).
It is a very American mentality: “I got mine. I don’t have time to care about
whether you got yours.” This attitude permeates parenting as much as anything
else. This is how we end up with cities across the nation in which some schools
do not have enough books while others have an abundance of everything. </span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">So, when we hear our leaders insist that they are
responding “as a parent,” we should consider what that has ALWAYS meant. One of
the unspoken prerequisites for our leaders is that they be heterosexual and
married with children. Candidates with these characteristics are viewed as
stable and responsible, and their morals are not automatically
questioned. Thus, it has mostly been heterosexual married parents who
have made the decisions that created our current policies. </span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Also, many of those now shedding tears for the
Sandy Hook victims quickly grew tired when Trayvon Martin’s parents had to beg
for a simple arrest…for 46 days after George Zimmerman killed their son.
Likewise, many of those who are heartbroken “as parents” about the Newtown
shooting rolled their eyes just a few weeks ago when Jordan Davis was killed in
a parking lot for the volume of his music, drawing comparisons to Martin’s
murder. Most readers will object to my even mentioning these dead
teenagers, insisting that Friday’s violence was different because small
children were targeted. A parent’s pain is a parent’s pain, though, right? No
parent should have to bury their child. We all understand that, right?</span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">As the heartrending funerals begin in Connecticut,
many note that counseling services should be a matter of course for the
community, that the surviving children and their families are traumatized and
in need of coordinated support. However, as a nation, we do not think in those
terms when we hear about the gun violence plaguing inner cities. We do
not work to ensure that youngsters exposed to that trauma will receive help.
Instead, our policies dictate that impoverished communities can count on <i>less</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"> investment in education and healthcare, but they
will receive more than their share of surveillance, juvenile detention, and
incarceration. </span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">In short, gun violence in Newtown inspires an
outpouring of support and empathy for victims and understanding for the
perpetrator, who has inspired a national conversation on mental illness.
Meanwhile, for those who are black and brown and/or poor, gun violence helps
justify the <a href="http://www.aclu.org/racial-justice/school-prison-pipeline">school-to-prison
pipeline</a>. And when the American Civil Liberties Union and other civil
rights organizations try to call attention to the injustice, they get nothing
like the media coverage and overall emotional investment that we see when
victims are white and middle class.</span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;"><i>And let’s not lie to ourselves and suggest that
our empathy has nothing to do with the fact that the victimized neighborhood is
predominantly white and middle class.</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;">
The reason so many Americans identify with Newtown residents is that, “as
parents,” they are doing exactly what Sandy Hook parents did. They are
moving to suburban areas with “the best schools” in order to shield their
children from interaction with “others.” </span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Our neighborhoods and schools are not segregated by
accident. Let’s not pretend that the best schools “just happen” to be
mostly white, and low-performing schools “just happen” to be mostly black and
brown. Parents’ decisions about where to live—when they possess the means to
make that decision—have everything to do with avoiding schools with too many
“undesirables”…and even the poorest among us have received an impeccable
education regarding who that is.</span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Americans are good at playing innocent,
though. We just can’t understand how tragedies like this happen. “Who
would visit this kind of violence on children?,” we ask desperately. </span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Meanwhile, our society does violence to children
everyday, and all of us are complicit. Not only do we allow corporations to
make untold profits by bombarding youngsters with violence via toys and video
games, but we also turn our backs on countless children. Because we have
allowed food deserts to form all over the nation, malnutrition is not just a
problem in so-called “Third World” countries. In fact, as Chris Williams <a href="http://politic365.com/2012/12/16/sandy-hook-elementary-gun-control-mental-health-and-the-state-of-our-union/">reports</a>,
“The number of federally licensed firearm dealers (129,817)” in the United
States far exceeds “the amount of grocery chain stores (36,569).”</span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Likewise, we sentence innocent black and brown
children to live (and die) in toxic environments. A 1992 study of 1, 177
cases handled by the Environmental Protection Agency revealed that “polluters
of sites near the greatest white populations received penalties 500 percent
higher than penalties imposed on polluters in minority areas—an average of
$335, 566 for white areas contrasted with $55, 318 for minority areas” (Lipsitz
9). Indeed, “nationwide, 60 percent of African Americans and Latinos live
in communities with uncontrolled toxic waste sites” (<a href="http://www.temple.edu/tempress/titles/1418_reg.html">Lipsitz 9</a>).
As long as white middle-class children are protected, there is apparently no
need for widespread action.</span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">What is most disappointing about American responses
to the realities <i>we have created</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;">
is that we pretend that our politics matter only some of the time. But, <span class="uficommentbody"><i>politics</i></span><span class="uficommentbody"> refers
to how societies make decisions about where to funnel resources, including
emotional resources. Everything social, everything about human
interaction, is political. This elementary school shooting does not <i>become
politicized</i></span><span class="uficommentbody"> because people discuss the
social issues it lays bare. What the United States values is simply being
exposed, and make no mistake, values and politics always go together.</span></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">When we do violence to children everyday but are
willing to acknowledge the damage only when particular kinds of children are
hurt, that is a reflection of our politics—of where we think resources and
energy should go.</span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">What would happen if being a parent motivated
people to want to change institutions and policies so that (for example) all
children receive a quality education, not just those whose guardians can afford
your zip code? </span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">If parenting meant that you want to make life
better for every child, not just your own, different decisions would be
made. Then, it might really mean something when people say that they
empathize “as a parent.” Without that shift in values/politics, the Sandy Hook
tragedy will simply encourage parents with material means to seclude themselves
and their children even more, <b><i>looking for a safety that they are not
invested in others having.</i></b></span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Since its inception, this country has operated on
the premise that we are <u>not</u> all brothers and sisters, that we can
disregard the welfare of others and it won’t negatively impact our own.
We still seem to believe that. However, as the incomparable James Baldwin
explained long ago, “you can’t deny your brothers without paying a terrible price
for it. And, even then, they are still your brothers.” </span></div>
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<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal" style="mso-margin-bottom-alt: auto; mso-margin-top-alt: auto;">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">So, as a nation, we should ask ourselves: As long
as we refuse to make the United States safe for all the children here, why
would we think it would be safe for our own? Putting the question another way, because
I ask it as an American with not only tears in my eyes but also blood on my conscience: When the United States
sends <a href="http://www.businessinsider.com/us-drone-tweets-reveal-double-tap-plan-2012-12">drones</a>
to deliver terror and death to families in other parts of the world, why would
we expect peace at home?</span></div>
<span style="font-size: small;"><span style="font-family: Georgia,"Times New Roman",serif;">
</span></span>Koritha Mitchellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09883710526813514536noreply@blogger.com5tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8663624494741057720.post-8951544210891421552012-09-08T19:20:00.000-04:002015-01-18T16:27:56.656-05:00OSU Haters: Exposing Know-Your-Place Aggression<div class="MsoNormal" style="line-height: 150%;">
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-</style><span style="font-family: Georgia;">A group of Ohio State
students have created a Tumblr site, <i><a href="http://bit.ly/NcknWm">OSU
Haters</a></i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;">, to expose the
microaggressions and hate speech that shape their daily lives. Quite
brilliantly, this group is remaining anonymous, determined to focus attention
where it belongs: on the atmosphere that OSU provides for them. In this way,
the site continues the activism of the last academic year. <a href="http://youtu.be/f7FMomSdP6I">On the heels of</a> domestic
terrorism—including the burning of a Muslim student’s home while he and his
roommate slept and the racist murders of Trayvon Martin and Shaima
Alawadi—students formed OSU Stand Your Ground and dramatically asserted,
“Enough is enough!” Yet, what was most striking about student testimony was the
insistence that racist incidents were <i>not</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"> unusual. Though the media outlets covering their activism failed to
highlight this refrain, it reverberated throughout the <a href="http://bit.ly/Stbzi8">organizing meetings</a> and the <a href="http://bit.ly/IiGqTo">sit-in</a>. Also, whenever the hate crimes came up
during a conversation with an alum who wasn’t white, the first thing they said
to me was, “That’s nothing new!” or “So, it hasn’t changed, huh?” </span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Arson and vandalism upped
the ante because the former was attempted murder and the latter made the
attitudes more public by involving school property, but students routinely said
that unsolicited antagonism was part of their experience as Buckeyes and United
States residents.</span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia;"><i>OSU Haters </i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;">is valuable, then, because it acknowledges what
students have been saying all along: that racism and other <i>–ism</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;">s shape their daily lives. If we truly listen to
these students, the vacuity of the administration’s most consistent responses
becomes painfully obvious. President Gordon Gee has been quick to say that
racist behavior does not represent Ohio State, and other administrators claim
that there is “no place for hate” here. But I have to ask, “Are you sure
about that?” These students have been brave enough to explain how much other
people’s hostility has shaped their reality. When the first reaction is
to insist that ugly attitudes are held by a small number of aggressors, we
discount their testimony. To launch into how little these tweets
represent Ohio State is to suggest that what these students endure does not
matter nearly as much as the picture of the university that we prefer.</span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia;">By its very existence, the
<i>OSU Haters</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"> tumblr challenges
the assumption that racist comments are insignificant or that they do not
accurately represent the climate at this institution. First, the site illustrates
the ordinary nature of the most persistent racism, reminding everyone that an
attack does not have to be physical (or even extreme) to do violence. Seemingly
thoughtless, off-hand comments send the powerful message that some people’s
presence is tolerated, not welcomed. </span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia;">As importantly, because
the site exposes hateful tweets, its existence ends up shining a light on that
which most allows hostility to persist: apathy. As more people learn of the
tumblr site, if they do not feel personally attacked by it, the reaction is
often to defend the tweeters, whom they believe should never have to worry
about facing consequences for creating a hostile environment. The experience of
students who are hurt and offended by these tweets barely seems to figure for
these defenders. They argue for the tweeters’ right to <a href="http://bit.ly/RXEnJa">“free speech” and “privacy”</a> (though Twitter is
the most public forum I can imagine). In other words, such responses confirm
what <i>OSU Haters</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"> suggested in an
<a href="http://bit.ly/NSDDd7">interview</a> with the local newspaper: “Even
though the number of students posting hate speech <i>compared to the entirety
of the student body</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"> is small, they
have a large audience in their online social circle, and the students who are
seeing these hateful messages aren't exposing or reporting them for hate
speech. Apathy is more widespread” (my italics). When these kinds of comments
are so acceptable as to be tweetable, how much do students who are not targeted
care<i> </i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;">about the experiences of
those who are? </span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia;">The Tumblr site exposes
hate as well as indifference about the conditions created by that hate, and in
the process, it reveals how easily any of us can be lulled into apathy. Many
are tempted to dismiss aggressors as “ignorant.” When we use this label, we are
suggesting that they are “just ignorant,” so why give them attention? Why worry
about what they think and say? Why bother addressing them at all? The
implication is that you should not waste your time and energy on those
“ignorant” people. <i>OSU Haters</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;">
shows that this sort of response is misguided.</span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia;">To dismiss individuals who
spew hate as “ignorant” is to deny what the Tumblr site so clearly reveals, that
these are informed people. Whether their articulation of hate is blatantly
aggressive or casually so, many of those exposed by <i>OSU Haters</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"> demonstrate a keen awareness of U.S. and world
history. Tweets refer to the bombing of Hiroshima, “summer camps” as a
reference to internment camps, lynchings, and honor killings.</span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia;">The violent force of many
of these tweets emanates from the fact that their authors understand the
function of bias-based violence: to keep certain groups from enjoying the
rights and privileges of citizenship, to deny certain groups a sense of
belonging within the community and the country. </span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Given the historical
awareness underpinning these tweets, we must remember what dominant assumptions
encourage us to forget: <b>racial violence is often a response to success.</b></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"> What have people of color and gays and Sikhs, for
example, done to deserve these attacks? What have they done “wrong”? They have
managed to succeed despite the many obstacles put in their way. These tweets
are therefore part of a much longer tradition of what I call <i>know-your-place aggression</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;">. The messages
conveyed by antagonists go something like this: “You may have a higher g.p.a.
than I do, but you are still just a ‘ch**k’” or “You may have a law degree, but
you are still just a ‘f*g’” or “You may have outstanding credentials, but you
are still just a woman” or “Barack Obama may be President of the United States,
but ….” </span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia;">In this country, people
who are white and/or male and/or heterosexual and/or Christian and/or “able”
and/or middle class will be respected when they achieve, but when those who do
not fit these categories succeed, they can expect aggression as often as
praise. </span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Of course, even those
targeted by this aggression sometimes insist that it is rare; doing so fuels
their success, they may believe. That is, they choose to focus on the positive
and give the benefit of the doubt. But targeted groups are expected to give
the benefit of the doubt (“she didn’t mean it” or “it was just a joke”) even in
the face of blatant malice. Given this very american expectation, it is
important for members of marginalized groups to believe in their capacity for
reading their surroundings accurately. You must be able to trust your ability
to interpret what is happening, no matter how many times someone else says,
“That’s just not the Buckeye way” and “We are better than that.” You must be
able to know the difference between those claims and something like, “That <i>shouldn’t
</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;">be the american way” or “We <i>can</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"> be better.” </span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia;">When faced with evidence
that the environment is hostile, especially when that hostility is inadequately
addressed by those in power, it is important to empower yourself and others to
call a spade a spade. Clearly, bias is leading many to prioritize the comfort
and “freedom” of dominant groups, even when it is at the expense of those who
become their targets.</span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia;">I am therefore impressed
by the students’ insistence that the tweets, and the hostile atmosphere they
represent, cannot be ignored. Building on the work of <i>OSU Haters</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;">, a town hall meeting was held on Tuesday,
September 4, 2012. It was sponsored by student organizations—the Asian American
Association, the Multicultural Greek Council, GradPAC, and OSU Stand Your
Ground—and the Multicultural Center. Substantial time was allotted for
attendees to share personal experiences with bias and discrimination. </span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Several students were
eloquent in their critical reading of the environment that OSU provides them.
For example, one young woman said that she is disturbed by peers who denigrate
others, but she can accept it as a simple expression of opinion. However, those
same individuals will also insist that they “hate when people are overly sensitive
or politically correct.” With great insight, this student explained that when
denigrating comments and admonitions against sensitivity and political
correctness go together (and they usually do), then the remarks are not just
casual judgments; they are active attempts to silence others. </span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
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<span style="font-family: Georgia;">As importantly, a student
leader said that it is simply too convenient to suggest that the attitudes
exposed on <i>OSU Haters</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"> belong to
a “fringe” group. With many in the audience nodding in agreement, he shared that
walking down High Street (the main drag near campus) and having racist comments
yelled at him has simply been part of life at Ohio State. In other words, the
incident described in “<a href="http://bit.ly/OZyWuJ">Hate on High</a>” is not
a rare occurrence. And, of course, what happens at OSU is <a href="http://bit.ly/Rp6gPm">a reflection</a> of what is happening all over the
country.</span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">When these students stand
firm in what they know about Ohio State and the United States, they are
operating as citizens of the spaces they inhabit. They are acting out of their
belief that they belong. In doing so, they approach hostile tweeters as equals.
Just as the tweeters assume that this is their school and they have a right to
feel that it is designed with them in mind, so do the creators of <i>OSU Haters. </i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;">The group behind this tumblr site is not accepting
the idea that so-called “minority” students must be suppliant, must put their
case forward as injured subordinates and hope for sympathy. They are
presenting themselves as equals who know that they deserve space.</span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">Some have suggested, even
at <a href="http://bit.ly/TvHQEz">the Town Hall gathering</a>, that those
behind <i>OSU Haters</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"> should not be
anonymous. Such calls for the online organizers to reveal their
identities should be understood as a sign that some resent dealing with members
of marginalized groups as equals. Some people want to be able to identify them
so that they can intimidate them or more directly dismiss their concerns and
downplay the significance of their experience. In an environment structured in
dominance, the group’s anonymity is one of the only ways that they can be on
equal footing with those who are privileged within the institution. And if you
wonder what being privileged in this environment might look like, please refer
to my post “<a href="http://bit.ly/y2BtE3">The AmericanWay: Mediocrity,
When White, Looks Like Merit</a>.”</span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;">The Town Hall meeting
focused on generating solutions that will add to the work of the <i>OSU Haters</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"> tumblr, but the site itself makes an important
contribution that should not be lost on any of us. These online organizers
clearly reject the idea that they should tolerate hostility and just be glad
they are here. They know that they more than earned their space, and they
(unfairly) keep having to earn it every day. </span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<span style="font-family: Georgia;"><i>Know-your-place
aggression</i></span><span style="font-family: Georgia;"> is a way of asserting
that certain groups do not truly belong. I am always proud when targeted
communities refuse to accept that painfully consistent message. </span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br />
<span style="font-family: Georgia;"></span><span style="font-family: Times; font-size: 10.0pt;"></span></div>
<div class="MsoNormal">
<br /></div>
</div>
Koritha Mitchellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09883710526813514536noreply@blogger.com10tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8663624494741057720.post-29333798267151915922012-06-11T21:15:00.001-04:002015-01-03T11:00:54.807-05:00Never-ending Battles Require Sustainable EnergyEveryday, the United States gives me plenty of reason to be frustrated, offended, and downright depressed. It sends powerful messages about how little it values me and mine. I live in a country where slavery literally lasted <a href="http://www.slaverybyanothername.com/pbs-film/" target="_blank">through the 1940s</a> and where today’s prison industrial complex continues to create <a href="http://www.newjimcrow.com/" target="_blank"><i>The New Jim Crow</i></a>. Nevertheless, the smallest acknowledgment of racial injustice inspires dismissive accusations of “playing the race card.” <br />
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I live in a country where 17-year-old Trayvon Martin can be murdered in cold blood, and his killer, George Zimmerman, is treated with leniency. In fact, I live in a country where Zimmerman would not have been arrested if there had not been weeks of <a href="http://msmagazine.com/blog/blog/2012/04/03/from-emmett-till-to-trayvon-martin-how-black-women-turn-grief-into-action/" target="_blank"> protest</a>. What is most painful about the Trayvon Martin tragedy, though, is the fact that his story is <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EQUL9zSBbxk" target="_blank">so familiar</a>. As Lisa Guerrero and David J. Leonard have noted, violence against black and brown people has long been considered an entertaining <a href="http://newblackman.blogspot.com/2012/05/playing-dead-trayvoning-meme-mocking-of.html#more" target="_blank">pastime</a>.<br />
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The United States excuses violence that prevents (certain) teenagers from fulfilling their potential, but when people of color beat the odds, the response can be equally brutal. Black and brown success is often discounted, disrespected, and denied or it becomes the reason for additional violence—what I call <i>know-your-place aggression</i>. In an <a href="http://koritha.blogspot.com/2011/07/american-way-mediocrity-when-white.html" target="_blank">earlier post</a>, I shared my experience with such aggression and the pain of seeing white mediocrity valued more than black excellence. Responses to that post suggest that my experience is far from unique, as does Dr. Christian Head’s <a href="http://www.change.org/petitions/ucla-chancellor-gene-block-stop-discriminating-and-retaliating-against-dr-christian-head" target="_blank">case against UCLA</a>. Still, some of the most egregious know-your-place aggression has become so pervasive that many don’t notice it: now that the president is clearly not 100% white, disrespecting the nation’s highest office has become routine. The vicious nature of Obama-era public discourse has been ably documented by <a href="http://theneworleanstribune.com/obamaseason.htm" target="_blank">Michael K. Wilson</a> and <a href="http://newblackman.blogspot.com/2012/02/obama-is-enslaving-white-middle-class.html" target="_blank">David J. Leonard</a>, and Huffington Post contributor Andres Jauregui notes that <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/2012/06/08/obama-effigy-hanged-outside-church_n_1581272.html?ref=mostpopular" target="_blank">hanging images</a> of President Obama in effigy has become a trend.<br />
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Facing these realities, how do you avoid utter despair? How do you keep from giving up by assuming that the country will never make good on its promises? As importantly, how do you resist the temptation to become completely disconnected? Many people of color try to escape by self-medicating with alcohol and drugs... or with religion. I can see why the latter is particularly tempting. This country is always doing us dirty. Why wouldn’t we welcome a holy cleansing?<br />
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I have decided to resist these temptations; I will not ignore the world around me, but I refuse to sink into despair, no matter how justified that sometimes seems. Too many people sacrificed to leave me the improved conditions that I enjoy. It is my turn to try to do the same for future generations.<br />
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But I am not deceived: surviving and thriving in a society that is set up to destroy, denigrate, and disrespect me requires much more than a strong will.<br />
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<b><i>Exercise has therefore become invaluable!</i></b> I am much more active now than I was as a teenager, and I don’t see myself slowing down. I cannot afford to—not if I want to make a difference in this world, which I do.<br />
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Though I have long understood the value of exercise, making a commitment to do it consistently did not happen over night. It has been a journey, and I have had many sources of encouragement along the way. In 2003, I was welcomed into <a href="http://www.sistermentors.org/home.htm" target="_blank">SisterMentors</a>, an organization that helps women of color finish writing their doctoral dissertations while they mentor school girls. Dr. Shireen Lewis, the founder and director, guides women through the dissertation process, and she takes a very holistic approach. She insists that each woman see herself as a complete human being whose mind, body, and spirit all deserve attention. Dr. Shireen encourages meditation, yoga, and clean eating. I followed much of her advice but never really became consistent.<br />
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Once I earned the PhD and relocated to begin my first job, I thought that a healthier lifestyle would be part of the transition. Again, I was not particularly consistent. However, the encouragement to prioritize physical and spiritual health continued to flow into my life. In July 2009, I attended an arts showcase by young women who had completed the Girl/Friends summer program. Girl/Friends is a project of <a href="http://www.alongwalkhome.org/" target="_blank"><i>A Long Walk Home</i></a> that empowers teenagers to do rape prevention educational work in their own schools. The showcase was titled “Fearless,” and it featured the girls’ creative work with photography, dance, and spoken word. As they shared some of the experiences that impacted them the most, I was struck by the program’s emphasis on being physically active and honoring the mind-body-spirit connection.<br />
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In short, the program confirmed that doing lasting good in a world that is designed to discount you—anyone who isn’t white and/or male and/or heterosexual and/or middle class—requires valuing yourself enough to prioritize self-care.<br />
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Still, it was not until I fell in love with running that I finally found my way of being good to myself on a regular basis. I have now been running since August 2010, because I found positive sources of motivation rather than focusing on losing weight. Basically, I run because I can. I am grateful that I can move, and I show my gratitude by moving.<br />
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Gratitude remains my motivation, but in April 2011, I found additional support by becoming <a href="http://www.dispatch.com/content/stories/life_and_entertainment/2012/05/04/club-for-black-women-becoming-a-fitness-force.html" target="_blank">an ambassador</a> for <a href="http://www.blackgirlsrun.com/" target="_blank"><i>Black Girls RUN!</i></a>, a national organization founded by Toni Carey and Ashley Hicks to promote active lifestyles.<br />
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It took me a while to find my primary exercise passion, but I kept looking because I knew that the benefits would be immeasurable. Too many people believe that self-care means being selfish and self-centered, but how can you give the world something of quality if your tank is empty? We assume that everything else is more urgent than nurturing ourselves, but there is no way around it: <i>you can't give what you don’t have, and energy is our most precious resource.</i><br />
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<b>Why Not You? Why Not Now?</b><br />
I continue to resist the idea that losing weight is a good motivation for exercise. My points of emphasis therefore differ from the sound bites often associated with <i>Black Girls RUN!</i> Nevertheless, I love seeing <i>BGR!</i> inspire women of all ages, sizes, and backgrounds. I am honored to be a part of it. And, we are not alone in this invigorating work.<br />
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More and more people understand the importance of getting everyone around them moving. Of course, First Lady Michelle Obama contributes significantly to <a href="http://www.letsmove.gov/" target="_blank">this endeavor</a>, but there are many such leaders. It is not uncommon to encounter messages like “Strong is the new sexy” and “Health is the new wealth.” And I love the way that Stic of Dead Prez puts it: “Healthy is the New Gangsta…<a href="http://www.feelrich.com/2012/05/30/stic-of-dead-prez-healthy-is-the-new-gangsta/" target="_blank">stay G’d up!</a>” Similar sentiments have recently been articulated by the great thinkers of <a href="http://crunkfeministcollective.wordpress.com/2012/05/14/on-the-queerness-of-self-love/" target="_blank"><i>Crunk Feminist Collective</i></a> and <a href="http://colorlines.com/archives/2012/05/3_wellness_tips_for_activists.html" target="_blank"><i>Colorlines</i></a>. It is an awakening that I am thrilled to see.<br />
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Why don’t you join us? Why not now? The nation is not getting any less racist, sexist, heterosexist, and classist or any less brutal toward people who are differently abled or whose gender expression resists rigidity. When you realize that, you understand that Audre Lorde said it best: “Caring for myself is not self-indulgence, it is self-preservation, and that is an act of political warfare.”<br />
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Running may not be the answer, but please find your source of sustainable energy.Koritha Mitchellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09883710526813514536noreply@blogger.com2tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8663624494741057720.post-33688104906271389852012-03-11T13:44:00.001-04:002012-06-12T20:15:21.530-04:00Interpreting American Experience: Which Facts Command Your Attention?Sometimes, a truly honest conversation can illuminate the different kinds of experiences that people are having even as they live in the same country. That is precisely what happened when I shared my frustration recently in a facebook status and a white male friend of mine took the time to express how slanted my view seemed. I reproduce the exchange here because I think we were both honest, civil, and respectful in ways that are instructive for anyone who wants to think more critically about how americans are encouraged to interpret the realities that surround us.<br />
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<b>My facebook status on Thursday, March 8, 2012:</b> How I WISH I were wrong more often about how much white privilege & racism rule everything around me.<br />
<b><br />
I commented on my own status:</b> James Baldwin always makes you think: "...it can be unutterably exhausting to deal with people who, with a really dazzling ingenuity, a tireless agility, are perpetually defending themselves against charges which one has not made. One does not have to make them. The record is there for all to read. [...] One wishes that Americans, white Americans, would read, for their own sakes, this record, and stop defending themselves against it. [...] The fact that Americans, white Americans, have not yet been able to do this—to face their history, to change their lives—hideously menaces this country." ("Unnameable Objects, Unspeakable Crimes").<br />
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White male friend:</b> Hi Koritha. I will preface this by saying I am in no way hiding from or defending “white history” (although I can easily argue that there is no such thing, but that is not for today) but given that your post is in the present, I am a bit curious. You have a fantastic job at a prestigious university, you get to study and teach your subject of choice, you own a home (and presumably were granted a loan), you are married, with equality, to a wonderful, well educated, well employed man, you can freely post your intellectual opinion on Facebook, you are a published author, you pay US income taxes, your president is multi-racial, you freely associate, interact, and socialize with people of various races. I may have some form of white ignorance here, but where in any of that are you being “ruled” by white privilege and racism? Sorry, but I don’t see anyone or anything ruling YOU!<br />
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<b>ME:</b> Well, I said that it rules everything *around* me. I certainly recognize that I have a good life, but I've also shared on here that I know that my successes are thanks God and to the sacrifices of my ancestors—they are not the result of this country becoming fair or free of racism, sexism and other -isms. And, my having the *privileges* that I have is exactly why it's important for me not to be silent about the injustices and double standards that I see. If I'm encountering them with all that I have going for me, then how much worse is it for other black women and members of other marginalized groups?? And, please understand that I know this country's past and present well enough to know that my success has been DESPITE everything that the nation has set up to ensure that I am NOT successful. The fact that I have the life I do is not because things are so fair but because I managed to escape—to this point, at least—all the traps that are set by a society that has designed pretty much everything to favor/advantage white male heterosexuals with middle-class backgrounds. I also very much understand my being able to speak out is a *privilege,* but again, it is one that has been HARD WON (by ancestors and others) with a lot of blood, sweat, and tears. And anyone who doesn't know that blood, sweat, and tears are still being shed today (Obama or not) should consider the possibility that not knowing that is also a sign of privilege.<br />
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<b>ME:</b> This makes me want to share this status from Feb 10 again: It must be nice: If you're a white man and mediocre, you're treated with respect, and your BELONGING in positions of authority is never questioned. Meanwhile, I can do exceptional work and folk act like I should be grateful for their even giving me a hearing. Then, if I'm more confident than overly grateful to mere mortals, it's interpreted as arrogance. It's the American way, and it's extremely tiresome.<br />
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<b>ME again:</b> And this too: @ Amy, I'm touched by this. Thank you. I appreciate that you can understand my venting. Yes, it's just part of the landscape. As you might guess, I'm articulating just a small part of my frustration. I'm in a moment when things are going so well but there's always got to be some race and gender BS with it. Not only is there some general hateration, as my girl Mary J. Blige would say, but there's also the reality that—because this is the United States, which is so good at being the changing same—I get to shop for something to wear to [an event at which I will be honored for my research] while dealing with sales clerks who act like I'm going to steal something and random shoppers trying to "girlfriend" me and make comments about how I probably can't afford x, y, or z. Just lovely. Accomplishments are always accompanied by this kind of stuff. So, on top of dealing with that, you also have to deal with folk forever trying to downplay the achievement, as if something was handed to you. You know, because this country has become so liberal, it's always cutting black women a break. The unearned arrogance that always insists that my accomplishments have to do with being black and a woman but whites' accomplishments have NOTHING to do with being white is just so freakin' old—and it would be funny if it didn't affect our lives so much.<br />
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<b>White male friend:</b> You are awesome. Privilege is earned (be you Bill Gates or Bruce Springsteen or Oprah Winfrey or Ken Chanault) and you have clearly earned yours, and I think we can agree on that. So my point remains firm. You may feel those things rule "everything" around you, but the very fact that you are who you are and a guy like me is so impressed by you, and what you do, is proof that you are not. You are so much better than all that nonsense!<br />
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And, for the record, I am a thoroughly mediocre white guy and routinely treated with little to no respect. Case in point, I would wager you have little to no respect for me right now!! <br />
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<b>ME:</b> Thanks for the compliment and for taking the time to share this. It's astonishing how different our experiences have clearly been because our perspectives feel worlds apart. I am made to see things that you simply don't, I guess. When I acknowledge that I have privilege, I am referring to the fact that I know that some of what I have is NOT EARNED because WE LIE when we say that we live in a country in which people have what they earn. I'll give just one example. Of course, I work hard. I certainly work harder than those who are even more privileged than I am by our racist, sexist, classist, heterosexist society. However, because I'm not invested in lying to myself about how much I earned x, y, or z, I can admit that I know that I have had certain breaks and only those breaks allowed me to get here. Why are breaks so crucial? Because we live in a society that consistently withholds from some and gives to others; it is not invested in equal distribution of ANYTHING, including opportunity. So, (for example) I've seen how black boys who were just as smart as I was did not get the opportunities that I got in the early decade or so of schooling. So much is set up to make everyone see black boys in less innocent, less child-like ways, so if my black male peers weren't extra bright (and caught on extra fast) and weren't extra perfect in behavior, they could easily be treated with no patience and end up falling behind in learning, etc. etc. etc. So, my decent intelligence coupled with the fact that I was girl and knew how to walk a VERY straight line—because enough imperfect behavior from me could've easily led to my being thrown away too (certainly quicker than misbehaving white children)—allowed me to end up okay. Now, this didn't mean that I didn't still encounter all kinds of craziness. Despite my record, despite honors classes, I was NEVER given college counseling. The only reason I ended up going to college is because my mom worked too many jobs for me to go to the college nights that the school sponsored anyway, so I always had to be proactive and figure out how to get exposure. Because I did that, I ended up at a college fair in downtown Houston (not associated with my school) and met a representative from Ohio Wesleyan University. Again, I know better than to think that I deserved x, y, or z because I took that extra initiative. How many breaks did I get that allowed me to know to figure these things out on my own? If I hadn't figured it out, it certainly wouldn't have been because I was lazy and didn't deserve it. It just would've been that I fell through the wide cracks that the society left for me. Anyway, I can't try to go through it all. The point is that I know the workings of this society well enough to know that it's not just about EARNING. It's also a lot of blessings and luck and chance because what is most consistent and systematic are those mechanisms that nearly ensure that people like me would never get to where I am. Again, there's more than I can say. But there's plenty of evidence that our society constantly advantages certain kinds of people, constantly ensures that certain kinds of people get 2nd, 3rd, and 4th chances and ruthlessly increases the likelihood that ONE MISTAKE will destroy another type of person's life. That's the United States that we live in and not knowing just how unfair its most systematic practices are requires a willingness to ignore that I can't pretend to have. Because I know that my privileges are unearned, I try to use the ones I have to create justice for others. I can only do that within the limits of the power that my privileges give me, so I hope and pray that those who have more privileges and power will see the value of using that to create justice for others. But here's the thing: Doing that means looking at the environment and what can be improved about it rather than saying, for example, "Well, if Oprah, Obama, and lesser folk like Koritha made it, then that proves that this is a country that spells opportunity for all." That's the hype we're told to believe, but the evidence to the contrary is everywhere—and it doesn't take being a researcher like me to find it. To refuse to see the environment and insist that all that matters is those few who escaped the traps of that environment has been the american way. I am working to inspire people to see that we can do a lot better. The country can actually walk its talk one day.<br />
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All that I will add now is that I am grateful for whites who are allies in anti-racist work. There have always been whites who are serious and proactive about being anti-racist thinkers and activists, and they have been in the trenches along with people of color and other marginalized groups. Tim Wise is the most visible, but I am grateful to know of others. Rather than list here, I would just encourage those who don't even know about Tim Wise to consider getting his latest book <i>Dear White America: Letter to a New Minority</i>. Also see his website <a href="http://www.timwise.org/" target="_blank">timwise.org</a>.Koritha Mitchellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09883710526813514536noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8663624494741057720.post-57744277293184227592012-01-19T16:03:00.021-05:002013-07-28T11:54:03.542-04:00What Are You Speaking to Power?Since the October 2011 publication of my book <i>Living with Lynching</i>, I have been asked whether I see parallels between our contemporary moment and the period that I study, 1890 to 1930. The short answer is <i>yes</i>. In fact, I find the last turn of the century fascinating partly because it looks so much like this one. The similarities include the ugliness of anti-immigrant sentiment, the need for women to fight for baseline equity and safety, the ease with which <a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yMLZO-sObzQ" target="_blank">certain families</a> are denied recognition and respect, and the dehumanizing treatment of the poor while corporations are treated as people. (See the <a href="http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Santa_Clara_County_v._Southern_Pacific_Railroad" target="_blank">1886 Santa Clara decision</a> and today’s <a href="http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=122805666">Citizen’s United case</a> leading to the doctrine that “money is free speech.”) And, of course, there are striking parallels between the lynching era and our present moment in terms of the strategies being developed—right now—to keep <a href="http://newblackman.blogspot.com/2012/01/cathy-cohen-melissa-harris-perry-on.html" target="_blank">certain populations from voting.</a> <br />
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Questions about whether or not the dynamics I examine still exist usually arise in relation to a very specific claim. Armed with the insight of those who lived and wrote in the midst of lynching, I contend that racial violence was a response not to black criminality but to black success. I hope to write several posts addressing various versions of the historical parallels question. Here, I begin with one from <a href="http://www.michaelericdyson.com/april41968/books.php" target="_blank">Michael Eric Dyson</a>, who interviewed me for his hour-long radio show honoring the legacy of Martin Luther King Jr. on Monday, January 16, 2012. <br />
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I was describing the revisions that black male lynching dramatists offered when they entered the genre a decade after it was initiated by women. While women playwrights had put forth ideal images of black manhood, black men offered the pimp and the coward. The message of their plays is that the mob attacks black patriarchs, those who gain traditional success and are family and community leaders, but it will often spare pimps and cowards. Michael Eric Dyson asked if there was any parallel between the collective message of these plays and today’s cultural landscape, in which black pimps are welcomed in popular media. I said that there is a link and that the circulation of pimp imagery is acceptable, and even desirable, because it does not disrupt the status quo. Let me elaborate here.<br />
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<i>Living with Lynching</i> is about citizenship. I am interested in the many ways that the nation defines citizenship as white and how racial violence contributes to this mission. After all, lynching emerged only after slavery ended (so, killing blacks didn’t mean losing property), and it intensified when black men began gaining ground politically. (Black women were far from voting rights at this point.) To discourage black men from voting and otherwise participating in the political process, whites used violence and they invented the black rapist myth to destroy black men’s reputations, portraying them as unworthy of citizenship. In other words, the images allowed to circulate in the public sphere—black rapists and white heroes who avenge rape—reiterated the assumption that whites are the rightful citizens. <br />
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Today’s pimp imagery works in a similar fashion to ensure that only certain people come to mind when you say “citizen.” Any success that a pimp might have is deemed immoral, so his popularity only confirms that black men cannot be responsible citizens because they do not live by the ideals of upstanding manhood that the country claims to respect. It is more threatening to have a black man who exemplifies american ideals, such as Barack Obama. He did everything according to what should bring him respect: he went to Ivy League schools, he’s heterosexual, he’s married, he's had only one wife, etc. He creates much more anxiety than does the commercial gold mine Snoop Dog because he embodies what the nation says it values, thereby illustrating that black men can be more admirable than whites, even by conservative standards.<br />
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Noticing this tendency is not enough, though; placing pimp imagery alongside Barack Obama reveals other dynamics that should not be overlooked. Namely, though conversations about the pimp lifestyle center on non-whites, white men have freely engaged in nefarious activity—including pimping, raping, and otherwise abusing women—since the founding of this nation. Indeed, this country’s biggest pimps have been and continue to be white men, but when we hear that word, they are not the image that comes to mind. Whites have created a society in which negative connotations stick to everyone but them. Another example: a white man can routinely bully and elegantly threaten others, in both his personal and professional life…but never be thought of as a “thug.” Meanwhile, all a black man has to do is choose a style of dress that we don’t like, and he is labeled a “thug” to the point where it limits his life chances.<br />
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On the other end of the spectrum, one finds Barack Obama and the countless black men whose existence is seldom acknowledged in mainstream media: black lawyers, black soldiers, veterans, and entrepreneurs, for example. If these men cannot be ignored, they are discredited (“he got that position because he is black”). Why? Because they expose the central myth of U.S. culture, that white men are the best the world has to offer. <br />
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Unfortunately, admirable people of color can also be understood as exceptions who confirm the worthlessness of others. You have heard it a million times from americans of all hues: “Just look at ____. Now, there are no excuses.” How did so many come to believe that the main thing that people of color do is make excuses? The ease with which people utter and accept this comment proves the success of the campaign to malign anyone who isn’t white. While everyone is busy making sure that non-whites don’t get away with making excuses, we ignore all of the systems put in place to prevent anyone who is not white and/or heterosexual and/or Christian and/or middle-class from attaining what the nation claims is within everyone’s reach.<br />
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But as I said on Dyson’s radio show, I am not invested in speaking the truth because I hope it might change white people’s minds. I am much more interested in keeping people of color from believing the lies that are meant to destroy them while making them feel ashamed if they notice that they are under siege. (Accusations of “playing the race card.”) To the extent that we buy the dominant portrait, which makes white right and everyone else wrong, we are in trouble.<br />
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Too often, I hear conversations on race among blacks that revolve around how “the white man doesn’t have to keep us down because we are doing it to ourselves—all these single mothers, deadbeat fathers….” Listening in, one would think that <i>even we</i> don’t know any examples of black mothers who are also wives and fathers who prioritize family life. Sure, images of single mothers and deadbeat fathers saturate mainstream discourse, but we are letting that dictate what comes to mind for us, too. [And this is to say nothing about the fact that being a single mother isn't shameful!!] <br />
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These conversations remind me of when then-Senator Obama chose the occasion of his address to the NAACP to insist on the necessity of “teaching our sons…to realize responsibility does not end at conception; that what makes them a man is not the ability to have a child but to raise one" (July 2008). He said this as if he does not know plenty of black men who are doing precisely that. He said this as if that’s the most powerful message he could bring to the NAACP. Really? Well, we don’t do any better when that’s how we talk about the race, too. <br />
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In contrast, lynching plays evince an understanding of the importance of speaking the truth about black communities that the rest of society is working so hard to ignore. The plays foreground representative figures that help audiences think together about black identity and citizenship. Because my book follows the conversation that blacks were having in the early 1900s, one chapter focuses on the black soldier, another on the black lawyer, another on the black mother who is also a wife. Imagine that! These authors actually placed a spotlight on the people <i>they knew</i> in their communities, not just those who saturated the mainstream: buffoons and mammies, rapists and whores. <br />
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According to mainstream assumptions, mobs targeted African Americans because they represented an evil that would destroy society: black men were supposedly rapists who cared nothing for stable domesticity and black women were said to be whores incapable of creating it anyway. In this climate, black playwrights most consistently depicted what national discourse denied existed: loving black homes. As they recorded and contributed to the community conversation, they placed a spotlight on the black soldier, the black lawyer, and the black mother/wife, so bringing the black pimp and coward into the genre constituted a major revision. Today, we seldom bother to talk about those who make us proud before focusing on those who don’t.<br />
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These tendencies have political implications. What is our current community conversation? What are we speaking to power? Do we talk about our own communities as if they contain no responsible men, commendable women, or adorable children? If so, is that the truth? Again, the mainstream denies that we have loving families, but we should pause before regurgitating those messages. Too often, we say these things as if we are the only admirable black person we know—and as if judging the <u>presumed</u> majority of the race will confirm how admirable and “objective” we are.<br />
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Having seen this pattern more often than I would like, I think we could take lessons from the playwrights. They preserved the truth that society’s myths disregarded, thereby affirming for African Americans what they hopefully already knew about the race. Doing so was (and remains) crucial because blacks are not magically impervious to the messages of american society; we are as vulnerable to national rhetoric as others, so we need to equip ourselves and each other to withstand the attack on our self-conceptions. <br />
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Today, no less than in the lynching era, the doctrine of white supremacy/black pathology insists that blacks are not worthy citizens of the nation because they are not even meaningful members of their own families and communities. Let’s not be the loudest supporters of those lies.Koritha Mitchellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09883710526813514536noreply@blogger.com6tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8663624494741057720.post-68387586303521048302011-12-11T16:10:00.002-05:002012-06-12T20:17:01.270-04:00Black Art ≠ Protest Art: A Contrarian View, IndeedIn the 2 months that my book <i>Living with Lynching</i> has been in print, readers have asked questions that have stayed with me, partly because I wish I had given more complete answers in the moment. One such question came from <a href="http://aaas.duke.edu/people?Gurl=%2Faas%2FAAAS&Uil=man9&subpage=profile" target="_blank">Mark Anthony Neal</a>, Duke University professor of African and African American Studies and host of the weekly webcast <a href="http://aaas.duke.edu/videos/-left-of-black-" target="_blank"><i>Left of Black</i></a>. Because I insist that <i>protest</i> is too limiting a framework for understanding the lynching plays that I examine, he asked why I think scholars so often use a <i>protest literature</i> lens. My answer was way too tentative and vague. I have very clear ideas about why this pattern persists. In short: because it has become “common sense” to think of black art as a reaction.<br />
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However, what parades as “common sense” sometimes creates a barrier to critical thinking. <a href="http://books.google.com/books/about/Racial_formation_in_the_United_States.html?id=j9v6DMjjY44C" target="_blank">Michael Omi and Howard Winant</a> have shown this very clearly regarding race in the United States. Because ideas supporting the racial status quo pass as common sense, certain assumptions and conclusions seem natural, despite not being even close to accurate. This has certainly become the case with approaches to black art.<br />
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The degree to which “black art = protest art” has become the kind of common sense that hinders critical thinking is perhaps best exemplified by the disproportionate attention that Kenneth Warren’s <i>What Was African American Literature?</i> has received. Somehow, it works for Harvard University Press, <i>The Chronicle of Higher Education</i>, <i>The LA Review of Books</i>, and respected scholars, such as Werner Sollors, that Warren defines a vast body of literature as simply a “response to the disfranchisement of blacks in the south, which set the stage for the consolidation of Jim Crow segregation.” Warren claims that resisting oppression was the only reason that countless literary works emerged, and too many have accepted this as a legitimate assertion. Of course, many have done so with the understanding that this overstated rhetoric simply makes his polemic possible, but even that acknowledgment (and the recognition that Warren's stature gives him cultural capital within the publishing industry), does not fully explain the solemnity with which this book is being engaged. I therefore humbly submit that an important reason for this book’s existence, and people’s willingness to have earnest discussions of it, is this: most in the United States accept as common sense that black artists who embrace that identity can only respond.<br />
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The tagline for Mark Anthony Neal’s show <i>Left of Black</i> is <i>"A Contrarian View of Blackness</i>," and thinking about his question has reminded me that a similar perspective produced <i>Living with Lynching</i>. I argue that lynching plays were not so much responses to white-authored violence as they were efforts to preserve community insights. These playwrights worked to equip African Americans to continue to believe in what they already knew about their communities, that they were made up of men and women who lived according to the standards that the nation claimed to respect. Even though these dramas acknowledge that the mob is a threat, they are not about convincing white people that racial violence is wrong. Contrary to what so many believe, not everything that black artists, philosophers, and even activists do is about white people.<br />
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Unfortunately, this is an argument that americans seldom hear and that few feel empowered to make. In fact, while writing this book, I kept encountering people who not only had trouble accepting my claim, but they also feared for my career because I was making it. With my best interests at heart, one colleague warned, “Well, we’re talking about lynching, Koritha. Can you really say that it’s not about responding to whites?” <br />
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There is no doubt in my mind, though: blacks who lived and wrote in the midst of mob violence do not simply teach us about anti-lynching efforts; they teach us a great deal about lynching itself. If you want to understand lynching, you cannot just look at the evidence that perpetrators left. You also need to pay attention to what targeted communities had to say. And one of the things that they said, if we will only listen, is that mob violence was a response to black achievement. <br />
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The plays show that African Americans were busy minding their own business, and sometimes, this led them not only to survive but also thrive in the “Progressive Era.” When they achieved certain kinds of success, white supremacists reacted violently. So, the literature preserves evidence of black community activities, but because those activities beckoned the mob, most scholars now claim that the art itself was a response to the mob. Not so! And, as my book demonstrates, lynching playwrights were not the only ones who made this clear. <br />
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I allowed myself to be tentative and vague regarding these issues on <i>Left of Black</i>, and I am haunted by what I did not say while being interviewed. So, I will now be bold enough to reveal the loftiest goal I had while writing this book. I hope that <i>Living with Lynching</i> will do for the study of lynching, racial violence, and the Jim Crow Era what books like John Blassingame’s <i>The Slave Community</i> (1972) did for the study of “the peculiar institution.” Blassingame’s research, and the work of those inspired by it, made it unacceptable to teach slavery using only documents produced by slave masters and other whites. Historians began recognizing that understanding the institution required new methodologies that allowed them to engage the perspectives of the enslaved. <br />
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If readers are at all convinced by what I present in <i>Living with Lynching</i>, it should be very hard to claim that you understand racial violence unless you can see black art as much more than protest.Koritha Mitchellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09883710526813514536noreply@blogger.com8tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8663624494741057720.post-38521550713445897882011-09-08T12:07:00.003-04:002012-06-12T20:17:47.971-04:00Why I love AWKWARD BLACK GIRLAs a literary historian and cultural critic committed to understanding how targeted communities survive racial violence, my work seldom focuses on comedy. But, of course, humor has been important for the survival of those grappling with colonialism, slavery, and their many legacies. Without making claims about its ties to these larger historical trajectories, I want to make a declaration: <i>The Mis-adventures of Awkward Black Girl</i>, a comedy series available on YouTube, is one of the few things that has made me laugh out loud in a long time. <br />
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What I find most brilliant about this show is its refusal to invest in any sort of propriety. Yet, it is not driven by the cliché premise of <i>Oh, look. I’m being shocking and irreverent!</i> Instead, the web series simply explores everything that its protagonist, J (portrayed by the show’s creator Issa Rae), would find vexing. In the process, hilarity emerges from sheer honesty. J asks questions that many of us have wanted to ask. For example, “What’s the protocol for repeatedly running into someone at a stop sign? (Episode 1). And, “How many fake laughs are acceptable before it becomes too much?” (Episode 1). Or, when unable to escape an annoying conversation, “Did I die and go to simple bitch hell?” (Episode 6). <br />
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The refusal to invest in propriety strikes a chord because it enables the show to represent a black woman protagonist with much more complexity than mainstream outlets allow. Perhaps the best example is that which opens the series: J’s voice-over introduces her character, and we quickly find that she enjoys violent rap songs saturated with <i>N</i>s and <i>B</i>s. She asks, “Am I the only one who pretends I’m in a music video when I’m by myself?,” and we find her driving while performing along with a song about <i>N</i>s wanting to sex her from behind (Episode 1). Clearly, this character’s portrayal is not going to be governed by whether or not this is a “positive” image of a black woman.<br />
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The music only gets worse—in every way—when J is responsible for its creation! As a coping mechanism, she composes violent rap lyrics. She despises one of her co-workers, and her songs reveal what she would like to do to this woman. No need for viewers to be concerned, though. As J explains, “it’s not violence if you don’t act on it” (Episode 6). <br />
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Because the writing focuses on the truth of J’s character, the episodes are all about situations that she finds awkward, and her workplace proves to be a treasure trove. Once again, J’s voice-over offers much of the comedy; her tone is very matter-of-fact, giving the impression that she is simply making observations. J describes the company she works for: “Basically, we sell bulimia in pill form” (Episode 2). Among her co-workers is “The Loud Black Bitch.” Though we only briefly encounter this character, her disregard for others encourages viewers to accept the description. The show is not so scared of a stereotype that it avoids suggesting that a few such people might exist. But, one of my favorite characters is “Boss Lady,” the white woman supervisor who loves to bond with J by speaking slang, wearing her hair in cornrows, and talking about her attraction to black men. Then, of course, there is Amir, the “walking rainbow of racism” who gets away with it “because no one knows what he is” (Episode 3).<br />
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The show engages interracial dating in Episode 7, and J’s new best friend (her awkward soulmate, Cece) declares herself “an interracial expert” and gives J horrible advice. Still, non-verbal communication is the most amusing element of this episode. For example, when J and her white date walk into a restaurant, they draw lots of stares. As the camera scans the room, a black man with his arm around his white girlfriend shakes his head and rolls his eyes. There is no voice-over commentary, no additional dialogue to underscore it—just the facial expression and clear message of the gesture. Beautiful! The well executed acting creates a moment that instantly brings to mind every conversation I have had about the frequency with which black men date white women and the very different reactions inspired when black women consider exploring similar options.<br />
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This first date with a white man does not go so well, partly because he takes J to a spoken word showcase. Again, we see evidence that this comedy series will not be governed by what “should” or “should not” be said. Via voice-over, J declares, “Rap and poetry had a baby called Spoken Word. I wish I could abort that baby.” And later, “God invented liquor because He foresaw spoken word. Praise Him!” (Episode 7). J’s disdain for the form is not a blanket statement. It has everything to do with the quality of work in this particular showcase—a fact that is undeniable as the episode features some of the performed pieces in their entirety. <br />
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You must see the short episodes on <a href="http://www.youtube.com/results?search_query=awkward+black+girl&aq=f" target="_blank">YouTube</a> for yourself because there is no way to capture the show’s genius here. There have already been <a href="http://colorlines.com/archives/2011/08/awkward_black_girl_creator_issa_rae_talks_race_hollywood_and_creative_control.html" target="_blank">insightful articulations</a> of why people love the series so much that viewers contributed <a href="http://www.huffingtonpost.com/issa-rae/kickstarter-awkward-black-girl_b_922966.html" target="_blank">more than $44K</a> to ensure that Episode 7 would not be the last one. I simply wanted to add that the show’s “improper” elements are crucial because they enable a nuanced portrait of the protagonist. This works so well because the truth about people of color is that we are complex and often contradictory, despite the mainstream media’s centuries-long habit of portraying us in narrow and simplistic ways. <br />
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These complexities can come through when we can free ourselves, even momentarily, from a bias toward perfection. This is difficult, I know. After all, those whom U.S. society marginalizes are constantly told that propriety is the ticket to social acceptance and full citizenship. Thus, people who are homosexual, of color, and/or poor are taught to invest in standards of propriety and morality that privileged folk can disregard without losing acceptance or basic rights. No wonder we so rarely encounter characters—who are not white, heterosexual, and middle-class—that are allowed to simply be themselves and experience life, whether what they do, think, and say is admirable or not.<br />
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When I see J, I am thoroughly amused for more reasons than I can name, but I know that the show’s tendency to avoid <i>should</i>s and <i>should not</i>s is at the top of the list. Though I understand the investment in propriety, we need more artists who will let their characters of color have their complete experiences and all of their messy behavior and quirky thoughts. Too often, our stories are all about moralizing, as if there is no room for anything else—as if black communities (especially) are so lost that everything that engages black characters must also come with a guidebook for living. That's not the case. Despite mainstream depictions (including those on the news), we have plenty of strong families in the community that fit the traditional mold. And, we have some that don't fit the traditional mold but are still quite nurturing and full of role models. Healthy, loving families headed by gays and lesbians constitute just one of many examples. <br />
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So, I don't believe that every bit of artistic expression involving folk who are not white and/or heterosexual and/or solidly middle-class must offer life lessons. Some can just make us laugh out loud, which <i>The Mis-adventures of Awkward Black Girl</i> does exceptionally well.Koritha Mitchellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09883710526813514536noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8663624494741057720.post-90672411258141989332011-07-29T22:10:00.010-04:002012-06-14T19:28:58.212-04:00The American Way: Mediocrity, When White, Looks Like MeritA couple years ago, I attended a meeting with a high-ranking administrator about diversifying the faculty and graduate student population. The administrator had recently hired someone to focus on diversity, and she was also at the meeting. Early in the conversation, someone asked about the racial composition of the administrator's unit. The newly hired diversity officer reported that the staff of nearly 100 people was 98% white. I really appreciated her wording. Rather than say that there were only 1 or 2 people of color, she emphasized that there were 98 whites. When we talk about diversity, we don't do this enough. We leave whiteness unmarked—as if its presence is never up for discussion and certainly not to be questioned. Missing her point, the very powerful administrator later said, sure that he was being reasonable, “Well, we have to be careful because people wanting to get minorities into positions may relax standards.” <br />
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His comment reflects the accepted way of understanding what most Americans call "affirmative action." However, this view depends on a bold-faced lie, that “race” is a factor only when people of color are involved. Yet, real affirmative action has always been for whites. Whether the rules governing who could own land in Colonial times (these policies certainly didn't favor Native Americans) or the practices ensuring that whites received 98% of FHA loans between 1932 and 1962, real affirmative action has always been for those deemed white. <br />
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Do you end up with a staff that is more than 90% white because they are the most qualified the country has to offer? That’s certainly the hype that we’re taught to believe. However, I have been surrounded by whites all my life, and that has not translated into being surrounded by excellence. When a candidate is white, they can be considered a “good fit” even when their qualifications are not all that impressive, but a candidate of color has to be exceptional (and put whites at ease) in order to get the same designation. <br />
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Of course, I am not saying anything new, but the intractability of American <i>-isms</i> makes saying it as relevant today as ever. For the same reason, it is always helpful to re-visit books that have stated the case better than I can. For example, if you have questions about the validity of the term “white” and claims about the benefits that follow “whiteness” in the U.S. context, please see George Lipsitz’s <i><a href="http://www.temple.edu/tempress/titles/1418_reg.html" target="_blank">The Possessive Investment in Whiteness: How White People Profit from Identity Politics</a></i>. It discusses (among other things) how maintaining the whiteness of institutions requires pretending that whiteness has nothing to do with how the institution works.<br />
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Recognizing the same dynamic, cultural critic Dwight McBride has argued that when you look at African American faculty members in the top English departments around the country, you find—with very few exceptions— scholars who "by any measure of 'quality' are achieving at the highest levels of distinction in the field." However, "canvass those same English departments of the same top institutions and consider the white faculty members there. What you will find is a range of faculty members from the very distinguished to the mediocre...." Therefore, “...one of the ways in which we will know when black people in the United States are truly liberated and equal to their fellow white citizens will be when there are as many mediocre blacks in academia as there are currently mediocre whites” (<a href="http://nyupress.org/books/book-details.aspx?bookId=9112" target="_blank">2005</a>: 8). <br />
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McBride’s words have long resonated with me, but my experiences keep telling me how far the United States is from that moment. In the five years before coming up for tenure review, I won two postdoctoral fellowships in competitions among PhD’s throughout the nation and from every scholarly discipline. Though neither of the competitions that I won excludes white candidates, they are designed to address the fact that white men are over-represented in the academy. I get the impression that, in the history of my very large and established English department, I am the first person to have won two national, year-long fellowships before tenure review. This has not always been treated as an honor for me and the university, though; sometimes, it has caused hostility.<br />
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The hostility has often been subtle and it has taken many forms; I will give only the most recent example. A renowned senior colleague told me that my fellowships were more like financial aid because they allowed me to get my first scholarly book written. The book will be the real sign of whether I have done my job well, he explained. (This was a couple months ago, after my book manuscript had already gone through several levels of favorable review, to which he was privy.)<br />
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It is incredibly difficult to win fellowships, especially the kind that I earned: that which requires no teaching. These fellowships are an honor and a straightforward investment in the potential that the foundation sees in you as a scholar. Therefore, the foundation essentially pays to relieve you of your teaching obligations to your home institution. <br />
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How does such an acknowledgment of the quality of my research get interpreted as financial aid??? In short, the unearned arrogance that comes with white privilege. It's like magic! This man believes that his achievements have had <i>nothing</i> to do with his whiteness, but he cannot imagine that my accomplishments are about <i>anything but</i> someone “cutting me a break” because I am black and a woman. <br />
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If I had been a white man who studies Shakespeare, these awards would have been deemed an honor to me and the entire department and university. There would have been NO suggestion that this was anything like financial aid. I am sure that my esteemed colleague has never thought of his own fellowships that way. <br />
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So, I agree with McBride that we will have made some progress when a wide range of merit is tolerable for people of color, as it currently is for whites. They can be anything from distinguished to mediocre and not have people question their qualifications. Yet, to the majority of those in power, even excellence—if it's not white—does not seem like merit. No wonder our institutions look like they do.Koritha Mitchellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09883710526813514536noreply@blogger.com23tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8663624494741057720.post-80772140243366335882011-04-26T11:22:00.001-04:002012-06-12T20:19:22.244-04:00Grappling with Midwestern Memories: A New Lynching PlayAmerican dramatist Charles Smith has given the nation a new lynching play of remarkable nuance and beauty. <i>The Gospel According to James</i> was commissioned by the Indianapolis Repertory Theatre as a way of engaging the state’s history—specifically, the lynching in Marion, Indiana that James Cameron survived, later founding the Black Holocaust Museum. The show ran at IRT from March 22 to April 10, 2011. From May 14 to June 12, 2011, the same <a href="http://csplays.com/thegospelaccordingtojames.html" target="_blank">cast and crew</a> will bring it to life for <a href="http://www.victorygardens.org/onstage/gospel.php" target="_blank">Chicago audiences</a>. Though inspired by racial violence in the Midwest, <i>The Gospel According to James</i> focuses on the role of memory in all accounts of history. <br />
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As Smith says in the author’s note, “[the play] is not about the lynching. The lynching is only the starting point.” Therefore, from the moment that he began facing the challenge of writing about this violent event, Smith had been sure about one thing: “I knew that I did not want to reproduce the lynching on stage.” <br />
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In this way, his work resembles the earliest black-authored lynching plays. Scripts about racial violence written in the 1910s and 1920s—such as Angelina Weld Grimké’s <i>Rachel</i> (1914/1916), Alice Dunbar-Nelson’s <i>Mine Eyes Have Seen</i> (1918), Mary Burrill’s <i>Aftermath</i> (1919), and Georgia Douglas Johnson’s <i>A Sunday Morning in the South</i> (1925) and <i>Safe</i> (1929)—refuse to describe, let alone portray, physical violence. <br />
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Adding to this tradition, Smith creates a fictional meeting between the black man who escaped the mob’s wrath and the white woman who had been with him that night. It is now the early 1980s—more than fifty years after the double lynching of Cameron’s friends Abe Smith and Tommy Shipp. James Cameron (André De Shields) asks Mary Ball, who now goes by “Marie” (Linda Kimbrough), to speak to a man who wants to make a documentary about the events that changed their lives. Marie is not at all interested in this project.<br />
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Still, the play unfolds as Marie and Cameron share what they remember about the events that led to the mob dragging the black teenagers through town. As they tell their stories, 16-year-old James Cameron (Anthony Peeples) and young Mary (Kelsey Brennan) appear downstage, along with the others involved. Mirroring the audience, the mature characters watch their younger selves in each other’s versions, sometimes learning details that they had no way of knowing in their teens. More crucial to the playwright’s purpose, though, they often disagree with each other’s accounts even when they had been privy to the exact same information. <br />
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<i>The Gospel According to James</i> confronts its audience with the impossibility of knowing exactly what happened that night. Indeed, the play suggests that (<i>pace</i> some historians’ claims) facts are never simply facts; all historical narratives are shaped by perspective. And this is especially true of histories wrought with the complexities that always attend race, sex, and violence in the United States. <br />
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From the very beginning of the action, Marie repeatedly calls Cameron a liar. She insists that he knows that events did not unfold as he claims in his autobiography and in interviews. Indeed, she is sarcastic as she declares that he has given the nation “the gospel according to James.” <br />
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It is not until much later that the audience discovers why Marie insists that Cameron lied. In a moment of empathy, she admits understanding why he said that her boyfriend Claude, who died that night in 1930, had been “a good white man.” If Cameron had told the truth about how low-down, dirty, and cruel Claude had been (to her and to others), there is no way that town whites would have let Cameron live.<br />
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From beginning to end, Smith’s work maintains a palpable tension. Painful stories contradict each other as they vie for space in the world, as they compete to survive and to be remembered. The play never offers its audience the comfort that comes with feeling certain…about what happened or about what motivated those involved. And Smith suggests that this uncertainty clings to all histories. History is shaped by memory. It therefore reflects what people are willing to remember and what they insist upon forgetting. <br />
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Smith’s work also suggests that language—the medium through which we create and convey history—sometimes reveals an investment in a particular image. After Cameron’s teenage friends are murdered, Mary’s father, Hoot Ball (Christopher Jon Martin), goes home and tells his wife Bea (Diane Kondrat) what has happened. He had been a member of the mob, and using that position of privilege, he had also helped save Cameron’s life. Still, his wife is shocked to discover that teenagers were lynched in her town. Hoot immediately corrects her: “Lynched? This ain’t Mississippi. This is Indiana. They were hanged!”<br />
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After James and Marie have finished sharing what they remember about that night and how it affected the rest of their lives, they have more compassion for each other. And they ultimately agree that when people face the past, they must decide either to bear witness to their truth or shirk that responsibility by trying to forget. Marie chooses the latter. She gives Cameron a necklace, her only memento from that night, and leaves him to grapple with his memories and hers. <br />
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Alone, Cameron faces all of the people whose stories were told as he and Marie shared their memories of that night in 1930. <a href="http://csplays.com/" target="_blank">Charles Smith</a> leaves his audience with an appreciation of the responsibility that Cameron shouldered. Having survived what his friends did not, Cameron refused to forget; he preserved stories that help make our nation’s history. He spent the <a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2006/06/12/AR2006061201594.html" target="_blank">rest of his life</a> encouraging the country to face all of its truths so that all of its <a href="http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=5490693" target="_blank">citizens might heal</a>.Koritha Mitchellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09883710526813514536noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8663624494741057720.post-36983577271650730152011-03-13T19:45:00.002-04:002012-06-12T20:19:56.437-04:00Anna Deveare Smith: Lessons on Living and DyingAnna Deveare Smith's <i>Let Me Down Easy</i> once again demonstrates that the usual terms are not sufficient for what she accomplishes on stage. As in her most famous theatrical work, <i>Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992</i>, Smith portrays many real-life characters, but “one-woman show” is not quite right. She places Lance Armstrong before us with as much force as she depicts Eve Ensler or Rev. Peter Gomes, and she does so by impeccably reproducing their accents, inflections, and gestures, and yet “impersonation” is not what we witness. <br />
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Part of what takes Smith’s work to another level is its commitment to testimony. As countless theorists have found, testimony is life-affirming because, by definition, it involves direct address. When a human being shares her story and another listens, the interlocutor becomes a witness. <br />
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In signature Smith style, <i>Let Me Down Easy</i> is composed of a series of monologues based on verbatim excerpts from face-to-face conversations. The twenty stories represented on stage are drawn from 320 interviews that Smith conducted on three continents. The monologues address the power of the human body as well as its limitations. They also explore the mental and spiritual aspects of both maximizing one’s physical potential and facing one’s mortality. Taken together, the monologues offer a powerful commentary on health care, the lack of it, and the implications of both. Smith became a witness for all 320 interviewees. And, she gives audiences an opportunity to bear witness to the humanity of the twenty people featured in this incarnation of the show—people who “<a href="http://www.theroot.com/multimedia/root-interview-anna-deavere-smith" target="_blank">have come through something</a>.”<br />
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Because these are stories of real life, <i>Let Me Down Easy</i> highlights inequalities. For example, in the monologue titled “Heavy Sense of Resignation,” Kiersta Kurtz-Burke, a doctor at Charity Hospital in New Orleans, shares her experience of Hurricane Katrina. She explains that she had always insisted that limited financial resources did not keep the hospital from offering quality care. However, when it was clear that Charity was not being evacuated so that patients could avoid danger—while other hospitals were—she found it more difficult to maintain a cheerful bedside manner. Still, what she remembers most vividly is that her (mostly black) staff and patients were not surprised that authorities had apparently forgotten them. She confessed, “the fact that it wasn’t a shock was a shock for me.” As she shares her story, she still seems stunned: “It was the first time that I’d been abandoned by my government.” Very clearly, she was surrounded by people for whom this was <i>not</i> the first time. <br />
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While Smith channels Kurtz-Burke, we see the profound effect of stepping into another person’s point of view. With both her head and heart, she acknowledges that the country of her birth claims to value equality while treating its citizens very differently. More than that, she actually stopped to consider what that reality might feel like when, for an entire lifetime, one is not on the privileged end of that differential treatment. <br />
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Yet, without fail, <i>Let Me Down Easy</i> resists sentimentality; every emotion serves to inspire thought long afterward. This is particularly true of the show’s insistence that living and dying are inextricably linked. As palliative care specialist Eduardo Bruera puts it, people generally face death like they faced life. That is, if you were angry, you will probably be angry. Those who tend to retreat will probably withdraw, and those who blame will probably blame. <br />
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Having been touched by these stories, I went home thinking. If we die as we lived, then I am happy with many of the priorities I have kept, but there is always room for improvement. So, as I strive to live life in a way that will allow me to greet death with grace, <i>Let Me Down Easy</i> has inspired me to be more deliberate about <a href="http://www.nytimes.com/2011/03/02/us/02gomes.html?_r=1" target="_blank">becoming a witness</a> for the experiences of my fellow human beings. How can I listen better today? How can I learn from others with both my head and heart? And how can I let that learning not only inform my outlook, but also shape what I believe merits saying out loud?<br />
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<i>Let Me Down Easy</i> has been recorded and will air on PBS during the 2011-2012 season of <i>Great Performances</i>. I hope it inspires you to take a similar challenge to live with intention.Koritha Mitchellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09883710526813514536noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8663624494741057720.post-14681777374654842882011-02-02T20:35:00.003-05:002012-06-12T20:20:33.656-04:00Blind Spots Created by PrivilegeOver the years, I have been struck by the assumption that those who are not white, male, and heterosexual do not have professional standards. Of course, no one comes out and says this, but the power of this belief is everywhere apparent. The environment I know best is academia—the supposed bastion of intelligence and critical thinking. Yet, it is in this environment that I have heard <i><b>several</b></i> versions of the following:<br />
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A white male who does feminist scholarship explains why he has had problems getting his work published: "Well, women are suspicious of me. It's annoying, but I get it." <br />
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On the surface, this sounds liberal and critically engaged. After all, he seems to be acknowledging what feminist scholarship does not shy away from admitting: that gender matters. However, what really motivates this comment is, in my view, the height of sexism. The speaker assumes that women scholars could not possibly have intellectual reasons for not being impressed with his work. Supposedly, they only respond to gender. What is the basis of this assumption? Why, the fact that they can't see his brilliance, of course! Only anti-male prejudice can explain his not having been catapulted to the top of his field. He cannot even imagine the possibility that his work is simply not that impressive—that when readers encounter his work, it doesn't at all strike them as brilliant.<br />
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What allows such a blind spot, such unjustified arrogance? Partly, it is a refusal to admit that being white and male has helped with every achievement. Whites are constantly assumed to be qualified, so before they even start, much of their job is done for them; people have few problems deferring to them, and it seldom enters anyone's mind to question their qualifications. <br />
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There are very few professions in which those who are white (especially if they are also male) do not seem to be the obvious best choice, so when whites venture into those arenas, they are susceptible to deeming themselves to be especially admirable. An understandable self-image forms: <i>I don't have to care about minority issues and/or women's issues, so the fact that I do means I'm exceptionally enlightened</i>. (Again, that's understandable.) Unfortunately, it is also easy for those in this position to fancy themselves oppressed. When their whiteness does translate into an automatic assumption of competence, they think that they are encountering hostility. They think that the injustices about which women and "minorities" complain are happening to them. But there is an enormous difference between discrimination and not being <i><b>assumed qualified</b></i> because you are white and/or male and/or heterosexual.Koritha Mitchellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09883710526813514536noreply@blogger.com1tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8663624494741057720.post-19966777149504920032010-12-06T11:52:00.003-05:002012-06-12T20:21:20.144-04:00Plays about Lynching in 2010: Recognizing History’s PresenceThis year’s New York International Fringe Festival received applications from 800 theatre groups. Approximately 200 shows were accepted and would be staged in August 2010. Within the wide array of offerings, one presentation proved especially compelling: Kym Gomes’s <i>By Hands Unknown,</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> which</span><i> </i><span style="font-style: normal;">consists of seven one-act plays about lynching, many of which I examine in my forthcoming book. Having studied these plays for many years, I was eager to see them staged for the first time, but I was also nervous. How would these scripts fit together to make a coherent show? They were all written in the 1920s and 1930s, when dramatic conventions were different from today’s. Would they seem melodramatic and unrealistic? Would they even be recognized as “good” plays? As importantly, would the content feel relevant in 2010?</span> <br />
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All of these questions could be answered with a resounding <i>yes</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> because the directors were so creative and resourceful, and the actors executed so well. My more detailed performance review should appear in the May 2011 issue of </span><i>Theatre Journal</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> (Johns Hopkins University Press), but I want to share a few thoughts here. The power of the presentation can be understood with a focus on its opening and closing moments.</span></div>
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The show began with a single light shining on Safiya Fredericks as she recited “Strange Fruit” from memory. Though a musician accompanied her on guitar, she shared it as a poem, not a song. However, most people know the lines because Billie Holiday made them famous with her 1939 recording, so the audience could instantly feel a sense of familiarity. Beginning this way drew audience members in; we were reassured that we knew something about the subject matter. There is always comfort in feeling like one has a way in, like one is not on the outside of an experience. </div>
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This powerfully rendered poem gave way to Georgia Douglass Johnson’s one-act play <i>A Sunday Morning in the South</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, in which a 19-year-old who aspires to be a lawyer is falsely accused of rape. The action begins with Tom’s grandmother and younger brother teasing him about having fallen asleep at 8 o’clock the night before. They laugh, recalling that he was snoring so loudly that they thought he might choke. Soon, officers barge into the house, demanding to know where Tom had been at 10 o’clock the previous night. The play dramatizes the moment when his testimony, and that of his family members, is disregarded. The officers insist that they already have the case “figured out.” </span></div>
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Gomes’s choice to begin with a piece that emphasizes African Americans’ exclusion from basic citizenship rights, such as due process, proved especially poignant as the show approached its end. One by one, the actors emerged from the shadows to recite a portion of Resolution 39, the 2005 measure in which the U.S. Senate apologized for having <u>never</u> passed anti-lynching legislation. By the time that all 18 members of the ensemble cast had stepped forward, the entire resolution had been shared, and they covered the stage from left to right, directly facing the audience. Black and white, different ages and backgrounds, each actor took responsibility for recognizing that this is a history that we all share, encouraging audience members to do the same.</div>
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Knowing that the black rapist myth emerged only after slavery ended and black men had finally won the right to vote, I was especially struck by the challenge issued by the actors’ stance. By labeling black men <span style="font-style: normal;">“</span>rapists,<span style="font-style: normal;">”</span> mobs insisted that they were simply protecting white women. The charge overshadowed the real purpose of mob violence: to ensure that blacks remained terrified—and too preoccupied with basic survival—to claim full citizenship rights. This white supremacist strategy has remained popular and effective. Relentlessly labeling black and brown people “criminals” has always been a way of insisting that they are not entitled to civic inclusion. Given this history, and the many ways that it shapes the present, we must understand that serious political realities are reflected in the way that Americans feel comfortable talking about people. </div>
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It matters that many of us speak with disgust in our voices about “immigrants” who are black and brown—when all Americans are actually immigrants. It also matters that the word “criminal” has a hard time clinging to white offenders, even though crimes against the environment and crimes that have cheated thousands out of their life savings are widely publicized. The nation consistently demonizes black and brown citizens, but the stakes are becoming even higher with the growth of the prison industrial complex. As legal scholar Michelle Alexander has shown in <i><a href="http://newjimcrow.com/" target="_blank">The New Jim Crow</a></i><span style="font-style: normal;">, the privatized prison system offers </span><i>incentives</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> for creating “felons” with laws that essentially target those who are black, brown, and/or poor. However, laws addressing crimes mostly committed by whites, especially moneyed whites, ensure that they receive mild punishment and relatively little stigma. Meanwhile, the “felons” become an underclass that cannot vote and is otherwise ostracized and excluded. </span></div>
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The reactionary, sometimes violent politics that now coalesce around labels like “immigrant,” “criminal,” and “<a href="http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=QZpT2Muxoo0" target="_blank">terrorist</a>” resemble those justified by the earlier “black rapist” myth—especially because, when actual immigrants, criminals, and terrorists are white, they are somehow not known by those labels. Though not equivalent, the situation was similar at the last turn of the century: hysteria regarding the mythic black rapist made the documented rape of black women by white men a non-issue in mainstream discourse and public policy. </div>
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Because <i>By Hands Unknown</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> begins and ends its engagement with lynching by raising questions about basic rights, it urges us to think seriously about who comes to mind when we say “citizen” today. </span></div>
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More about <i>By Hands Unknown:</i></div>
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<b>A Brava Company/<a href="http://www.actingstudio.com/chelsea_rep/chelsea_rep_lab.html" target="_blank">Chelsea Rep LAB</a> Production</b> </div>
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<b><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 12pt;"><i>Conceived</i></span></b><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 12pt;"> by Kym Gomes</span><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br />
</span><b><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 12pt;"><i>Directed</i></span></b><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 12pt;"> by Harvey Huddleston, Kym Gomes</span><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br />
</span><b><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 12pt;"><i>Associate Directors:</i></span></b><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 12pt;"> Carmen Balentine, Ravin Patterson</span><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br />
</span><b><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 12pt;"><i>Music Director:</i></span></b><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 12pt;"> Bruce Baumer</span><span style="font-size: 12pt;"><br />
</span><b><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 12pt;"><i>Costumes</i></span></b><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 12pt;"> by Jennifer Anderson</span></div>
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<b><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 12pt;"><i>Ensemble Cast:</i></span></b><span style="font-family: 'Times New Roman'; font-size: 12pt;"> Carmen Balentine, Michael Bunin, Valerie Elizabeth Donaldson, Safiya Fredericks, Kym Gomes, Matt Hammond, Phil John, Nancy Keegan, Jamil Moore, Brett Pack, Alison Parks, Ravin Patterson, Jihan Ponti, Rick Schneider, Stefania Diana Schramm, Vonetta Steward, Temesgen Tocruray, Nathan Yates</span></div>Koritha Mitchellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09883710526813514536noreply@blogger.com3tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8663624494741057720.post-88639950649961804452010-11-08T11:48:00.006-05:002012-06-12T20:22:09.493-04:00Tyler Perry’s ‘For Colored Girls’: Not the Disaster PredictedLike so many who love Ntozake Shange’s <i>For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/ When the Rainbow is Enuf</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, I was upset when I heard that Tyler Perry would direct an adaptation for the big screen. I was more infuriated to discover that a screenplay by a black woman author had been pushed aside to accommodate his. I went to the movie sure that I would hate it, but left surprised that so much of the original text had been preserved. I was also (dare I say it?) impressed with the methods used for fleshing out the women’s stories in order to make the fairly long monologues of Shange’s choreopoem work well in the film’s scenes. Perry’s </span><i>For Colored Girls</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> is far from perfection, but the criticism that his leadership sparked led him to seek extensive help from collaborators. The result? The film is not the disaster that so many just </span><i>knew</i> it would be. <span style="font-style: normal;"></span> <br />
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Having read Shange’s original and seen it staged, I wondered why it would seem appealing as a potential film. The Broadway revival that fell prey to the most recent economic crisis made sense. A movie? Not so much. In theatrical productions, the text’s focus on the women’s monologues is easily maintained; there is little need for props and changing scenery. In film, the minimalism would have to be replaced, and men would be present in many scenes that would not have required them on stage. Thus, I anticipated unnecessary distractions from the beauty and music of Shange’s poetic language. Yet, the film succeeds by not trying to do the same kind of work achieved by the original text and stage productions of it. </div>
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The movie does not keep intact the women’s individual stories. Shange’s original represents the journeys of <i>The Lady in Brown, The Lady in Yellow, The Lady in Purple, …Red, …Green, …Blue, and …Orange.</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> Though Gilda (Phylicia Rashad) and Alice (Whoopi Goldberg) do not represent women in the play, their words sometimes come directly from it. Yet, Perry prepares viewers for the variation in that Gilda often wears black and Alice is always in white—colors that are not featured in the original. Besides creating characters associated with colors not highlighted in Shange’s text, the film emphasizes color through props more than wardrobe. For instance, Crystal (Kimberly Elise) rarely wears yellow, but she serves beverages in yellow mugs and her children’s stuffed animals are often yellow. </span></div>
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Even those characters associated with Shange’s colors do not match the text. Juanita (Loretta Divine) is always in green in the film, but she delivers a monologue that the play assigns to The Lady in Red. Outside of her unreliable lover’s door, Juanita ends the relationship declaring that it has been an experiment to see “if i waz capable of debasin’ my self for the love of another.” Similarly, Jo (Janet Jackson) is most often associated with red, but she is the one who insists, “one thing i dont need is any more apologies,” which The Lady in Blue says in the play. Jackson’s rendition is extraordinarily constrained. She has a very staid demeanor throughout the film, and this speech makes her emotional fatigue palpable. Jackson’s soft-spoken but unwavering declarations wonderfully contrast the way that “the betrayed black woman” is typically represented in the nation’s popular imagination.</div>
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Interestingly, though film offers the flexibility to place characters is several settings, the scope of Shange’s vision is reigned in, not expanded. The choreopoem begins with each of the women naming their locations: “outside of” Chicago, Detroit, Houston, Baltimore, San Francisco, Manhattan, St. Louis. In the film, they are all in the New York metropolitan area and several live in or visit the same apartment building. More strikingly, Shange’s diasporic vision is largely excised from the film. The play’s incorporation of Latin music, and dance of all kinds, is all but missing from the movie. Also, the film reduces the importance that Shange’s work places on Haiti and Toussaint L'Ouverture to a distraction for frightened children. The story is creatively woven into the movie’s plot, but much detail is sacrificed, as is the dominant role that this story played for the female character in the original.</div>
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Perhaps the most lamentable missing element is one that could have been predicted. Many of us feared that the original work’s black feminist orientation could not survive when placed in Perry’s hands. I would certainly join the chorus of those who would suggest that there is little nuance in his work where black women are concerned. In the play, one of the clearest moments of women supporting women emerges when The Ladies in Blue, Red, and Purple each take a part in pinpointing the assumptions that keep rapists safe and women vulnerable. Together, they reject the myth that rapists are strangers, not friends. Shange uses several women, not a lone voice, to assert that “the nature of rape has changed.” Yet, in the film, it is largely in isolation that Yasmine (Anika Noni Rose) bears witness to rape and struggles to survive its trauma. The movie does not lose sight of the injustice of Yasmine’s experience, but its linear narrative is not conducive to preserving the communion that Shange made possible on stage.</div>
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As someone invested in the insurgent possibilities of black performance, I nevertheless remain convinced that whenever black performance appears in the mainstream, sacrifices are made. The popularity of movies featuring black men in over-the-top drag indicates that Americans do not tire of stereotypes and denigration. (The previews preceding <i>For Colored Girls</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> included another </span><i>Big Momma </i><span style="font-style: normal;">movie from Martin Lawrence.) Big ticket entertainment that tells black people’s stories is far from plentiful, and the movies with the best chances for commercial success come in the “plum foolishness” variety. As the late Marlon Riggs might say, the country’s “<a href="http://newsreel.org/video/ETHNIC-NOTIONS" target="_blank">ethnic notions</a>” continue to guarantee this trend. </span></div>
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<span style="font-style: normal;">For this and so many other reasons, Tyler Perry has secured a position that allows him to be one of the few people who could have made this film the success that it is. (It’s a must-see, even if you go expecting to hate it.) Furthermore, because the nation continues to devalue black actors, especially black women actors, much of the talent that Perry assembles would not otherwise enjoy major roles. A very American state of affairs.</span></div>
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I left the movie in awe—once again—of the actor’s craft. Even though Shange’s original language requires performers to deliver relatively long speeches, her words are often uttered verbatim. As a result, the actors gave me opportunity to re-consider lines that already meant so much. As mentioned, Janet Jackson’s rendition of the “i got sorry greetin me at my front door” speech is refreshingly powerful. Likewise, Loretta Divine’s “somebody almost walked off wid alla my stuff” takes full advantage of the life created for her in the film as a woman’s group instructor in a community center. Her delivery beautifully melds the humor and solemnity of that monologue. </div>
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Similarly, Kimberly Elise’s “I found god in myself & I loved her” maximizes the fact that the film represents more of her journey than we see in the play. Because the audience has witnessed her interactions with her husband as he struggled with mental illness and alcoholism, as well as her painful journey without him and her children, her shrieking delivery of “fiercely” at film’s end works. (I have to add that the back-story that the film creates for Crystal's husband Beau makes untenable assertions that <a href="http://www.theroot.com/views/wheres-colored-girls-men" target="_blank">black men are being bashed</a>. As much as I agree with the concern that the movie may fuel “down-low hysteria,” the claim that it<a href="http://www.washingtonpost.com/wp-dyn/content/article/2010/11/07/AR2010110704428.html" target="_blank"><span style="text-decoration: none;"> </span>denies the existence of good black men</a> demonstrates the lasting relevance of Ann duCille’s warning against “phallocentric” reading practices, which are preoccupied with how black men are figured and show little regard for how accurately black women’s lives are represented.)</div>
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Ultimately, having Perry at the helm did not create the disaster expected because he clearly consulted many people in this process. And the film will surely help create interest in supporting the Broadway revival that so nearly came to fruition before. Even better, it will get more of us to turn back to the original text. If you’re anything like me, you’ll find that you love what Ntozake Shange accomplished in the mid-1970s even more than you remembered. If I have Tyler Perry and the empire that he has built with Madea (a character that I could do without) to thank for that, I’ll have to accept it as yet another American contradiction that makes being black and a woman “a metaphysical dilemma/ i havent conquered yet.”</div>Koritha Mitchellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09883710526813514536noreply@blogger.com0tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-8663624494741057720.post-86797826016925175562010-09-26T13:16:00.006-04:002012-06-12T20:23:46.273-04:00RACE on Broadway: “Black Bitches” and Convenient Amnesia<i> </i><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;">David Mamet’s latest Broadway success,</span> <i>Race</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, has been receiving praise since its star-studded debut in December 2009. David Alan Grier, Kerry Washington, and James Spader helped draw crowds, but reviews remained enthusiastic after they were replaced in mid-June. Even before the show’s Broadway run concluded, the Philadelphia Theatre Company announced that its upcoming season will feature </span><i>Race</i><span style="font-style: normal;">. So, the play’s Broadway success has paved the way for profits on the road. Yet, when I traveled to New York sure that I would encounter intellectually challenging theatre, I was disappointed. Mamet’s work is characterized by a lack of complexity to be expected (perhaps) in college freshmen when they first arrive, not a respected artist. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;"><i></i></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;">The show’s most notable features? Its frequent use of the term “black bitch” and the convenient amnesia that produces its take-away message: whites, especially white men, are forced to tip-toe through life because blacks cry “discrimination” every chance they get. </span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;">In short, the play operates as if blacks wield unlimited social and legal power. According to </span><i>Race</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, African Americans regularly make accusations--even false ones--and they are sure to triumph because whites (including those on juries) are afraid to appear racist. This flies in the face of the reality of U.S. discrimination suits. Further, it ignores the fact that non-whites are slow to label racist behavior because we know that our most painful experiences can be dismissed with “playing the race card, eh?”</span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;"><i></i></span></div>
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;">The play centers on law partners (Jack, white and Henry, black) who debate whether they should defend a rich, white man (Charles Strickland) who has been accused of raping a black woman. The firm recently hired Susan, a young black female attorney whose rooky mistakes force them to take the case. Ultimately, though, she seems to have been a “traitor” all along, and Henry concludes that Jack compromised the firm by giving an “ungrateful” affirmative action baby a chance. In short, black women can only mean trouble. The uneducated ones falsely accuse you of rape, and the educated ones try to destroy your business with claims of discrimination or worse.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;">Naturally, then, “black bitch” is repeated throughout the production, and though the characters are often simply quoting others, this show confirmed that John McWhorter’s plea that we “</span><a href="http://www.theroot.com/views/lets-make-deal-n-word" target="_blank"><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;">make a deal on the N-word</span></a><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;">” underestimates the critical thinking that blacks routinely employ when we encounter racial epithets. (“Black nigger bitch” quotations </span><span style="font-style: normal;">emerge a couple times, too.) The play’s generous use of “black bitch” is tied to its overall logic, which depends on the idea that black women are temptresses that can ensnare men who are basically moral. The woman who has been raped never appears on stage, but she is constantly discussed. She is a prostitute whose rape charge is deemed irrelevant, if not ridiculous. </span><span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;"><i></i></span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;">Mamet is known for crass language, so the epithet is not surprising, but its prominence calls attention to the only force that propels the action: the relentless reversal of historical facts. The notion that it is impossible to rape black women, because they are so naturally promiscuous, helped make slavery profitable. White men impregnated black women but their doing so not only made them rich and left their reputations intact, but it also somehow confirmed negative assumptions about blacks. These assumptions are not relics of the past. Indeed, the play relies on the audience’s awareness of the black whore stereotype but then denies its power. After all, audiences are expected to believe that whenever black women cry foul, white men are vulnerable.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;">Accepting Mamet’s portrait of American society requires ignoring power dynamics and the history that put them so firmly in place. Mamet has Susan reveal that Strickland has been </span><span style="font-style: normal;">flirting with her, and when asked why she thinks he would do that while being investigated for raping a black woman, she answers without hesitation, “He wants punishment.” In order for her to believe that, she must assume that white men accused by black women are sure to be prosecuted. Our nation’s past and present scream that this is not the case. More likely, Strickland is bold because he knows he won’t be punished.</span><br />
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<span class="Apple-style-span" style="font-style: normal;">In Mamet’s world, power dynamics favor blacks. Apparently, the exception makes the rule: Obama’s election means anti-black racism does not exist; there is only anti-white sentiment. Likewise, as suggested by Mamet’s earlier play,</span> <i>Oleanna</i><span style="font-style: normal;">, women who charge sexual harassment are not looking for protection under the law; they just want to manipulate men and the system. </span><i>Oleanna</i><span style="font-style: normal;"> originally appeared in 1992, on the heels of Clarence Thomas’s confirmation hearings. Like Thomas, Mamet conjures up an altered history in which a black woman makes false accusations and the nation launches into action, punishing whomever she names. Must be science fiction; this world has never existed.<o:p></o:p></span></div>
</i>Koritha Mitchellhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/09883710526813514536noreply@blogger.com0