Links worth checking out
CVK
These articles are all worth a read…
Acting Your Race
In These Times
(Thanks to Bryce for this!) Author Kenji Yoshino calls this behavior “covering,” which is also the title of his recent book exposing the shortcomings of civil rights legislation. He defines covering in the context of race as the pressure to “act white” by eliminating or playing down non-white aspects of one’s identity… Yoshino argues that people of color—consciously or otherwise—perform this whiter version of their identity to satisfy an unspoken “social contract, in which racial minorities are told we will be rewarded for assimilating to white norms.”
Book reveals influence of white philanthropy on founding and future of black studies
Princeton Weekly Bulletin
The success of the Ford Foundation’s strategy of funding black studies programs has created a complex situation wherein institutions continue to use the field in order to diversify their institutions, but very often, the preponderance of black people in and around African American studies programs, and their absence in other departments in those institutions, unfairly mark the field as an affirmative action program…
The Browning and Yellowing of Whiteness
WBAI
(Thanks to Tariq for this!) By 2050, according to Yancey, most Latino/as and Asian Americans will be white… European phenotype or ancestry will no longer be prerequisites for becoming white. While the US Census Bureau treats Latino/as as an “ethnic group” of sorts by emphasizing Latin American origin, many are socially read as “brown.” Most Asian Americans are markedly non-European in phenotype and ancestry. Nevertheless, Yancey argues that while they may experience patterns of discrimination and racism from whites, both Latino/as and Asian Americans are following the same pattern of assimilation as Europeans did before them.
Adrianna wrote:
I agree with the acting your race article. When I moved here from the caribbean 4 years ago, I was at lost on why some of my African American peers thought that intellectualism was A ” white thing” I found it to be an insult to all black person on this planet. Are you trying to say that Black = stupid ? was my question. I thought do these kids suffer from some sort of inferiority complex? Do they not know about African history. About the wealth of knowledge that has been handed down by black people all over the world. Worst was the expectation of some of my teachers, One went has far has to tell me this ” you are an intelligent young woman, but there going some people that will have low expectatian for you, because you are black”. I think now i know that 1 there is not a lot expected of African American youths. 2 A lot of people in the black community continue to perpetuate negative sterotypes 3 People in the Black community have forgotten where they came from, the richness of their history. 4 There is not enough positive role models. where I went to school in the carribean, I was expected to grow up and be a doctor, lawyer ect. now when some black people say you don’t talk black or you are an oreo I dimiss them because I am who I am,the color of my skin is not what defines my speech, my intelligence, my personality. It’s my morals and values that do. And that for me is the only way to be Authentic.
Posted 27 Apr 2006 at 1:55 am ¶
Damie_Troy wrote:
In my encounters, I notice most of the anti-intellectual attitudes come from people in the under-class and street culture.
Class and economic culture does play a role in this. Their is a cultural immorality in the under-class involved in street life, so I’m not surprised by their absurd counter-productive views.
Posted 27 Apr 2006 at 5:08 am ¶
mr guy wrote:
“In my encounters, I notice most of the anti-intellectual attitudes come from people in the under-class and street culture.”
Agreed.From my experience, only those into “street culture” would actually pull the trying to be white stuff.Basically, the stupid ones who knew they were not going anywhere in life would try to take down good students.Many if not most lower economic students would praise successful students that were going somewhere with their life.I know they did for me.
Posted 27 Apr 2006 at 10:01 am ¶
Adrianna wrote:
I agree with you it is street culture!!! there lies the problem street culture is the mainsteam. You don’t see alot of show about non stereotypical black people on TV except for ER and Grey’s anatomy. And this street culture has started to sipped itself in African cultures and Caribbean culture. Now in Latin America, the Caribbean, it is popular for girls to shake their Ass and in africa to hear people caliing themselves Ni!#$#r. What have we become? Mediocrity is now the dominant culture !!!
Posted 27 Apr 2006 at 3:22 pm ¶
Daniel wrote:
It can be a pretty scary thing if you start to think about it. Unfortunately, that bad attitude dominates in my neighborhood as well. As always, people need to stand up as individuals and follow their own path. The good news is that there are still a lot of people doing that. Not every American is bamboozled by the media, the designers and the street.
Posted 27 Apr 2006 at 4:48 pm ¶
brad wrote:
Having grown up in teh suburbs with two parents who graduated from college, there was never any question that good graddes were essential and expected by my parents. When people talk of the “Street.” I’m always puzzled about what that really means, especially when you consider that life in NYC is different from life in LA or Atlanta or Miami.
On the other hand, I had a collegue at work who is around 25, Italian-American woman, who is the first person who went to college in her family. When she told her parents that she wanted to go to college, her parents tried to discourage her from going. From what my colleague said, it sounded like a class issue combined with fear.
Have any of you encountered similar attitudes from any of your “white” acquaintances?
Posted 28 Apr 2006 at 10:51 pm ¶
Damie_Troy wrote:
It’s true that different regions have differing traits in their underclass neighborhood behavior, which is nicknamed ’street life’ or the ‘ghetto’.
There always seems to be a common and fundamental series of behavior that exist in most of these neighborhoods, which is commonly celebrated in rap music.
1. A abnormally large rate of children born out of wedlock with unwed parents.
2. A desire to make illegal and quick money, with out concern of the consequences.
3. Partying and becoming inebriated under the influence with legal or illegal substances which naturally leads to recklessness.
4. Violent might makes right, in dealing with any problem or disagreement, major or minor.
5. Distrusting the police, but having more tolerance, fear, sympathy and respect for criminals.
6. Scapegoat the rest of society for their reckless and unwise immorality without taking personal responsibility, and feeling this justifies not giving a damn about obeying laws.
7. And finally, anti-intellectualism. With the attitude that education is nerdy or not hip, especially when you can make money quicker in illegal fashion.
I’m sure there are more dysfunctional social traits common everywhere in underclass American neighborhoods, but these are the ones that come to mind.
Posted 06 May 2006 at 5:22 pm ¶