I am a huge fan of Toni Morrison. Morrison is the last American to have won the Nobel Prize in Literature, which she was awarded in 1993. The Swedish committee that gave her the prize cited her many works of fiction, especially "The Bluest Eye," her first novel. (If you get a chance and you like ~~magical realism, please read it. "The Bluest Eye" is really life changing-- without exaggeration.) (**WARNING: in order to understand how her literature connects to the Civil Rights Movement, I have to spoil some of the books, so if you plan on reading them and would like to be surprised, stop reading here.)
"The Bluest Eye" is set in Lorain, Ohio in the years following the Great Depression and before World War II. Pecola Breedlove, a little black girl who is considered by many to be monstrously ugly, wishes beyond anything that she could have blue eyes so that she can be considered pretty like all the white girls. She wishes and prays, and she even goes to her local priest to make a bargain with God. In the end, though, a gut-wrenching twist of fate flips her life on its head, and she's raped by her father. When he splits, she has the child and goes mad.
How does any of this, you may wonder, connect to civil rights?
One of the aspects of "The Bluest Eye" that makes it absolutely brilliant is the way the Morrison analyzes and shows why Pecola is raped by her father. She delves deep into the history of slavery and the segregated South and crafts a story-line for Pecola's father in which he is born to a single mother and goes on a search for his estranged father in Ohio. When his father rejects him (a practice common in the African American community at the time), Pecola's father turns to alcohol. The night he stumbles home drunk, some 20 years later, and finds Pecola cleaning the dishes is when everything spirals out of control.
Morrison is bold in her analysis of Pecola's father's character. She links his abandonment to the dynamics of slave culture that were popular in the South. One of Morrison's conclusions is that because of the way that fathers were separated from their children when slave-owners traded slaves (but mothers were more often allowed to keep their children), a dynamic of paternal abandonment took hold in the African American community.
She then goes on to say that the way he abused her is a result of a psycho-sexual desire that is, in itself, a result of confusion. Black men were taught by white men to hate sex for fear that black men would impregnate white women. On the other hand, black men are humans, and, as humans, desire sex to the same degree as anyone else.
What sets Morrison apart from her contemporaries is her brash and often non-linear command of time in her novels. "The Bluest Eye" opens at the end of the crisis with Pecola, and then goes back in time, goes forward in time, and then back again. The furthest back the novel goes is into 1901, when Pecola's father runs away from a sharecropping collective to try and find his father. What this allows her to do is the assign each horrible thing that happens to Pecola some sort of historical origin.
Morrison does not just say that these things happen. She brings every negative part of segregation and racism to an extreme and shows how these extremes are a result of behavior and social dynamics popular during the times of slavery and Jim Crow.
If you're interested in how the Civil Rights Movement has influenced and is conveyed in popular culture, you should definitely check out Morrison's books. Most, if not all, of her stories explore the roots of racism in America and how that racism drives social dynamics.
Friday, February 28, 2014
Friday, February 28th Podcast
If anyone wasn't here during 1st period or 5th period, I was able to record the audio of the movie and Mr. Stewart's lecture. The whole thing should take around 48 minutes. Let me know if it's unable to play because I marked them as unlisted.
Here are the youtube links (btw they overlap a bit):
Part 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lm6j0wxB94&feature=youtu.be (19:52 minutes)
Part 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c383prv6T4s&feature=youtu.be (13:55 minutes)
Part 3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWj3K1yfmEU&feature=youtu.be (14:43 minutes)
Here are the youtube links (btw they overlap a bit):
Part 1: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_lm6j0wxB94&feature=youtu.be (19:52 minutes)
Part 2: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=c383prv6T4s&feature=youtu.be (13:55 minutes)
Part 3: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=TWj3K1yfmEU&feature=youtu.be (14:43 minutes)
Thursday, February 27, 2014
Is Everything Black and White (in the Civil Rights Movement)?
Whenever I see or read anything about the civil rights movement of the sixties, there seems to be only black and white people involved. For instance, the documentary we watched in class today did not mention Latinos, Asians, or people of other biological origins fighting for civil rights in America. Or take a look at how we have discussed the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People (NAACP). We have never studied in detail a similar organization for any other minority race. Other minority races mysteriously disappear from context, and I wonder if they were relevant at all to the civil rights movement. After some research, I've identified what was perhaps the second largest civil rights movement in the twentieth century.
Mexican American Civil Rights Movement - This movement began in the 1940s. Like African Americans, Latin Americans were discriminated against. An example of this discrimination was segregation in schools. In 1945, the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) won against the Orange County School System in court, resulting in a ruling to integrate schools. Also like African Americans, Latin Americans were charged poll taxes that prevented them from gaining political power.
They fought against this by raising money in poll tax drives, gaining enough votes to elect some Latino representatives in the late fifties and early sixties. The movement was also largely supported by young people. They participated through student walkouts and youth organizations. (Sources: http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/6582/, http://lulac.org/about/history/)
After placing this in context, I have drawn a conclusion as to why the African American Civil Rights movement is the most celebrated and remembered one in American history. My conclusion consists of two main reasons:
1) History - Unlike other minorities, African Americans have the longer and more bitter history of slavery and discrimination. Even after they were emancipated, black Americans were always at the bottom of the social order. Their more tragic history makes their climb to equality all the more epic.
2) Population - African Americans were the largest minority. In the 1940 there were 12,865,518 blacks living in the United States. Hispanics, the second largest minority, had only 1,858, 024 living in the United States. By having a larger population, blacks could have a larger impact. For example, one of their protest strategies was to destroy city infrastructure by being arrested. Overwhelming quantities of protestors willing to be arrested was essential to this strategy. (Source: http://www.census.gov/population/www/documentation/twps0056/tab01.pdf )
There are many similarities between the Mexican American and African American Civil Rights Movements. However, the history and large population of black Americans make their movement better remembered today.
Have you ever thought about other minority civil rights movements? What are your thoughts about my conclusion?
Mexican American Civil Rights Movement - This movement began in the 1940s. Like African Americans, Latin Americans were discriminated against. An example of this discrimination was segregation in schools. In 1945, the League of United Latin American Citizens (LULAC) won against the Orange County School System in court, resulting in a ruling to integrate schools. Also like African Americans, Latin Americans were charged poll taxes that prevented them from gaining political power.
They fought against this by raising money in poll tax drives, gaining enough votes to elect some Latino representatives in the late fifties and early sixties. The movement was also largely supported by young people. They participated through student walkouts and youth organizations. (Sources: http://historymatters.gmu.edu/d/6582/, http://lulac.org/about/history/)
After placing this in context, I have drawn a conclusion as to why the African American Civil Rights movement is the most celebrated and remembered one in American history. My conclusion consists of two main reasons:
1) History - Unlike other minorities, African Americans have the longer and more bitter history of slavery and discrimination. Even after they were emancipated, black Americans were always at the bottom of the social order. Their more tragic history makes their climb to equality all the more epic.
2) Population - African Americans were the largest minority. In the 1940 there were 12,865,518 blacks living in the United States. Hispanics, the second largest minority, had only 1,858, 024 living in the United States. By having a larger population, blacks could have a larger impact. For example, one of their protest strategies was to destroy city infrastructure by being arrested. Overwhelming quantities of protestors willing to be arrested was essential to this strategy. (Source: http://www.census.gov/population/www/documentation/twps0056/tab01.pdf )
There are many similarities between the Mexican American and African American Civil Rights Movements. However, the history and large population of black Americans make their movement better remembered today.
Have you ever thought about other minority civil rights movements? What are your thoughts about my conclusion?
The Ballot Or the Bullet Speech
If you click here, you can see "The Ballot or the Bullet" speech I talked about in my last blog post.
This speech is really long. Tl;dr: the main point Malcolm X is trying to make is that the black man needs to rise up and fight for suffrage. If the African American community doesn't fight for civil liberty, then their struggle for equality will quickly turn into a violent affair.
X is a lot different from King, both in his writing and in his message. King has more of a peaceful-protest approach (which white people responded okay to), while X was sort of a bit more direct with his words (which scared white people and elicited much more negative reactions than King received). X was assassinated in 1965.
This speech is really long. Tl;dr: the main point Malcolm X is trying to make is that the black man needs to rise up and fight for suffrage. If the African American community doesn't fight for civil liberty, then their struggle for equality will quickly turn into a violent affair.
X is a lot different from King, both in his writing and in his message. King has more of a peaceful-protest approach (which white people responded okay to), while X was sort of a bit more direct with his words (which scared white people and elicited much more negative reactions than King received). X was assassinated in 1965.
The 1950s Outside of America
Even though today we spent the period talking about the Civil Rights Movement and all the hardships that African American's faced I feel like it is also important to look at what was happening in other areas of the world. I know we are in an American history class but I feel that all nations have interesting history that sometimes is left out because of the lack of media coverage and lack of information in texts books. Also America and other European powers usually have something to do with it.
First off after the War although America had escaped the grasp of the Great Depression the rest of the world was not having too much fun. Most of Europe was forced into the conditions that mirror medieval times, Russia had lost 13 million people, and Germany and Japan were no longer self governing nations. This just shows the awful conditions that proceeded a war.
At the end of the War Japan had fallen and with it all of its territories had fallen as well. This was a green light for many allies as the French returned back to Indochina and tried to recolonize the territory they had lost. We all know what happened to Korea but what happened to Indochina or Veitnam was just as significant. From the Wars end to 1954 France was fighting Vietnamese soldiers known as the Viet Minh led by Ho Chi Minh. These soldiers had tried to fight off Japanese occupation and continued fighting when it came to occupation by the French. The war lasted for seven years until France recognized that they had lost. However after this America got involved which started the know very well known Vietnam war which lasted for 20 years (from 1955-1975). This was one of the worst wars that America was involved with mostly because many people didn't even know what we were fighting for. Truman's doctrine was not as powerful as the idea of a safer world for democracy which we fought for during the first war. Anyway the wars in Indochina completely devastated the region and killed millions of people. Most Veterans alive today come from this war and have been greatly effected by it.
Another even that in my opinion shattered the 50's was the Coup D'etat in Iran in the year 1953. The story here dates from the early days of the 20th century where Iran a monarchial nation created a constitutional revolution establishing great power in the branches of government as well as the king. However, In 1953 the prime minister Mohammad Mossadegh was overthrown and the current king Mohammad Reza Shah presumed absolute power. Now during this time period Putsches happened in many countries including Syria and Guatemala but what make this significant is what happened behind the scenes. It is evident that the CIA and America supported this Coup and actually help make sure it occurred. Why you ask would the CIA be interested in America. The answer is very simple oil, and in a time in which the soviets were no longer our ally oil was an important commodity.
I hope this gives you a pretty nice description of Americas foreign affairs during this time period and somethings happening outside our continent. I believe it is important to understand all history to better understand why things happen.
(Side note* My Grandmother met Eisenhower when he came to Iran in 1956 on a visit my family and I speculate it had something to do with the Coup but we are not completely sure)
First off after the War although America had escaped the grasp of the Great Depression the rest of the world was not having too much fun. Most of Europe was forced into the conditions that mirror medieval times, Russia had lost 13 million people, and Germany and Japan were no longer self governing nations. This just shows the awful conditions that proceeded a war.
At the end of the War Japan had fallen and with it all of its territories had fallen as well. This was a green light for many allies as the French returned back to Indochina and tried to recolonize the territory they had lost. We all know what happened to Korea but what happened to Indochina or Veitnam was just as significant. From the Wars end to 1954 France was fighting Vietnamese soldiers known as the Viet Minh led by Ho Chi Minh. These soldiers had tried to fight off Japanese occupation and continued fighting when it came to occupation by the French. The war lasted for seven years until France recognized that they had lost. However after this America got involved which started the know very well known Vietnam war which lasted for 20 years (from 1955-1975). This was one of the worst wars that America was involved with mostly because many people didn't even know what we were fighting for. Truman's doctrine was not as powerful as the idea of a safer world for democracy which we fought for during the first war. Anyway the wars in Indochina completely devastated the region and killed millions of people. Most Veterans alive today come from this war and have been greatly effected by it.
Another even that in my opinion shattered the 50's was the Coup D'etat in Iran in the year 1953. The story here dates from the early days of the 20th century where Iran a monarchial nation created a constitutional revolution establishing great power in the branches of government as well as the king. However, In 1953 the prime minister Mohammad Mossadegh was overthrown and the current king Mohammad Reza Shah presumed absolute power. Now during this time period Putsches happened in many countries including Syria and Guatemala but what make this significant is what happened behind the scenes. It is evident that the CIA and America supported this Coup and actually help make sure it occurred. Why you ask would the CIA be interested in America. The answer is very simple oil, and in a time in which the soviets were no longer our ally oil was an important commodity.
I hope this gives you a pretty nice description of Americas foreign affairs during this time period and somethings happening outside our continent. I believe it is important to understand all history to better understand why things happen.
(Side note* My Grandmother met Eisenhower when he came to Iran in 1956 on a visit my family and I speculate it had something to do with the Coup but we are not completely sure)
The Civil Rights Movement Today in Rap Culture
In another episode of a white boy trying desperately to understand the nuances and complexities of the Civil Rights Movement (CRM), I will try to connect the CRM to modern rap culture. Bear with me. (*Disclaimer: some of the content I go over is explicit, so just be warned).
Last year, Lil Wayne apologized to the family of Emmett Till, the 14-year-old, African American Chicago native who was brutally murdered by white aggressors in the South. Till's death helped to spark the CRM sixty years ago, and, when Lil Wayne compared his sex skills in the "Karate Chop" remix to Till's horrific death, an understandable uproar ensued.
Wayne, considered by many to be a paragon of the modern rap movement, was harshly criticized by political and social figures for appropriating Till's death into an accessory, a rap lyric that was as tawdry as it was unnecessary. You can be the judge: "Pop a lot of pain pills/Bout to rims on my skateboard/Beat that p**** up like Emmett Till/Yeah..."
Wayne is not the only famous rapper guilty of marginalizing the CRM. Kanye West, well known for his eccentric and narcissistic idiosyncrasies and lyrics also likened an integral part of the CRM to sex. In the song, "I'm in It," West croons, "Uh, black girl sippin' white wine/Put my fist in her like a civil rights sign..."
Unlike Wayne, though, West also boasts his pride in his African American lineage and in the (arguable) success of the CRM of the 60's. In the song, "New Slaves," West opens with the painfully accurate, "My momma was raised in the era when/Clean water was only served to the fairer skinned," and he goes on to say, "They'll [likely white people] confuse us with some b*******/Like the New World Order/Meanwhile the DEA/Teamed up with the CCA/They tryna lock n***** up/They tryna make new slaves."
These lyrics harken back to the often defamed and forgotten Civil Rights activist Malcolm X in his speech "The Ballot or the Bullet" (which everyone should definitely read). In it, Malcolm X warns his brethren about the white man bringing drugs to the black community, making blacks drug addicts, and then convicting the black man. (The DEA is the substance control agency.) The "New World Order" lyric is likely a reference to X's critique of the Double Victory that was fought for by black and white soldiers in the hopes of bringing in a new world of freedom and equality that was quickly abandoned after WWII was won.
Additionally, in "Blood on the Leaves," West laces in clips of a hymn, "Strange Fruit," (sung by Nina Simone) from the times of Jim Crow era that beckons, "Strange fruit hangin' from the poplar trees/... /black bodies swayin' in the summer breeze/blood on the leaves." These lyrics evoke the imagery of recurrent lynchings that were commonplace in the Jim Crow south.
So, in a way, we analyze ourselves to a contradiction. On one hand, we have rap artists boasting about their seemingly rambunctious and promiscuous lifestyles and comparing these lifestyles to the CRM. On the other hand, we have self-conscious rappers, using rap as a medium for expressing a thorough and deep understanding of black history and the CRM.
This may stem from the confusing nature of humanity in the face of brutality and subjugation. When a race or a people is taught to hate itself by everyone, they themselves begin to hate themselves and their history. Imagine being told in the home that you should be proud of who you are and then going to school and listening to white kids talk about how the shouldn't let "illegal immigrants" into the country and that anyone who isn't white is just automatically inferior. It's hard to be exposed to history and not feel a bit shameful for your people when you learn the worst about what has happened to them.
Perhaps this mixture of racial pride and degradation stems from an uncertainty of how these rappers feel about their histories. On one hand, they have been programed to hate themselves, and so they liken the martyrs of their people to sexual acts that are deemed disgusting by the modern media. On the other hand, they have been taught that they should be proud, and so they run circles around the white man in their rebellious prose and complex lyrics.
I will say that I don't fully understand the CRM, and this is just a theory. I will also apologize, because this is a really long blog post. I don't think I'll ever truly understand the manifestation of the CRM in modern culture in the same way I wouldn't expect someone to understand how the Holocaust has indirectly driven the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The nuances of an entire culture are too hard to capture in less than a novel or a lifetime.
BUT! That doesn't mean we shouldn't learn about them. We should learn about history because it opens the opportunity for discussion and maybe just a bit of understanding. There is always value in the prospect of understanding something, even if it's just a pixel of the entire picture.
Last year, Lil Wayne apologized to the family of Emmett Till, the 14-year-old, African American Chicago native who was brutally murdered by white aggressors in the South. Till's death helped to spark the CRM sixty years ago, and, when Lil Wayne compared his sex skills in the "Karate Chop" remix to Till's horrific death, an understandable uproar ensued.
Wayne, considered by many to be a paragon of the modern rap movement, was harshly criticized by political and social figures for appropriating Till's death into an accessory, a rap lyric that was as tawdry as it was unnecessary. You can be the judge: "Pop a lot of pain pills/Bout to rims on my skateboard/Beat that p**** up like Emmett Till/Yeah..."
Wayne is not the only famous rapper guilty of marginalizing the CRM. Kanye West, well known for his eccentric and narcissistic idiosyncrasies and lyrics also likened an integral part of the CRM to sex. In the song, "I'm in It," West croons, "Uh, black girl sippin' white wine/Put my fist in her like a civil rights sign..."
Unlike Wayne, though, West also boasts his pride in his African American lineage and in the (arguable) success of the CRM of the 60's. In the song, "New Slaves," West opens with the painfully accurate, "My momma was raised in the era when/Clean water was only served to the fairer skinned," and he goes on to say, "They'll [likely white people] confuse us with some b*******/Like the New World Order/Meanwhile the DEA/Teamed up with the CCA/They tryna lock n***** up/They tryna make new slaves."
These lyrics harken back to the often defamed and forgotten Civil Rights activist Malcolm X in his speech "The Ballot or the Bullet" (which everyone should definitely read). In it, Malcolm X warns his brethren about the white man bringing drugs to the black community, making blacks drug addicts, and then convicting the black man. (The DEA is the substance control agency.) The "New World Order" lyric is likely a reference to X's critique of the Double Victory that was fought for by black and white soldiers in the hopes of bringing in a new world of freedom and equality that was quickly abandoned after WWII was won.
Additionally, in "Blood on the Leaves," West laces in clips of a hymn, "Strange Fruit," (sung by Nina Simone) from the times of Jim Crow era that beckons, "Strange fruit hangin' from the poplar trees/... /black bodies swayin' in the summer breeze/blood on the leaves." These lyrics evoke the imagery of recurrent lynchings that were commonplace in the Jim Crow south.
So, in a way, we analyze ourselves to a contradiction. On one hand, we have rap artists boasting about their seemingly rambunctious and promiscuous lifestyles and comparing these lifestyles to the CRM. On the other hand, we have self-conscious rappers, using rap as a medium for expressing a thorough and deep understanding of black history and the CRM.
This may stem from the confusing nature of humanity in the face of brutality and subjugation. When a race or a people is taught to hate itself by everyone, they themselves begin to hate themselves and their history. Imagine being told in the home that you should be proud of who you are and then going to school and listening to white kids talk about how the shouldn't let "illegal immigrants" into the country and that anyone who isn't white is just automatically inferior. It's hard to be exposed to history and not feel a bit shameful for your people when you learn the worst about what has happened to them.
Perhaps this mixture of racial pride and degradation stems from an uncertainty of how these rappers feel about their histories. On one hand, they have been programed to hate themselves, and so they liken the martyrs of their people to sexual acts that are deemed disgusting by the modern media. On the other hand, they have been taught that they should be proud, and so they run circles around the white man in their rebellious prose and complex lyrics.
I will say that I don't fully understand the CRM, and this is just a theory. I will also apologize, because this is a really long blog post. I don't think I'll ever truly understand the manifestation of the CRM in modern culture in the same way I wouldn't expect someone to understand how the Holocaust has indirectly driven the Israeli-Palestinian conflict. The nuances of an entire culture are too hard to capture in less than a novel or a lifetime.
BUT! That doesn't mean we shouldn't learn about them. We should learn about history because it opens the opportunity for discussion and maybe just a bit of understanding. There is always value in the prospect of understanding something, even if it's just a pixel of the entire picture.
Wednesday, February 26, 2014
The Desire to be Different - Human Nature?
I can't help noticing similarities between the American Beatnik of the fifties to sixties and French flâneur of the nineteenth century. Both types of people reacted against to the type of modernization that resulted in conformity.
Beatniks - They were the beginning of the 1960's counterculture. Beatniks did not see any reason to conform and criticized mainstream values, especially materialism. In context, the fifties was a period of conformity and stability. Socializing, purchasing, and ultimately modernizing, revolved around the family home. This resulted in materialism, such as "Keeping up with the Joneses", as well as extreme conformity (i.e. tract homes). The Beatniks were rebels against such values and promoted rising above those values.
Flâneurs - They were the urban explorers (literal translation is "stroller"). Flâneurs looked for individualism in the crowds that wore mass-produced, factory-made clothing. Before modernization brought conformity, there had been more discerning social identities. A major event that exemplified this loss of difference was the modernization of Paris in the nineteenth century. A new city space, and uniform standard of dress leveled social identities. The flâneur's goal was to recognize details that revealed the individual. In this way, they were rebels against conformity.
Is the desire to be different part of human nature? Or is it more natural to conform?
I used info about the Beatniks from the documentary we watched in class. If you're interested in learning more about the flâneurs (quite irrelevant to U.S. History but a very interesting movement), I recommend reading The Flaneur: A Stroll Through the Paradoxes of Paris by Edmund White.
Beatniks - They were the beginning of the 1960's counterculture. Beatniks did not see any reason to conform and criticized mainstream values, especially materialism. In context, the fifties was a period of conformity and stability. Socializing, purchasing, and ultimately modernizing, revolved around the family home. This resulted in materialism, such as "Keeping up with the Joneses", as well as extreme conformity (i.e. tract homes). The Beatniks were rebels against such values and promoted rising above those values.
Flâneurs - They were the urban explorers (literal translation is "stroller"). Flâneurs looked for individualism in the crowds that wore mass-produced, factory-made clothing. Before modernization brought conformity, there had been more discerning social identities. A major event that exemplified this loss of difference was the modernization of Paris in the nineteenth century. A new city space, and uniform standard of dress leveled social identities. The flâneur's goal was to recognize details that revealed the individual. In this way, they were rebels against conformity.
Is the desire to be different part of human nature? Or is it more natural to conform?
I used info about the Beatniks from the documentary we watched in class. If you're interested in learning more about the flâneurs (quite irrelevant to U.S. History but a very interesting movement), I recommend reading The Flaneur: A Stroll Through the Paradoxes of Paris by Edmund White.
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