So, I just rewatched The Grapes of Wrath this evening, and golly by golly, it has to be one of the saddest stories ever told. We had to stop it twenty minutes short because class was over, and seeing how last twenty minutes are the most tragic part, we didn't even watch the worst of it. But you could feel the spirit of the class puddling around our shoes when the lights came on...a very real way to start "Class, Poverty, and Politics" this semester.
It is always a unique experience re-encountering things you have encountered before - it becomes so much more clear to you what effect time and growth has had on you in the space between. The book made a great impression on me as a teenager, partly because of the horrible fate of the Joads, and partly because of the language. Steinbeck's use of Midwestern dialect was credited as making the book accessible, but I found it be full of words that couldn't be looked up in the dictionary. For example, I have a strong memory of the whole chapter about jalopies, which I thought were some kind of strange fruit until my teacher explained they were lemon cars. I also remember how "Rose of Sharon" was written "Rosasharn" to emulate the dialect, but I really thought the character's name was "Rosasharn," not "Rose of Sharon," largely because I didn't know that rose of sharon is a plant (which my mother told me) and from the bible (which evangelical classmates informed me).
Watching the film again, which I haven't seen in four or five years, brought some of these memories back. It also struck me how superficially I understood the film the first and second, and probably third, time I watched it. As a teenager, I thought it was just a sad story about the Great Depression. Sort of like movies about the Holocaust - you watch them and feel a wrenching sensation in your gut because it's not pleasant to reflect on the horrible things we have done to each other, especially when we are in need. But then you go home and watch Boy Meets World and do your calculus homework, and that's that. To feel badly about or for someone is not the same as being reflexive.
Before we started the film this evening, our professor asked us to think about the relevance of The Grapes of Wrath to today. What if this film just came out? Where do we see the themes of this film played out today? What similarities exist between the Great Depression and our great recession? And so now being reflexive was built into the viewing. It was no longer an old black and white movie with some sad-looking poor people in it. They were more human to me now, more real. And the utter tragedy of their situation was not one that was bandaged by Roosevelt and some rain, but timeless. It persists. It rages on.
At the end of class, the professor pointed out a line where the Joads are refused admittance to a town by a group of torch-bearing men. "We ain't gonna have no goddamn Okies in this town," one says, "You turn right around, and don't come back until the cotton's ready." Versions of this have played out over and over again...although The Grapes of Wrath is about white people, this is said to low-income Central American immigrants today. The professor gestured to the way in which mid-westerners could once be considered migrants in California, and now we think of migrant workers as being from out of the country, especially Mexico. The boundaries of statehood have expanded to nationalism, but the message remains the same: we don't want you, except to do the lowest work for the lowest pay, and you better not plan on doing it where we can see you.
Such forced invisibility and dehumanization of the poor was a prominent theme in the film (and book), and it is not limited to migrant or undocumented laborers in our contemporary society. Two other themes - although I am sure there are others - from The Grapes of Wrath are widely experienced by the poor. The first is the policing of the poor, as the Joads are monitored, refused admittance, inspected, scrutinized, surveyed, and always doubted by authority figures. This remains true, as law enforcement is set up to protect those in power from those without. (I grew up believing the police would protect me...but not all my classmates saw the police that way.) Patrolled borders, limited mobility, containment...all serve to prevent the poor from class-based organizing.
Tied to this is the second theme, that of disunity. The logic of classist structures seeks to disunify the poor. They are pitted against each other to compete for starvation wages, used as strikebreakers, separated to prevent the spread of information, and all "agitators" are removed to ensure groups remain malleable and controllable. Families, as Ma Joad laments, are torn apart as a result of such hardship and depravity. Poverty - structurally-enforced poverty - breaks the spirit of a family. People die. People go mad. People lose children. People do terrible things to each other out of hunger and emptiness. Those who are not shown love are equally denied the ability to love one another. Poverty ensures there can be no "whole" to a family, only fissures and cracks and shards.
On another note, there is an interesting strain running through the film about how Ma Joad is the central figure of the family. She does an awful lot of emotion work, and it seems like a large conclusion of the film is that, despite all the misery and tragedy and all-around crappiness of poverty, women will stick around to heal those fissures and cracks, to pick up those shards. Men might lose their dignity in not being able to secure a job to fulfill the gendered provider role, but, by golly, their women remain steadfast. And in many ways this is true, as a gendered expectation of women is to fulfill family duties. They do not get to go crazy, or beat up the cop, or die...they have to take care of everyone who does.
Also, I wondered what happened to black people during the Great Depression, because there were only white faces in the film - this is something that never occurred to me the first few times I watched it. Surely there were black people in Kansas and Arkansas and Oklahoma who migrated when the dust storms came and richer white people came to swallow up the land...but their story is likely even more tragic. It is also not the film that was made. It may also have to do with why we'd like to think of the Dust Bowl Migration, with Henry Fonda's salt-of-the-earth white tough guy who got a raw deal, as entirely different than our current dependence on invisible and dehumanized undocumented labor force. Or the aftermath of Hurricane Katrina, which displaced over one million people, most of them poor and black. It's always much easier to think of ourselves as roses, and as not having any thorns.
Monday, January 24, 2011
Thursday, January 13, 2011
Just as we suspected
You may have heard of a recent Wall Street Journal article by Amy Chua that is garnering considerable attention. It's called "Why Chinese Mothers are Superior" and is an excerpt from Chua's just-released book, Battle Hymn of the Tiger Mother. The article explains why the "Chinese" parenting style produces more successful children than the "Western" parenting style, it reads as much like an Onion article as the idea of an Obama Chia pet. But no, dear readers. Once again the people who come up with this stuff are totally, absolutely, sincerely serious.
Chua, a Yale Law School professor, uses her own experiences as a case study to make sweeping generalizations about a groups she terms "Chinese" parents, which can include immigrants of many races and ethnic backgrounds, but is predicated on strict, shame-heavy, warden-style child-rearing tactics. She begins with a list of things "Chinese" parents never permit their children, including "attending a sleepover," "watch TV or play computer games," "choose their own extracurricular activities," and "get any grade less than an A." Based on her eyewitness accounts, she determines that there are three main differences between the parenting styles - 1) Western parents care too much about their children's psyches, while "Chinese parents assume strength, not fragility," and can therefore shame their children because they know them to be strong enough to take it; 2) Western parents see themselves as indebted to their children, while Chinese parents see their children as indebted to them; 3) Western parents believe their children can determine what is best for themselves, while "Chinese parents believe they know what is best for their children and can therefore override all of their children's own desires and preferences."
And then she tells a story about how she bullied (not "insulted," she says, but "motivated") her seven year old to master a very difficult piano song overnight, not even letting her get up to pee. (But it's okay because they had a nice cuddlefest afterwards, plus the kid totally rocked out at the recital!)
Let me begin by saying that I think there are a few other details left out of the article that would have likely made better sense of the success of the "Chinese" mothering model. For one, Chinese immigrants in the mid to late 20th century (Chua's parents are of Filipino descent, but migrated from China the year before Chua's birth), are one of the highest socio-economic status immigrant groups; not surprisingly, one of the highest correlations with academic success is the class status of one's parents. And, while we're at it, let's just make this clear - the only kinds of parents Chau is talking about, "Chinese" or "Western," are middle and upper-class. (I doubt low-income mothering rests within the purvue of any news source whose name begins with the words "Wall Street.") And where the heck are fathers in this article? Although Chua's Jewish husband, Jed, makes some "Western" parenting appearances, it seems that "parenting" really means "mothering," as child-rearing is, as we all know, a mother's responsibility. Women, who are often treated as if their primary purpose is to make and rear children, are judged severely for the outcomes of their children - it seems that this burden rests just as heavily on Chua's shoulders.
Chua's critique of Western parenting does highlight some harmful flaws. In a side-ways manner, she gestures to the way passive aggressive parenting tactics coupled with an overindulgence of children's desires breeds entitlement and laziness. And while the focus of the controversy has been on the stuff she put her kids through - is it even legal? - I want to address something equally as complex: the racialization of mothering. Because although Chua nods her head to "squeamishness about cultural stereotypes," it doesn't seem to stop her from painting herself as one. She terms herself a "Tiger mother," for Pete's sake! The line between a celebration of cultural identity and capitalizing on orientalism to sell books is especially blurred as Chua sets herself up to be called the "tiger mom" by the press.
In the Wall Street Journal excerpt from her book, Chua's initial assurance that she is using "Chinese" and "Western" to represent broad categories quickly erodes as "Chinese" becomes Chua herself (and all other Chinese and Chinese-American mothers, or, for most Americans, any middle-aged woman who looks Asian) and "Western" becomes all the other white moms on the block. This polarizing dichotomy only furthers the 'us versus them' divide, as if there is no grey area. And there IS no grey area for Chua, as all Chinese-ethnic moms who employ Western parenting methods are deemed not 'really' Chinese mothers. (Check out an awesome post on Slate.com where Nina Shen Rastogi makes this critique, and also notes the complexity of identifying with Chua's writing.) Regardless of Chua's intentions, for Western readers, Chua is ultimately always reduceable to her ethnicity.
Interestingly, Chua has responded to the controversy over her Wall Street Journal article, as it seems she wasn't the one to title it, or approve of the final editing. She emphasized in a CNN interview (as well as elsewhere) that her book is not meant to be a parenting guide, and in fact it is a memoir about how she changed her ways over the course of her daughters' upbringing when her youngest daughter fiercely rebelled against her tactics. So it turns out most of the article is meant to be self-deprecating, a joke on herself for going to such extreme measures. It is an Onion article after all.
But that's not how the Wall Street Journal article sounds, or how its readers are taking it. And there is the rub, dear readers! A public who already believes that "Chinese" mothers are everything Chua paints herself out to be are not able to pick up on sardonic nuance. We don't just think that Chua fits a stereotype, we think that the stereotype is truth, and Chua is merely presenting additional evidence of what we've already condemned her to.
This article reads more to me like a tragedy of intersectional proportions, where race and gender stereotypes feed the preconceived notions of Wall Street Journal readers. It flames the 'yellow peril' of China's imminent dethroning of our red, white, and blue awesomeness, when they will presumably spend their time laughing in our faces and relishing their children's comparatively higher SAT scores. It reinforces the xenophobia that lead us to see Chinese as representative of all Asians, and all Asians as not-Americans, and to treat "tiger mom" as a euphemism for "dragon lady." Chua is not seen as a conflicted mother striving to raise her children in a nativist nation that will never fully claim them as its own. She is not seen as attempting to bridge a multiplicity of cultures amid a prevailing culture that demands she walk that bridge. She is not seen, like all of us, as learning and growing and changing and making mistakes. She is just that mean Chinese lady who terrorized her Carnegie Hall-performing children. And she's selling a lot of books off of it, too.
Chua's role is dubious one, as Chua apparently had no say in what was eventually published in the article. But as Angry Asian Man eloquently notes, "the Wall Street Journal excerpt is still a piece of shit, and the damage has been done."
And in the end, we are the tiger that cannot change its stripes.
Chua, a Yale Law School professor, uses her own experiences as a case study to make sweeping generalizations about a groups she terms "Chinese" parents, which can include immigrants of many races and ethnic backgrounds, but is predicated on strict, shame-heavy, warden-style child-rearing tactics. She begins with a list of things "Chinese" parents never permit their children, including "attending a sleepover," "watch TV or play computer games," "choose their own extracurricular activities," and "get any grade less than an A." Based on her eyewitness accounts, she determines that there are three main differences between the parenting styles - 1) Western parents care too much about their children's psyches, while "Chinese parents assume strength, not fragility," and can therefore shame their children because they know them to be strong enough to take it; 2) Western parents see themselves as indebted to their children, while Chinese parents see their children as indebted to them; 3) Western parents believe their children can determine what is best for themselves, while "Chinese parents believe they know what is best for their children and can therefore override all of their children's own desires and preferences."
And then she tells a story about how she bullied (not "insulted," she says, but "motivated") her seven year old to master a very difficult piano song overnight, not even letting her get up to pee. (But it's okay because they had a nice cuddlefest afterwards, plus the kid totally rocked out at the recital!)
Let me begin by saying that I think there are a few other details left out of the article that would have likely made better sense of the success of the "Chinese" mothering model. For one, Chinese immigrants in the mid to late 20th century (Chua's parents are of Filipino descent, but migrated from China the year before Chua's birth), are one of the highest socio-economic status immigrant groups; not surprisingly, one of the highest correlations with academic success is the class status of one's parents. And, while we're at it, let's just make this clear - the only kinds of parents Chau is talking about, "Chinese" or "Western," are middle and upper-class. (I doubt low-income mothering rests within the purvue of any news source whose name begins with the words "Wall Street.") And where the heck are fathers in this article? Although Chua's Jewish husband, Jed, makes some "Western" parenting appearances, it seems that "parenting" really means "mothering," as child-rearing is, as we all know, a mother's responsibility. Women, who are often treated as if their primary purpose is to make and rear children, are judged severely for the outcomes of their children - it seems that this burden rests just as heavily on Chua's shoulders.
Chua's critique of Western parenting does highlight some harmful flaws. In a side-ways manner, she gestures to the way passive aggressive parenting tactics coupled with an overindulgence of children's desires breeds entitlement and laziness. And while the focus of the controversy has been on the stuff she put her kids through - is it even legal? - I want to address something equally as complex: the racialization of mothering. Because although Chua nods her head to "squeamishness about cultural stereotypes," it doesn't seem to stop her from painting herself as one. She terms herself a "Tiger mother," for Pete's sake! The line between a celebration of cultural identity and capitalizing on orientalism to sell books is especially blurred as Chua sets herself up to be called the "tiger mom" by the press.
In the Wall Street Journal excerpt from her book, Chua's initial assurance that she is using "Chinese" and "Western" to represent broad categories quickly erodes as "Chinese" becomes Chua herself (and all other Chinese and Chinese-American mothers, or, for most Americans, any middle-aged woman who looks Asian) and "Western" becomes all the other white moms on the block. This polarizing dichotomy only furthers the 'us versus them' divide, as if there is no grey area. And there IS no grey area for Chua, as all Chinese-ethnic moms who employ Western parenting methods are deemed not 'really' Chinese mothers. (Check out an awesome post on Slate.com where Nina Shen Rastogi makes this critique, and also notes the complexity of identifying with Chua's writing.) Regardless of Chua's intentions, for Western readers, Chua is ultimately always reduceable to her ethnicity.
Interestingly, Chua has responded to the controversy over her Wall Street Journal article, as it seems she wasn't the one to title it, or approve of the final editing. She emphasized in a CNN interview (as well as elsewhere) that her book is not meant to be a parenting guide, and in fact it is a memoir about how she changed her ways over the course of her daughters' upbringing when her youngest daughter fiercely rebelled against her tactics. So it turns out most of the article is meant to be self-deprecating, a joke on herself for going to such extreme measures. It is an Onion article after all.
But that's not how the Wall Street Journal article sounds, or how its readers are taking it. And there is the rub, dear readers! A public who already believes that "Chinese" mothers are everything Chua paints herself out to be are not able to pick up on sardonic nuance. We don't just think that Chua fits a stereotype, we think that the stereotype is truth, and Chua is merely presenting additional evidence of what we've already condemned her to.
This article reads more to me like a tragedy of intersectional proportions, where race and gender stereotypes feed the preconceived notions of Wall Street Journal readers. It flames the 'yellow peril' of China's imminent dethroning of our red, white, and blue awesomeness, when they will presumably spend their time laughing in our faces and relishing their children's comparatively higher SAT scores. It reinforces the xenophobia that lead us to see Chinese as representative of all Asians, and all Asians as not-Americans, and to treat "tiger mom" as a euphemism for "dragon lady." Chua is not seen as a conflicted mother striving to raise her children in a nativist nation that will never fully claim them as its own. She is not seen as attempting to bridge a multiplicity of cultures amid a prevailing culture that demands she walk that bridge. She is not seen, like all of us, as learning and growing and changing and making mistakes. She is just that mean Chinese lady who terrorized her Carnegie Hall-performing children. And she's selling a lot of books off of it, too.
Chua's role is dubious one, as Chua apparently had no say in what was eventually published in the article. But as Angry Asian Man eloquently notes, "the Wall Street Journal excerpt is still a piece of shit, and the damage has been done."
And in the end, we are the tiger that cannot change its stripes.
Sunday, January 2, 2011
Only the 'good' stuff
With the recent snowfall in eastern North Carolina, the local American Red Cross blood bank is running on a shortage. (The Red Cross is really always running on a shortage,* so 'a greater shortage than usual' is more apt.) My mother is a regular donor, and she brought me - a first time donor - with her when she went in last week.
Alas, I failed the eligibility requirements, even though I had great vitals and a high iron level. Turns out New York doesn't have state health regulations for their tattoo studios - they have local regulations and have to meet health codes, but no state official goes around and accredits them, which is the criteria for Red Cross donations. So I can't give blood until August.
But the point is not that I may have under-researched state regulations before I got inked again (learn from me, all you kids out there!), but that I had my first personal encounter with the eligibility requirements. And I could not help but set my analysis upon them, as I am inclined to do. Here is how it goes. Before giving, they prick your finger to test your iron, take your blood pressure, your pulse, and temperature. They ask you some general health questions to assure themselves that you are generally healthy. Then they leave you alone with a computer to answer about a dozen questions in private. The presumption is that way you'll be honest and be more likely to admit to any embarrassing likelihood of having 'bad' blood. And what do I mean by 'bad' blood?
These questions can roughly be summarized as the following five themes:
1) "Is your blood messed up because you have some kind of illness or disease?"
This is hepatitis, mostly, or HIV/AIDs, although it also includes things like blood-related cancers and tuberculosis. There is also a year long waiting period after you've completed treatment for certain STDs, like syphilis or gonorrhea.
2) "Might your blood be messed up because you sleep with someone who has some kind of illness, or take money for sleeping with anyone who has God knows what, or because you've been to jail?"
Basically, if you've slept with someone who has hepatitis or has tested positive for HIV/AIDs. You are also considered at risk for HIV/AIDs risk if you've ever taken any form of payment for sex since 1977. If you've been jailed for more than three days, you are ineligible for a year because of the risk of hepatitis exposure.
3) "Might your blood be messed up because you are taking legal or illegal drugs?"
In terms of legal drugs, this could be anything from a recent aspirin or immunization to antibiotics or bovine insulin. As for illegal drugs, if you've ever shot up (heroin, steroids, etc.), you are ineligible to donate, ever. This is because of the risk of hepatitis and HIV transmission through shared needles or anything not doctor-proscribed.
4) "Might your blood be messed up because you are a gay man who practices gayness?"
The ARC considers all those who are deemed at risk for HIV/AIDs ineligible for blood donation. If you are "a male who has had sexual contact with another male, even once, since 1977," you are considered as "having done something that puts you at risk" for HIV/AIDs. The same is true if you are a woman who has had sexual contact with another man who had sexual contact with another man. (Did you follow that? If you're a woman who has had a sexual relationship with a man who sleeps with men, then you are considered to have put yourself at risk for HIV/AIDs, too.)
5) "Might your blood be messed up because you are African, have ever been to Africa, or have ever slept with someone who is in any way connected to Africa?"
I'm being harsh. It's not all of Africa, just 8 western African countries where there is a rare strain of HIV that is not easily detected. In the case of malaria, however, it's pretty much all of Africa. Actually, there is a nice yellow and red band that sweeps across the entire Global South, marking highly infected regions, and if you've lived in any of them, you have to wait three years before being eligible to donate. Now, the United Kingdom isn't completely spared, as the risk of mad cow disease makes anyone who has spent more than three months in any UK nation since 1980 ineligible to donate as well. Iraq also requires a year long waiting period.
I don't want to make light of the importance of regulating blood donations. Believe me when I say I understand why many of these regulations are in place, and I want those who need blood to receive the purest, healthiest blood we can offer. I cannot overemphasize that truth.
It does strike me, however, that donating blood is a reminder of our place on various hierarchies. It reinforces what is 'good' blood and what is 'bad' or 'tainted' blood, where is the right place to be from and where is the wrong place, what is the appropriate sex to have and what is the dangerous, what are the correct ways to live and what are the perverse. If you've done it all correctly, then your blood is welcomed. If you've made some mistakes - or worse, if you are a mistake, or if a legacy of imperial depravity has made it so that you will be forever marked as a mistake - then your blood is not.
More than that, though, is that to be able to give blood suggests something about your structural position and probability of avoiding mistakes (making them, being them, or being in any way connected to people who make mistakes or are deemed mistakes) entirely. As I looked around the room of sweet locals sitting patiently as their packs filled with blood, I thought about how donating blood could be considered a public way of saying "Yep, I'm privileged!" I am heterosexual and I only sleep with heterosexuals. I have never had to prostitute myself to survive. I have great health insurance, so all my drugs are legal. I have easy and affordable access to condoms. I've never spent any considerable duration of time seeing any part of the Global South. I've only ever been to the UK for six weeks one summer to study Shakespeare (come on, I know I'm not the only one!). I've never experienced any life-long, blood-related illness, probably because I am of a class position in which I can avoid the structural circumstances that track me into unprotected sex, intravenous drug use, incarceration, and a higher risk of certain diseases.
I know it's not as simple as that. Nothing is ever as simple as that. But given these questions that deem you "in" or "out," it does say something about us having the ability to give blood. It says we have privilege. We might not be privileged through and through, but we do have some privilege; that much is clear.
And do you know what else it says? It says we are using that privilege for good. Even if we have not made mistakes or are not considered mistakes, we will give our blood to those who have (although I have to add that our blood will probably be differentially distributed to others like us who have the resources for it and access to it). After the standards we've set, it's the least we can do.
*For information about how you can give blood, see the American Red Cross website.
Alas, I failed the eligibility requirements, even though I had great vitals and a high iron level. Turns out New York doesn't have state health regulations for their tattoo studios - they have local regulations and have to meet health codes, but no state official goes around and accredits them, which is the criteria for Red Cross donations. So I can't give blood until August.
But the point is not that I may have under-researched state regulations before I got inked again (learn from me, all you kids out there!), but that I had my first personal encounter with the eligibility requirements. And I could not help but set my analysis upon them, as I am inclined to do. Here is how it goes. Before giving, they prick your finger to test your iron, take your blood pressure, your pulse, and temperature. They ask you some general health questions to assure themselves that you are generally healthy. Then they leave you alone with a computer to answer about a dozen questions in private. The presumption is that way you'll be honest and be more likely to admit to any embarrassing likelihood of having 'bad' blood. And what do I mean by 'bad' blood?
These questions can roughly be summarized as the following five themes:
1) "Is your blood messed up because you have some kind of illness or disease?"
This is hepatitis, mostly, or HIV/AIDs, although it also includes things like blood-related cancers and tuberculosis. There is also a year long waiting period after you've completed treatment for certain STDs, like syphilis or gonorrhea.
2) "Might your blood be messed up because you sleep with someone who has some kind of illness, or take money for sleeping with anyone who has God knows what, or because you've been to jail?"
Basically, if you've slept with someone who has hepatitis or has tested positive for HIV/AIDs. You are also considered at risk for HIV/AIDs risk if you've ever taken any form of payment for sex since 1977. If you've been jailed for more than three days, you are ineligible for a year because of the risk of hepatitis exposure.
3) "Might your blood be messed up because you are taking legal or illegal drugs?"
In terms of legal drugs, this could be anything from a recent aspirin or immunization to antibiotics or bovine insulin. As for illegal drugs, if you've ever shot up (heroin, steroids, etc.), you are ineligible to donate, ever. This is because of the risk of hepatitis and HIV transmission through shared needles or anything not doctor-proscribed.
4) "Might your blood be messed up because you are a gay man who practices gayness?"
The ARC considers all those who are deemed at risk for HIV/AIDs ineligible for blood donation. If you are "a male who has had sexual contact with another male, even once, since 1977," you are considered as "having done something that puts you at risk" for HIV/AIDs. The same is true if you are a woman who has had sexual contact with another man who had sexual contact with another man. (Did you follow that? If you're a woman who has had a sexual relationship with a man who sleeps with men, then you are considered to have put yourself at risk for HIV/AIDs, too.)
5) "Might your blood be messed up because you are African, have ever been to Africa, or have ever slept with someone who is in any way connected to Africa?"
I'm being harsh. It's not all of Africa, just 8 western African countries where there is a rare strain of HIV that is not easily detected. In the case of malaria, however, it's pretty much all of Africa. Actually, there is a nice yellow and red band that sweeps across the entire Global South, marking highly infected regions, and if you've lived in any of them, you have to wait three years before being eligible to donate. Now, the United Kingdom isn't completely spared, as the risk of mad cow disease makes anyone who has spent more than three months in any UK nation since 1980 ineligible to donate as well. Iraq also requires a year long waiting period.
I don't want to make light of the importance of regulating blood donations. Believe me when I say I understand why many of these regulations are in place, and I want those who need blood to receive the purest, healthiest blood we can offer. I cannot overemphasize that truth.
It does strike me, however, that donating blood is a reminder of our place on various hierarchies. It reinforces what is 'good' blood and what is 'bad' or 'tainted' blood, where is the right place to be from and where is the wrong place, what is the appropriate sex to have and what is the dangerous, what are the correct ways to live and what are the perverse. If you've done it all correctly, then your blood is welcomed. If you've made some mistakes - or worse, if you are a mistake, or if a legacy of imperial depravity has made it so that you will be forever marked as a mistake - then your blood is not.
More than that, though, is that to be able to give blood suggests something about your structural position and probability of avoiding mistakes (making them, being them, or being in any way connected to people who make mistakes or are deemed mistakes) entirely. As I looked around the room of sweet locals sitting patiently as their packs filled with blood, I thought about how donating blood could be considered a public way of saying "Yep, I'm privileged!" I am heterosexual and I only sleep with heterosexuals. I have never had to prostitute myself to survive. I have great health insurance, so all my drugs are legal. I have easy and affordable access to condoms. I've never spent any considerable duration of time seeing any part of the Global South. I've only ever been to the UK for six weeks one summer to study Shakespeare (come on, I know I'm not the only one!). I've never experienced any life-long, blood-related illness, probably because I am of a class position in which I can avoid the structural circumstances that track me into unprotected sex, intravenous drug use, incarceration, and a higher risk of certain diseases.
I know it's not as simple as that. Nothing is ever as simple as that. But given these questions that deem you "in" or "out," it does say something about us having the ability to give blood. It says we have privilege. We might not be privileged through and through, but we do have some privilege; that much is clear.
And do you know what else it says? It says we are using that privilege for good. Even if we have not made mistakes or are not considered mistakes, we will give our blood to those who have (although I have to add that our blood will probably be differentially distributed to others like us who have the resources for it and access to it). After the standards we've set, it's the least we can do.
*For information about how you can give blood, see the American Red Cross website.
Saturday, January 1, 2011
Year end review
I came across this website of year-end reflection prompts by way of a recent post from a lovely friend. While I am not so sold on the idea that we can "manifest what's next" (it's a little too a-la-The-Secret bunk for my taste), I do believe that reflective practice is often what makes our next steps most clear, and helps us appreciate the depths of our past experiences. Forgive the self-indulgence of my posting my answers (even if somewhat edited for cyber privacy) here. I invite you to do the same, if you are the same sort of person.
1) Encapsulate 2010 in one word. What one word would you like to encapsulate 2011?
As a former English major, I have a hard time with the one word questions, so perhaps I should stick with potent imagery. I pulled a 10 of Swords as my overall year card in the reading I did for 2010, and I feel it has encapsulated my year in many ways. As for the new year, I pulled the Ace of Cups. And I do hope the meaning of the Ace of Cups (love, mostly) will encapsulate 2011.
2) What do you do each day that doesn't contribute to your writing, and how can you eliminate it?
I do not have cable at my apartment, but I watch television shows on my computer...I'd like to watch less. Television is horrible for both inspiration and productivity in writing (although it is fantastic for hedonism!).
3) What one moment did you feel most alive this year?
I remember the first night I was in Lewes, Delaware, and there was two feet of frozen snow on the ground, and the main street was practically empty on a February weekend evening. It was cold, and you had to toddle everywhere over the ice and snow, and I had on my boots and hat and heavy down coat. But my partner was with me, and the sun was setting, and I was free, and fully myself, and joyful.
4) How did you cultivate a sense of wonder in your life this year?
Does being super invested in Harry Potter 7 count?
5) What (or whom) did you let go of this year?
I let go of dissertation topics and advisors, of mentors and friends who never were, and of attachments and obligations and responsibilities that were my own creations.
6) What was the last thing you made? What materials did you use? Is there something you want to make, but you need to clear some time for it?
The last thing I made was a chocolate raspberry torte, which was made of all of the things we don't like to know we are eating, plus it was the first time I used my largest tart pan. I want to bake many more desserts this year, as baking is something I don't realize I'm missing until I pull out the mixing bowls again. There is nothing so grounding as cracking an egg over a bowl of sugar, or running a spatula around the edges to mix in all the dry ingredients, nor does any other practice have such a rewarding end result.
7) Where have you discovered community in 2010? What community would you like to join, create, or more deeply connect with in 2011?
Rather than discovering community itself, I have discovered the precious, precariousness of community. I have re-remembered where community is not, and where my community continues to be. I would like to continue to nurture the community I have, and build on it where I go next.
8) What makes you beautifully different? What do you do that lights people up?
Baking is not all that unique or different, but people are always happy to eat it.
9) What social gathering rocked your socks off in 2010?
A July wedding of friends in Greensboro, North Carolina. I was grateful for the chance to see many friends again, all together in one place for a brief few hours. Also, to eat cake! And to dance!
10) What was the wisest decision you made this year, and how did it play out?
It's been an all-around wise-up year, if I do say so myself. But the wisest was perhaps to cut to the chase already and get on with it. When I know how it plays out, I'll tell you.
11) What are 11 things you life doesn't need in 2011? How will you go about eliminating them? How will getting rid of them change your life?
Here are four: over-planning, excessive doubt, war movies, and skipping dessert. I propose to get eliminate them by doing my best never to skip dessert.
12) When did you feel most integrated with your body this past year? Did you have a moment when there wasn't mind and body, but simply a cohesive YOU?
After four extremely painful hours, there was a permanent picture on my back. I didn't feel that integrated afterward (in fact, I felt pretty terrible), and for a time I panicked and fretted about whether I had made the right choice. But the healing process takes over two weeks, and caring for such a large wound requires meticulous care and attention. The tenderness faded as I tended my back, and as it healed, so did I. So the cohesive me was a process, not a moment.
13) When it comes to aspirations, it's about action, not ideas. What is your next step?
To actually do what it is I have been promising myself and my partner for two and a half years.
14) What's one thing you have come to appreciate most in the past year? How do you express gratitude for it?
Fancy bourgeois food! I am on a limited budget, but a similarly-economical friend and I have started up monthly fancy restaurant visits, and my partner shares a penchant for fancy food that is probably not the wisest expenditure (but it's so awesome!! Why do bourgeois things have to be so awesome?!) I think gratitude comes in some degree of scarcity, and knowing that it is a gift to oneself to go out in a place too pretty for you once in a while.
15) Imagine you will completely lose your memory of 2010 in five minutes. What do you most want to remember?
Don't retake your comprehensive exams - you finished those, okay?
16) How has a friend changed you or your perspective on the world this year? Was it a gradual change, or a sudden burst?
In one hour, an acquaintance showed me that there wasn't any reason to keep myself from my greatest desires. Soul-starving need not be self-imposed. Sometimes the best way we can love ourselves is to know we are already worth what we most want.
17) What's the best thing you learned about yourself this year? And how will you apply that lesson going forward?
That I make for a decent instructor! I really do know what I'm doing after all...and I should not be so afraid of it. But I also learned that it's alright to not to commit myself to it...we can be good at many things, but we'll never know what we'll miss unless we try something else for a while.
18) What do you want to try in 2011? Is there something you wanted to try in 2010? What happened when you did or didn't go for it?
I want to try to recultivate the spirit...to burn more candles, have more quiet moments, to maybe visit the local meetinghouse for Sunday service.
19) What healed you this year? Was it sudden or gradual? How would you like to be healed in 2011?
See #16. That is healing enough.
20) What should you have done this year but didn't because you were too worried, unsure, busy, or otherwise deterred from doing it? (Will you do it?)
I am a woman who acts, so I don't think there is anything I didn't do that I should have done. (There were, however, things I probably shouldn't have done that I did!)
21) Imagine yourself five years from now. What advice would you give your current self for the year ahead?
Let go. Don't try to harness your fate. Let your life happen with you. And yes, this is the best thing...there will always be regrets, but no one ever regrets not regretting enough. You already have all the tools you need.
22) Where did you travel this year? How or where would you like to travel next year?
Lewes and Rehoboth, Boston and Cambridge, Ontario, Niagara Falls, Atlanta, Northampton, Greensboro, Asheville, Cary, Chapel Hill, Greenville, and many precious trips to D.C. Next year I will go to San Francisco! And Philadelphia! And hopefully a much, much longer stay in D.C.
23) If you could introduce yourself to strangers with a new name for a day, what would it be and why?
Just my own name is fine...I've come round to it.
24) What's the best moment that could serve as proof that everything is going to be alright? How will you incorporate that discovery in the year ahead?
My grandfather's funeral was sort of comedic, what with the pastor starting the prayers while my father was in the middle of a loud conversation about the weather with the undertaker as he carried the urn, then my sister forgetting she was the youngest grandchild, the sudden a capella burst into "Wind Beneath My Wings," and my father driving back to the cemetery later and taking a picture of the wrong plot. We are only human, and there is comfort in that. We will always have reasons to laugh at each other and at ourselves.
25) What one photo from the past year best captures you, either who you are or who you strive to be?
The best photo, I think, was the first photo of the year of me. It was taken at a barbecue place in northern Virginia. I was digging into pork and beans and macaroni and cheese - it's not that I want to be seen as uber-carnivorous, but I was eating on a wooden table in the sunlight of the window, and I like how content I look (although it could be that I was about to tear into a pulled pork sandwich). I look like someone who knows herself, or at least is at home in a barbecue restaurant.
26) What did you eat this year that you will never forget? What went in your mouth and touched your soul?
Dates stuffed with chorizo and goat cheese. From a tiny, empty wine bar in my eastern North Carolina hometown. OMG like candy. Also, burnt brown sugar ice cream from a local shop in Northampton, Massachusetts. And a fried chicken sandwich in Asheville.
27) What was one of your most joyful ordinary moments this past year?
It was in a coffee shop in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where my lovely friend had an unfortunate encounter with a plastic coffee cup lid because of my insistence that she "push harder" on the top to open it. Such a silly moment is the kind of moment our friendship is full of.
28) What's one thing you most want to achieve next year? How do you imagine you will feel when you get to it?
Transitioning from a long-distance relationship to living under the same roof. I think it will feel wonderful, although we might wish the other person would go away once in a while. That is the beauty of it - we will have the privilege of taking each other for granted.
29) Describe a defining moment (or series of moments) that has affected your life this year.
For some reason I can only thing of poignant, sad moments in response to this question, although there are funny realizations that come of them. There was one time when I was so overwhelmed by what I saw as my tragic, dour situation that I burst into tears in my shower and proceeded to have a very good, long cry in the bathroom. Not long afterwards, new neighbors moved in below me, and they were much noisier than the previous tenants. They were so noisy, in fact, that I realized the walls are thinnest between the bathrooms! So now I don't cry in the bathroom.
30) What's the most memorable gift, tangible or intangible, that you received this year?
I received a gift of loss. Many losses, I think. My grandfather's death seemed to set my father freer, even amid the tragedy. I lost (or reoriented...'lost' might be too extreme) many friendships over this year, and a mentor I never really had to begin with. These are gifts, though, because losing them allowed me to see where my strongest relationships still lay, and to prioritize what I wanted (because how could doing what I wanted to do hurt anyone else when not doing what I wanted to do was hurting myself?)
31) What central story is at the core of you, and how do you share it with the world?
The central story is something like integrity and living rightly, and homecoming. I don't know how I share it with the world, yet...I don't know if I want to share it with the whole wide world, just the people who are the world to me. We will keep believing a better world is possible, and building it as we go.
1) Encapsulate 2010 in one word. What one word would you like to encapsulate 2011?
As a former English major, I have a hard time with the one word questions, so perhaps I should stick with potent imagery. I pulled a 10 of Swords as my overall year card in the reading I did for 2010, and I feel it has encapsulated my year in many ways. As for the new year, I pulled the Ace of Cups. And I do hope the meaning of the Ace of Cups (love, mostly) will encapsulate 2011.
2) What do you do each day that doesn't contribute to your writing, and how can you eliminate it?
I do not have cable at my apartment, but I watch television shows on my computer...I'd like to watch less. Television is horrible for both inspiration and productivity in writing (although it is fantastic for hedonism!).
3) What one moment did you feel most alive this year?
I remember the first night I was in Lewes, Delaware, and there was two feet of frozen snow on the ground, and the main street was practically empty on a February weekend evening. It was cold, and you had to toddle everywhere over the ice and snow, and I had on my boots and hat and heavy down coat. But my partner was with me, and the sun was setting, and I was free, and fully myself, and joyful.
4) How did you cultivate a sense of wonder in your life this year?
Does being super invested in Harry Potter 7 count?
5) What (or whom) did you let go of this year?
I let go of dissertation topics and advisors, of mentors and friends who never were, and of attachments and obligations and responsibilities that were my own creations.
6) What was the last thing you made? What materials did you use? Is there something you want to make, but you need to clear some time for it?
The last thing I made was a chocolate raspberry torte, which was made of all of the things we don't like to know we are eating, plus it was the first time I used my largest tart pan. I want to bake many more desserts this year, as baking is something I don't realize I'm missing until I pull out the mixing bowls again. There is nothing so grounding as cracking an egg over a bowl of sugar, or running a spatula around the edges to mix in all the dry ingredients, nor does any other practice have such a rewarding end result.
7) Where have you discovered community in 2010? What community would you like to join, create, or more deeply connect with in 2011?
Rather than discovering community itself, I have discovered the precious, precariousness of community. I have re-remembered where community is not, and where my community continues to be. I would like to continue to nurture the community I have, and build on it where I go next.
8) What makes you beautifully different? What do you do that lights people up?
Baking is not all that unique or different, but people are always happy to eat it.
9) What social gathering rocked your socks off in 2010?
A July wedding of friends in Greensboro, North Carolina. I was grateful for the chance to see many friends again, all together in one place for a brief few hours. Also, to eat cake! And to dance!
10) What was the wisest decision you made this year, and how did it play out?
It's been an all-around wise-up year, if I do say so myself. But the wisest was perhaps to cut to the chase already and get on with it. When I know how it plays out, I'll tell you.
11) What are 11 things you life doesn't need in 2011? How will you go about eliminating them? How will getting rid of them change your life?
Here are four: over-planning, excessive doubt, war movies, and skipping dessert. I propose to get eliminate them by doing my best never to skip dessert.
12) When did you feel most integrated with your body this past year? Did you have a moment when there wasn't mind and body, but simply a cohesive YOU?
After four extremely painful hours, there was a permanent picture on my back. I didn't feel that integrated afterward (in fact, I felt pretty terrible), and for a time I panicked and fretted about whether I had made the right choice. But the healing process takes over two weeks, and caring for such a large wound requires meticulous care and attention. The tenderness faded as I tended my back, and as it healed, so did I. So the cohesive me was a process, not a moment.
13) When it comes to aspirations, it's about action, not ideas. What is your next step?
To actually do what it is I have been promising myself and my partner for two and a half years.
14) What's one thing you have come to appreciate most in the past year? How do you express gratitude for it?
Fancy bourgeois food! I am on a limited budget, but a similarly-economical friend and I have started up monthly fancy restaurant visits, and my partner shares a penchant for fancy food that is probably not the wisest expenditure (but it's so awesome!! Why do bourgeois things have to be so awesome?!) I think gratitude comes in some degree of scarcity, and knowing that it is a gift to oneself to go out in a place too pretty for you once in a while.
15) Imagine you will completely lose your memory of 2010 in five minutes. What do you most want to remember?
Don't retake your comprehensive exams - you finished those, okay?
16) How has a friend changed you or your perspective on the world this year? Was it a gradual change, or a sudden burst?
In one hour, an acquaintance showed me that there wasn't any reason to keep myself from my greatest desires. Soul-starving need not be self-imposed. Sometimes the best way we can love ourselves is to know we are already worth what we most want.
17) What's the best thing you learned about yourself this year? And how will you apply that lesson going forward?
That I make for a decent instructor! I really do know what I'm doing after all...and I should not be so afraid of it. But I also learned that it's alright to not to commit myself to it...we can be good at many things, but we'll never know what we'll miss unless we try something else for a while.
18) What do you want to try in 2011? Is there something you wanted to try in 2010? What happened when you did or didn't go for it?
I want to try to recultivate the spirit...to burn more candles, have more quiet moments, to maybe visit the local meetinghouse for Sunday service.
19) What healed you this year? Was it sudden or gradual? How would you like to be healed in 2011?
See #16. That is healing enough.
20) What should you have done this year but didn't because you were too worried, unsure, busy, or otherwise deterred from doing it? (Will you do it?)
I am a woman who acts, so I don't think there is anything I didn't do that I should have done. (There were, however, things I probably shouldn't have done that I did!)
21) Imagine yourself five years from now. What advice would you give your current self for the year ahead?
Let go. Don't try to harness your fate. Let your life happen with you. And yes, this is the best thing...there will always be regrets, but no one ever regrets not regretting enough. You already have all the tools you need.
22) Where did you travel this year? How or where would you like to travel next year?
Lewes and Rehoboth, Boston and Cambridge, Ontario, Niagara Falls, Atlanta, Northampton, Greensboro, Asheville, Cary, Chapel Hill, Greenville, and many precious trips to D.C. Next year I will go to San Francisco! And Philadelphia! And hopefully a much, much longer stay in D.C.
23) If you could introduce yourself to strangers with a new name for a day, what would it be and why?
Just my own name is fine...I've come round to it.
24) What's the best moment that could serve as proof that everything is going to be alright? How will you incorporate that discovery in the year ahead?
My grandfather's funeral was sort of comedic, what with the pastor starting the prayers while my father was in the middle of a loud conversation about the weather with the undertaker as he carried the urn, then my sister forgetting she was the youngest grandchild, the sudden a capella burst into "Wind Beneath My Wings," and my father driving back to the cemetery later and taking a picture of the wrong plot. We are only human, and there is comfort in that. We will always have reasons to laugh at each other and at ourselves.
25) What one photo from the past year best captures you, either who you are or who you strive to be?
The best photo, I think, was the first photo of the year of me. It was taken at a barbecue place in northern Virginia. I was digging into pork and beans and macaroni and cheese - it's not that I want to be seen as uber-carnivorous, but I was eating on a wooden table in the sunlight of the window, and I like how content I look (although it could be that I was about to tear into a pulled pork sandwich). I look like someone who knows herself, or at least is at home in a barbecue restaurant.
26) What did you eat this year that you will never forget? What went in your mouth and touched your soul?
Dates stuffed with chorizo and goat cheese. From a tiny, empty wine bar in my eastern North Carolina hometown. OMG like candy. Also, burnt brown sugar ice cream from a local shop in Northampton, Massachusetts. And a fried chicken sandwich in Asheville.
27) What was one of your most joyful ordinary moments this past year?
It was in a coffee shop in Cambridge, Massachusetts, where my lovely friend had an unfortunate encounter with a plastic coffee cup lid because of my insistence that she "push harder" on the top to open it. Such a silly moment is the kind of moment our friendship is full of.
28) What's one thing you most want to achieve next year? How do you imagine you will feel when you get to it?
Transitioning from a long-distance relationship to living under the same roof. I think it will feel wonderful, although we might wish the other person would go away once in a while. That is the beauty of it - we will have the privilege of taking each other for granted.
29) Describe a defining moment (or series of moments) that has affected your life this year.
For some reason I can only thing of poignant, sad moments in response to this question, although there are funny realizations that come of them. There was one time when I was so overwhelmed by what I saw as my tragic, dour situation that I burst into tears in my shower and proceeded to have a very good, long cry in the bathroom. Not long afterwards, new neighbors moved in below me, and they were much noisier than the previous tenants. They were so noisy, in fact, that I realized the walls are thinnest between the bathrooms! So now I don't cry in the bathroom.
30) What's the most memorable gift, tangible or intangible, that you received this year?
I received a gift of loss. Many losses, I think. My grandfather's death seemed to set my father freer, even amid the tragedy. I lost (or reoriented...'lost' might be too extreme) many friendships over this year, and a mentor I never really had to begin with. These are gifts, though, because losing them allowed me to see where my strongest relationships still lay, and to prioritize what I wanted (because how could doing what I wanted to do hurt anyone else when not doing what I wanted to do was hurting myself?)
31) What central story is at the core of you, and how do you share it with the world?
The central story is something like integrity and living rightly, and homecoming. I don't know how I share it with the world, yet...I don't know if I want to share it with the whole wide world, just the people who are the world to me. We will keep believing a better world is possible, and building it as we go.
Sunday, December 19, 2010
On being the only white person in the room (Part I)
My sense of responsibility as a politicized white person, I believe, rests with holding other white people accountable. I know that my skin privilege means other whites will listen to me and, often despite my gender, see me as an authority figure simply because I am white. This is powerful stuff when it comes to teaching about racism and structural inequality - we often expect people of color to care about racism. Due to the complexities of white privilege, white people carry more sway with other whites when we care about racism. The flawed logic is, I suppose, since racism benefits us whites, then if a white person cares, it must matter! (Because, of course, if the people who have been historically, socially, and politically oppressed for centuries and, as a result, remain extensively marginalized today care, well, that's really not our problem.)
I have made a surprising discovery about this during the past semester, however. Well, several, actually.
Let me explain. Many of you know that I took a Race Theory course in the Africana Studies department. I chose this class for many reasons...the most important of which was that I still felt I had so much to learn about race, and I wanted to build in a structured time to continue reading and discussing the literature.
But I had other expectations of the class, too. The thing is, in my department, I could easily claim 'mastery' in race studies without ever taking a class on race. And I could easily go about my entire graduate career without ever taking a class with black people. To my knowledge, there is only one(!) black person who is a matriculated graduate student in my department. This is not uncommon nationally. Black people are severely underrepresented in graduate studies - and the Africana Studies department is a safe space that centers the experiences of blacks. Most white people - including myself - are often uncomfortable in a room full of black people. But if we merrily go about our lives without ever intentionally spending time with black people, we will remain uncomfortable and miserably ignorant. Part of being a politicized white person, dear readers, is spending genuine and meaningful time with people of color. It also, in my case anyway, means taking classes with them.
So there I was, a random white Sociology student taking an Africana Studies class. On the first day, I walked up the stairs and into the hallway, and who did I see standing in front of the classroom door? One of my students from my summer class.
Taking a class with a former student? Oh, no, that's not awkward at all.
We all sat down and the professor introduced himself. He asked us to go around the room and share why it was we were in this class. As we went around the room, most folks gave vague answers about how they were here because they wanted to take a theory course (it was required for their master's). But my former student, a black woman, shocked me when she said, "I wanted to learn more about intersectionality, which I started reading about this summer," then she gestured to me, "with my professor over there, like race and gender and Patricia Hill Collins, things like that."
OMG. Besides the false title (but please, God, one day!), I was floored when she named my class as having an impact on her studies. I had always felt that I was there to politicize white students. It had never occurred to me that I would - or even could - politicize students of color. This isn't because I felt I should only focus on white students, but because I knew I might not necessarily be an authority figure for students of color, and I certainly would not be an identifiable role model. That was my first discovery - that white teachers can still cultivate a political sociological lens in students of color. Or more specifically, that I could. And really, dear readers, if I was able to get just this one student to think about her experiences as a black woman through an intersectional lens, well, then, I am a very humbled sociology instructor.
Here was my second discovery. This one, sadly, is a major downer.
After introductions and reviewing the syllabus, the professor wrote "RACE" on the board in all caps. He turned to us and asked, "what is race?"
"Skin color," someone shouted. "Ethnicity," said someone else. "Biology," another added, "you know, like your ancestry, or the origins of your people." Each time an answer was offered, the professor dutifully wrote it on the board.
Yes, dear readers. This class of mostly black folks believed "race" really meant skin color, ethnicity, and biology; in that order. When "skin color" came out, I thought, well, I'm sure they just meant that it's often determined based on skin color, or that the perception of skin color and other phenotypic aspects are usually used as the measuring stick for race. But then "ethnicity" was added, and I was like, wait a minute! Seriously? I mean I had just written a paper on how race and ethnicity are two different (but interrelated) things! No way!
So when it came to "biology," (Biology?! BIOLOGY!?! What the hell, people?!) I just couldn't stand it. I had wanted to sit quietly and not be that obnoxious white person that takes up space and pretends to have all the answers for people of color. But I had just done this same exercise a few weeks ago for my summer class, and my teaching instinct (or obnoxious white person...probably both) was rearing at the bit. As smoothly and unobtrusively as possible, I raised my hand. "It's a political and social construction." The professor added "social categorization" to the board. "What else?" he asked.
"Your religion!" someone shouted.
Here is the second discovery I made: Not all people of color have a race analysis.
I was blindsided by this over and over and over again during my Race Theory class this semester (more to come on this in Part II of this post). It's not that I haven't seen this before, but it has always been in undergraduate students of color - not my colleagues. This was a room of very well-educated people of color! They were graduate students and still thinking race was skin color and ethnicity and your ancestry!
It seems naive of me now to have been so shocked. As a white person, I have spent most of my life around mostly white people. But I have also probably spent more time around people of color than many white people, and all this time, I never realized the honor I have had of only really being around radical people of color. Or at least, I've only ever talked about race and politics and oppression and all that with people of color who were already progressive. Even if we were different races and they were more than happy to call me out and hold me accountable for having lighter skin, we already saw each other as allies. We already shared a vision of a liberated world.
And I assumed, through my white privilege education, that to be white meant to be oblivious to racial inequality (which it generally does) and to be a person of color meant to already have a nuanced view of structural inequality. Or even that women of color would automatically be able to speak to living at the intersections of hierarchies. Repeatedly throughout the semester, however, I found this was not the case. Someone else would say another icky problematic thing and inside I'd cringe, "Nooooo! But that's what the oppressor wants you to think!"
It dawned on me that I needed to recognize the ways in which people of color are not automatically able to speak to their experiences in a way that will disrupt or dismantle the systems that oppress them. It seems obvious now, because it makes total sense - people of color are not supposed to be able to spit hot flames of fierce sociological mindfulness. That's not how the game works. It works by convincing them that they are on the bottom because they deserve to be there, that race is real. Not just the social consequences of race (which are very, very real!), but "race" itself as a construct is real. Being born a person of color means you are still socialized by the same institutions as white people. Like many, many, many others, the students in my class already believed the myths.
Now, to say that not all people of color have a race analysis doesn't mean that they are not all experts on their own experiences as people of color. They will always know best what it is their lives are like, and what it is they need. Their voices are the ones that we as white people must listen to, and listen closely. This was an incredible challenge for me these past few months - to hear the truths through the bullshit that has tried to snuff them out. Many times I failed at this. Many times I wondered why I was there, or what the hell I thought I was doing. But see, the point is not to revel in the beautific wonder of being an awesome white person with active-listening skills, but to confront and engage with the hell white people have left in our wake. The point is at least, at least, to try.
I have made a surprising discovery about this during the past semester, however. Well, several, actually.
Let me explain. Many of you know that I took a Race Theory course in the Africana Studies department. I chose this class for many reasons...the most important of which was that I still felt I had so much to learn about race, and I wanted to build in a structured time to continue reading and discussing the literature.
But I had other expectations of the class, too. The thing is, in my department, I could easily claim 'mastery' in race studies without ever taking a class on race. And I could easily go about my entire graduate career without ever taking a class with black people. To my knowledge, there is only one(!) black person who is a matriculated graduate student in my department. This is not uncommon nationally. Black people are severely underrepresented in graduate studies - and the Africana Studies department is a safe space that centers the experiences of blacks. Most white people - including myself - are often uncomfortable in a room full of black people. But if we merrily go about our lives without ever intentionally spending time with black people, we will remain uncomfortable and miserably ignorant. Part of being a politicized white person, dear readers, is spending genuine and meaningful time with people of color. It also, in my case anyway, means taking classes with them.
So there I was, a random white Sociology student taking an Africana Studies class. On the first day, I walked up the stairs and into the hallway, and who did I see standing in front of the classroom door? One of my students from my summer class.
Taking a class with a former student? Oh, no, that's not awkward at all.
We all sat down and the professor introduced himself. He asked us to go around the room and share why it was we were in this class. As we went around the room, most folks gave vague answers about how they were here because they wanted to take a theory course (it was required for their master's). But my former student, a black woman, shocked me when she said, "I wanted to learn more about intersectionality, which I started reading about this summer," then she gestured to me, "with my professor over there, like race and gender and Patricia Hill Collins, things like that."
OMG. Besides the false title (but please, God, one day!), I was floored when she named my class as having an impact on her studies. I had always felt that I was there to politicize white students. It had never occurred to me that I would - or even could - politicize students of color. This isn't because I felt I should only focus on white students, but because I knew I might not necessarily be an authority figure for students of color, and I certainly would not be an identifiable role model. That was my first discovery - that white teachers can still cultivate a political sociological lens in students of color. Or more specifically, that I could. And really, dear readers, if I was able to get just this one student to think about her experiences as a black woman through an intersectional lens, well, then, I am a very humbled sociology instructor.
Here was my second discovery. This one, sadly, is a major downer.
After introductions and reviewing the syllabus, the professor wrote "RACE" on the board in all caps. He turned to us and asked, "what is race?"
"Skin color," someone shouted. "Ethnicity," said someone else. "Biology," another added, "you know, like your ancestry, or the origins of your people." Each time an answer was offered, the professor dutifully wrote it on the board.
Yes, dear readers. This class of mostly black folks believed "race" really meant skin color, ethnicity, and biology; in that order. When "skin color" came out, I thought, well, I'm sure they just meant that it's often determined based on skin color, or that the perception of skin color and other phenotypic aspects are usually used as the measuring stick for race. But then "ethnicity" was added, and I was like, wait a minute! Seriously? I mean I had just written a paper on how race and ethnicity are two different (but interrelated) things! No way!
So when it came to "biology," (Biology?! BIOLOGY!?! What the hell, people?!) I just couldn't stand it. I had wanted to sit quietly and not be that obnoxious white person that takes up space and pretends to have all the answers for people of color. But I had just done this same exercise a few weeks ago for my summer class, and my teaching instinct (or obnoxious white person...probably both) was rearing at the bit. As smoothly and unobtrusively as possible, I raised my hand. "It's a political and social construction." The professor added "social categorization" to the board. "What else?" he asked.
"Your religion!" someone shouted.
Here is the second discovery I made: Not all people of color have a race analysis.
I was blindsided by this over and over and over again during my Race Theory class this semester (more to come on this in Part II of this post). It's not that I haven't seen this before, but it has always been in undergraduate students of color - not my colleagues. This was a room of very well-educated people of color! They were graduate students and still thinking race was skin color and ethnicity and your ancestry!
It seems naive of me now to have been so shocked. As a white person, I have spent most of my life around mostly white people. But I have also probably spent more time around people of color than many white people, and all this time, I never realized the honor I have had of only really being around radical people of color. Or at least, I've only ever talked about race and politics and oppression and all that with people of color who were already progressive. Even if we were different races and they were more than happy to call me out and hold me accountable for having lighter skin, we already saw each other as allies. We already shared a vision of a liberated world.
And I assumed, through my white privilege education, that to be white meant to be oblivious to racial inequality (which it generally does) and to be a person of color meant to already have a nuanced view of structural inequality. Or even that women of color would automatically be able to speak to living at the intersections of hierarchies. Repeatedly throughout the semester, however, I found this was not the case. Someone else would say another icky problematic thing and inside I'd cringe, "Nooooo! But that's what the oppressor wants you to think!"
It dawned on me that I needed to recognize the ways in which people of color are not automatically able to speak to their experiences in a way that will disrupt or dismantle the systems that oppress them. It seems obvious now, because it makes total sense - people of color are not supposed to be able to spit hot flames of fierce sociological mindfulness. That's not how the game works. It works by convincing them that they are on the bottom because they deserve to be there, that race is real. Not just the social consequences of race (which are very, very real!), but "race" itself as a construct is real. Being born a person of color means you are still socialized by the same institutions as white people. Like many, many, many others, the students in my class already believed the myths.
Now, to say that not all people of color have a race analysis doesn't mean that they are not all experts on their own experiences as people of color. They will always know best what it is their lives are like, and what it is they need. Their voices are the ones that we as white people must listen to, and listen closely. This was an incredible challenge for me these past few months - to hear the truths through the bullshit that has tried to snuff them out. Many times I failed at this. Many times I wondered why I was there, or what the hell I thought I was doing. But see, the point is not to revel in the beautific wonder of being an awesome white person with active-listening skills, but to confront and engage with the hell white people have left in our wake. The point is at least, at least, to try.
Friday, December 10, 2010
Ra-ra-ra-racism!
It is the holiday season, dear readers, and I attended a Yankee swap gift exchange the other day to celebrate. You know, the kind where you open presents and then steal other people's presents if you like them better than the one you got, all in the name of Jesus. If you are strategic, you bring a crappy gift (bonus points if it's from the As Seen on TV store). If you are a sucker like me, you bring a nice gift and walk out with one of the crappy gifts. It's all very American, really.
Being a sucker doesn't bother me so much - I'm too deeply programmed by middle-class white woman hospitality (it's not "being a sucker," it's "making sure others are happy!") to dwell on that. But what did stick with me that night was an incident that is, sadly, a common occurrence in everyday life if you are the kind of person who happens to get out bed every morning: the Vaguely Racist Comment (VRC). Oh, VRCs! They come up when you expect them, they come up when you least expect them, they come up when you are neither expecting nor not expecting them. They are always, as a matter of principle, uttered casually, and, also a matter of principle, extremely difficult to challenge. They are usually in public spaces where it would make you stand out in a bad way if you were to do anything other than nod, or smile, or laugh, or pretend they didn't really just say something vaguely racist (and by vaguely, I mean overtly). That is the brilliance of racism - it is so embedded in our social exchanges that it seems like common courtesy to just go along with it. The nature of racism is that it makes those who call it out appear to be the rude ones.
That's the thing...sometimes I'm one of those rude people, which may explain why I don't have a robust social life. I realize I'm really not that much fun to be around, because the vast majority of our cultural humor is predicated on social inequality. And I'm one of those Debbie-Downers who doesn't laugh. Or I try in some awkward, flailing way to intervene. It doesn't matter how many VRCs I've witnessed...I have yet to have a beautific teaching moment come of one. It almost invariably ends with me laughing tersely and saying something like "I don't know about that, y'all" and then people change the subject before they have to think too hard about how much they benefit from racial inequality.
That's the typical script, anyway, and the incident at the Yankee swap was no exception. We were halfway through opening the gifts when the VRC slipped - nay, strolled out into public conversation: the white man beside me announced that he wished he could have brought an Obama Chia Pet.
These are hard moments for me, dear readers. Perhaps you have encountered them too. You hear a white person say something like, "I wish I could have brought an Obama Chia Pet," and the room of almost entirely white people erupts in laughter, and you aren't exactly convinced that, deep down in their heart of hearts, they really know that an Obama Chia Pet is racist as hell. In fact, you are fairly sure they don't.
Here is evidence. As the laughter was dying down, I added "Not a good idea!" with an awkward laugh (I know, I know...my VRC interventions need polishing). For the sake of a more personal challenge, I noted to the white man beside me who had made the comment, "You know, there is this great video clip of the white guy who made the Chia Pet saying "I don't know why this is racist!" I said this with a tone that implied that of course this man beside me knew it was racist, and surely he would find additional sad humor in the fact that the white guy who designed it would be so tragically misled. But that's not what happened. What you want to happen is never what happens. Instead, another white man across the room said "I know! I don't know why either!" (Crap! I didn't curb the racism...I gave it wings!) And then a white woman added, as if this was a sufficient explanation to close the conversation, "They have one of every president!"
And then the next person started opening their gift and any chance of a beautific teaching moment (if there had been any chance at all) was crushed by the opening of a leg lamp nightlight. (Gah! Intercepted by the Vaguely Sexist Present! How many interventions am I supposed to handle by myself? Sweet Mother of God, I'm only one angry white woman!)
And so I wasn't able to say what it was I really wanted to say, or have an honest conversation about why, yes, an Obama Chia Pet really is racist. With the exception of two international students from China, we were a room of well-educated white people...it is definitely a problem for a white person to bring an Obama Chia Pet for another white person to open up as a hilaaaaarious Yankee swap gift. Even on its own, no matter the race of the gifter or giftee, the Obama Chia Pet is super problematic. Because I wasn't able to state why to the well-intentioned white people at the Christmas party, I will do so here.
Let me tell you, if you didn't know about this already, Obama's head has been made into a Chia pet - the controversy surrounding it is portrayed in a disappointing way in this CNN video. It's one thing that he's the president, "not a damn plant!" as the black woman in the video so aptly denounces. But it is Obama's blackness the makes this Chia pet so horrifying. Yes, the Chia company offers Chia pets of other presidents' heads...but all of our other presidents have been white. Only Obama's Chia Pet lets you grow the Black president of the United States an Afro.
And Black hair is distinctly political. It has been stigmatized and eroticized, degraded and objectified. Black hair has a history of oppression, parody, mimicry, marginalization. It has been straightened and hot-combed, pulled and stitched, 'relaxed' and greased until it is believed to resemble the highly prized, wavy, shakable locks of whites. It has been caricatured in minstrelry, front porch jockey statues, social Darwinist drawings, and pimp and seventies-hippie Halloween costumes. Black hair is not neutral territory. We finally have the first Black president, but just as Hilary Clinton can be reduced to a nut-cracking feminist who doesn't know better than to stay out of the public sphere, Obama can be reduced to an Afro-growing plant for your "desk, home, or school." (Yes...let's be shamelessly public about our race-based mockery, shall we?) The commercial - where owning the Obama Chia Pet is said to be a "symbol of Liberty, Opportunity, Prosperity, and Hope" and allows you to make the statement that "I'm proud to be an American" - could be on SNL or the Onion if the Chia company weren't taking itself absolutely seriously. The only 'statement' the Obama Chia Pet really makes is that white people still feel at Liberty to Prosper off every Opportunity to parody Blackness.
The thing is, if I had really said these things at the Christmas party, I would have been written off as "taking things too seriously," even by those people who I know probably agree with me. It is a Christmas party after all. Time to be generous and good-spirited and to pretend oppression is the stuff of fairies. And I would have further cemented my reputation as the wrong person to invite when you want to have a good time. Which is unfortunate, because I do enjoy having a good time...for some reason my version of 'good time' doesn't always match with the 'good time' had by the people I work with.
And I know I can't challenge everything. We can't call out ever VRC, or else we'd never stop to breathe. If people of color stopped and said something every time they experienced racism, they'd never get through their day - being a vocal white anti-racist makes this startlingly clear. I have to remind myself to walk the line between challenging other white people and not trying to prove that I'm a good white person, taking on the burden of racism as if I have any idea what that means or that it is up to me to 'save' the people of color. When VRCs arise, I'm never entirely sure which side of the line I'm on...the point is really just to remember that the former can easily turn into the latter. We must never be too self-congratulatory. But I also believe there is such a thing as being too silent.
Also, white antiracists can't just write off anyone who isn't perfectly politicized. We can't afford to alienate all the well-intentioned white people we know who issue VRCs. The only way we cultivate future white antiracist allies is to prod them just enough so that they do not shut down entirely and we are not entirely complicit to public racist discourse. VRCs really aren't made for teaching moments, even if we want them to be - those happen at a later time, when you are away from the public spaces where paranoia of accountability prevents any honest discussion. Sometimes you can only write out what you wanted to say, even if you didn't get to say it to the people you wanted to say it to. At least it will have been said. And that has to be enough, at least for now.
Being a sucker doesn't bother me so much - I'm too deeply programmed by middle-class white woman hospitality (it's not "being a sucker," it's "making sure others are happy!") to dwell on that. But what did stick with me that night was an incident that is, sadly, a common occurrence in everyday life if you are the kind of person who happens to get out bed every morning: the Vaguely Racist Comment (VRC). Oh, VRCs! They come up when you expect them, they come up when you least expect them, they come up when you are neither expecting nor not expecting them. They are always, as a matter of principle, uttered casually, and, also a matter of principle, extremely difficult to challenge. They are usually in public spaces where it would make you stand out in a bad way if you were to do anything other than nod, or smile, or laugh, or pretend they didn't really just say something vaguely racist (and by vaguely, I mean overtly). That is the brilliance of racism - it is so embedded in our social exchanges that it seems like common courtesy to just go along with it. The nature of racism is that it makes those who call it out appear to be the rude ones.
That's the thing...sometimes I'm one of those rude people, which may explain why I don't have a robust social life. I realize I'm really not that much fun to be around, because the vast majority of our cultural humor is predicated on social inequality. And I'm one of those Debbie-Downers who doesn't laugh. Or I try in some awkward, flailing way to intervene. It doesn't matter how many VRCs I've witnessed...I have yet to have a beautific teaching moment come of one. It almost invariably ends with me laughing tersely and saying something like "I don't know about that, y'all" and then people change the subject before they have to think too hard about how much they benefit from racial inequality.
That's the typical script, anyway, and the incident at the Yankee swap was no exception. We were halfway through opening the gifts when the VRC slipped - nay, strolled out into public conversation: the white man beside me announced that he wished he could have brought an Obama Chia Pet.
These are hard moments for me, dear readers. Perhaps you have encountered them too. You hear a white person say something like, "I wish I could have brought an Obama Chia Pet," and the room of almost entirely white people erupts in laughter, and you aren't exactly convinced that, deep down in their heart of hearts, they really know that an Obama Chia Pet is racist as hell. In fact, you are fairly sure they don't.
Here is evidence. As the laughter was dying down, I added "Not a good idea!" with an awkward laugh (I know, I know...my VRC interventions need polishing). For the sake of a more personal challenge, I noted to the white man beside me who had made the comment, "You know, there is this great video clip of the white guy who made the Chia Pet saying "I don't know why this is racist!" I said this with a tone that implied that of course this man beside me knew it was racist, and surely he would find additional sad humor in the fact that the white guy who designed it would be so tragically misled. But that's not what happened. What you want to happen is never what happens. Instead, another white man across the room said "I know! I don't know why either!" (Crap! I didn't curb the racism...I gave it wings!) And then a white woman added, as if this was a sufficient explanation to close the conversation, "They have one of every president!"
And then the next person started opening their gift and any chance of a beautific teaching moment (if there had been any chance at all) was crushed by the opening of a leg lamp nightlight. (Gah! Intercepted by the Vaguely Sexist Present! How many interventions am I supposed to handle by myself? Sweet Mother of God, I'm only one angry white woman!)
And so I wasn't able to say what it was I really wanted to say, or have an honest conversation about why, yes, an Obama Chia Pet really is racist. With the exception of two international students from China, we were a room of well-educated white people...it is definitely a problem for a white person to bring an Obama Chia Pet for another white person to open up as a hilaaaaarious Yankee swap gift. Even on its own, no matter the race of the gifter or giftee, the Obama Chia Pet is super problematic. Because I wasn't able to state why to the well-intentioned white people at the Christmas party, I will do so here.
Let me tell you, if you didn't know about this already, Obama's head has been made into a Chia pet - the controversy surrounding it is portrayed in a disappointing way in this CNN video. It's one thing that he's the president, "not a damn plant!" as the black woman in the video so aptly denounces. But it is Obama's blackness the makes this Chia pet so horrifying. Yes, the Chia company offers Chia pets of other presidents' heads...but all of our other presidents have been white. Only Obama's Chia Pet lets you grow the Black president of the United States an Afro.
And Black hair is distinctly political. It has been stigmatized and eroticized, degraded and objectified. Black hair has a history of oppression, parody, mimicry, marginalization. It has been straightened and hot-combed, pulled and stitched, 'relaxed' and greased until it is believed to resemble the highly prized, wavy, shakable locks of whites. It has been caricatured in minstrelry, front porch jockey statues, social Darwinist drawings, and pimp and seventies-hippie Halloween costumes. Black hair is not neutral territory. We finally have the first Black president, but just as Hilary Clinton can be reduced to a nut-cracking feminist who doesn't know better than to stay out of the public sphere, Obama can be reduced to an Afro-growing plant for your "desk, home, or school." (Yes...let's be shamelessly public about our race-based mockery, shall we?) The commercial - where owning the Obama Chia Pet is said to be a "symbol of Liberty, Opportunity, Prosperity, and Hope" and allows you to make the statement that "I'm proud to be an American" - could be on SNL or the Onion if the Chia company weren't taking itself absolutely seriously. The only 'statement' the Obama Chia Pet really makes is that white people still feel at Liberty to Prosper off every Opportunity to parody Blackness.
The thing is, if I had really said these things at the Christmas party, I would have been written off as "taking things too seriously," even by those people who I know probably agree with me. It is a Christmas party after all. Time to be generous and good-spirited and to pretend oppression is the stuff of fairies. And I would have further cemented my reputation as the wrong person to invite when you want to have a good time. Which is unfortunate, because I do enjoy having a good time...for some reason my version of 'good time' doesn't always match with the 'good time' had by the people I work with.
And I know I can't challenge everything. We can't call out ever VRC, or else we'd never stop to breathe. If people of color stopped and said something every time they experienced racism, they'd never get through their day - being a vocal white anti-racist makes this startlingly clear. I have to remind myself to walk the line between challenging other white people and not trying to prove that I'm a good white person, taking on the burden of racism as if I have any idea what that means or that it is up to me to 'save' the people of color. When VRCs arise, I'm never entirely sure which side of the line I'm on...the point is really just to remember that the former can easily turn into the latter. We must never be too self-congratulatory. But I also believe there is such a thing as being too silent.
Also, white antiracists can't just write off anyone who isn't perfectly politicized. We can't afford to alienate all the well-intentioned white people we know who issue VRCs. The only way we cultivate future white antiracist allies is to prod them just enough so that they do not shut down entirely and we are not entirely complicit to public racist discourse. VRCs really aren't made for teaching moments, even if we want them to be - those happen at a later time, when you are away from the public spaces where paranoia of accountability prevents any honest discussion. Sometimes you can only write out what you wanted to say, even if you didn't get to say it to the people you wanted to say it to. At least it will have been said. And that has to be enough, at least for now.
Monday, November 22, 2010
On blogging and change
Last August, I was asked to start a blog as part of a class requirement. At the time, I was anxiously uncertain. I've never thought of myself as a blogger, or as a potential blogger, or as someone who would ever in their little life do anything remotely blog-like. Part of it is my general aversion to social media...I cling to the idea of a quiet, inward life that I share with actual friends. You know...in person. As in, not on the internet.
But it was also largely because I had no idea why I'd do it. As far as I saw it, there were three kinds of blogs. The first are the genuinely awesome blogs that have been around for a long time and work collectively with multiple writers. In that sense, me starting a blog would be like starting another non-profit - why would I try and go out on my own when thousands of others are already doing what I'm doing, but better? Wouldn't it be smarter for me to just link up with another blog? Shouldn't I be the bigger person and resist individualism, here?
The second kind of blog are the grounded, personal kinds of blogs my friends have made to connect with other friends while they embark on their adventures. I was not leaving a well-paid corporate job to couch surf to the midwest, nor was I traveling to South America for two years, or anything at all romantic worth blogging about. My life is comparatively quite simple, really.
The third kind of blog, which most blogs are in my opinion, is pure self-promotional navel-gazing. I don't know why, but I was fairly sure that if I started a blog, it would be like that. It seemed to me that writing about my thoughts and feelings on a public cyber format for the multitudes to read seemd kinda...conceited.
But then I started blogging, and you know what? I realized that it didn't have to be self-aggrandizing after all! In fact, blogging came shockingly naturally to me. Rather, I should say, writing comes quite naturally to me, and blogging is just a more public form of writing. After working out the early kinks of the Academic Voice I'd straight-jacketed myself into over the years, I unearthed a warmer, more casual voice. I remembered how much I had loved to write, to find the narrative, to arch the narrative back to a meaningful point. I remembered how to discover these points as I was writing, to start writing without really knowing what I was saying until I knew I had already said it. And remembering the sense of aliveness in writing, not for an assignment or because I had to, but out of the love of it.
More importantly, I soon found that I had. Something. To. Say.
And (ah, here comes the aggrandizing!) I feel as though this blog has been some of the best scholarship I've produced in graduate school. If not the best, it has undoubtedly been the most meaningful. It keeps me fresh. It keeps me thinking. It keeps me honest. It challenges me to put out to known and unknown public eyes truths that I am not always so sure of, and others that I feel profoundly to be certain. It has called on me to articulate in old and new ways a progressive vision of the world. It has reminded me that the part of me that believes in fighting for this newer, better world has not been snuffed out by the academy, or upstate New York. It has reminded me of why I came here, and what I will do when I leave.
Writing this blog has shown me that there is a fourth kind of blog - the kind where the dorkish among us work out our vision. It's okay with me if no one reads it. It's okay with me if I spend an hour writing a post instead of volunteering. It's okay with me because life is, after all, a strenuous briefness, and I still have a lot to think about.
I'm not sure how long I will maintain this, but I am committed to riding it out a long as it still seems worthwhile. And during this week where we seem to suddenly remember to be gracious, I thank you, dear readers, for joining me in the struggle and the celebration of the blogosphere.
But it was also largely because I had no idea why I'd do it. As far as I saw it, there were three kinds of blogs. The first are the genuinely awesome blogs that have been around for a long time and work collectively with multiple writers. In that sense, me starting a blog would be like starting another non-profit - why would I try and go out on my own when thousands of others are already doing what I'm doing, but better? Wouldn't it be smarter for me to just link up with another blog? Shouldn't I be the bigger person and resist individualism, here?
The second kind of blog are the grounded, personal kinds of blogs my friends have made to connect with other friends while they embark on their adventures. I was not leaving a well-paid corporate job to couch surf to the midwest, nor was I traveling to South America for two years, or anything at all romantic worth blogging about. My life is comparatively quite simple, really.
The third kind of blog, which most blogs are in my opinion, is pure self-promotional navel-gazing. I don't know why, but I was fairly sure that if I started a blog, it would be like that. It seemed to me that writing about my thoughts and feelings on a public cyber format for the multitudes to read seemd kinda...conceited.
But then I started blogging, and you know what? I realized that it didn't have to be self-aggrandizing after all! In fact, blogging came shockingly naturally to me. Rather, I should say, writing comes quite naturally to me, and blogging is just a more public form of writing. After working out the early kinks of the Academic Voice I'd straight-jacketed myself into over the years, I unearthed a warmer, more casual voice. I remembered how much I had loved to write, to find the narrative, to arch the narrative back to a meaningful point. I remembered how to discover these points as I was writing, to start writing without really knowing what I was saying until I knew I had already said it. And remembering the sense of aliveness in writing, not for an assignment or because I had to, but out of the love of it.
More importantly, I soon found that I had. Something. To. Say.
And (ah, here comes the aggrandizing!) I feel as though this blog has been some of the best scholarship I've produced in graduate school. If not the best, it has undoubtedly been the most meaningful. It keeps me fresh. It keeps me thinking. It keeps me honest. It challenges me to put out to known and unknown public eyes truths that I am not always so sure of, and others that I feel profoundly to be certain. It has called on me to articulate in old and new ways a progressive vision of the world. It has reminded me that the part of me that believes in fighting for this newer, better world has not been snuffed out by the academy, or upstate New York. It has reminded me of why I came here, and what I will do when I leave.
Writing this blog has shown me that there is a fourth kind of blog - the kind where the dorkish among us work out our vision. It's okay with me if no one reads it. It's okay with me if I spend an hour writing a post instead of volunteering. It's okay with me because life is, after all, a strenuous briefness, and I still have a lot to think about.
I'm not sure how long I will maintain this, but I am committed to riding it out a long as it still seems worthwhile. And during this week where we seem to suddenly remember to be gracious, I thank you, dear readers, for joining me in the struggle and the celebration of the blogosphere.
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