It’s Black History Month, originated in 1926 by Carter G. Woodson as “Negro History Month.” What that means to me, for one, is that it’s the busiest time of year. As an educator specializing in West African cultural arts, and living and working in predominately African American communities, every month is “Black History Month.” “Black History” isn’t an event, it’s what I do. It’s my life. Day in, day out. The good, the bad and the ugly. It’s just that during the month of February, the rest of the country is reminded of this fact, and my services are suddenly in high demand.
This diary has been a long time brewing. It started with a comment I posted to a diary (NYTimes, Uppity Nig**ers and the Destruction of Wall Street)
by fellow Kossack Deoliver47, on September 24, 2008, when I said:
My husband is black, I am white. We don't have children, but we are educators who live and work in a pretty much 100% African American community on Chicago's south side.
When my husband and I first met he said he was going to have to marry me because he wasn't about to bring a white woman home more than once! When his mother (a Baptist missionary who was rapidly losing her eyesight) met me, she said (not to me): "She's so nice, I thought she was BLACK!"
Last night, we took some of "our" kids out to an event at the University of Chicago--of course, I explained to them, as we passed the law school, "This is where Barack Obama worked as a professor." After the event, one of the boys (14 yr old) said, "Wow, these are nice white people."
Why I post this? For one thing, I think it's interesting to see/hear how white people are perceived from within all Black communities--where does the perception of white people as "mean" come from (or at the very least, not "nice")? It's tragic and all that (yada yada), but before anyone starts screaming "reverse racism", please, think about it.
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When we got home, I said to my husband, "You know, it just occurred to me: we are probably giving these kids their ONLY exposure to white people." Think about that: kids in America who almost NEVER experience white people, at least not in groups (sure, there might be one or two white teachers in their schools, one or two white people in their neighborhoods, but here on the segregated south side of Chicago, it is de facto the case that many children NEVER have to interact with white people because they never get the chance to leave "the Hood".)
Usually, when people talk about "diversity" and "multiculturalism", they talk about it in terms of how white people would benefit from "exposure" or interaction with Blacks. I always cringe at that--so, now black folk are supposed to do the dirty work of cleaning up residual (and or overt) racism? And usually, that means bringing a couple of Black people, as tokens, into otherwise majority white environments, whether in schools or workplaces. Rarely does this occur in the interest of giving those few (token) blacks exposure to white environments--it's done in the interest of helping white people (or white people's children) overcome racism. I guess the idea is that if the experiment succeeds, at some point black people will benefit because racism will be eliminated. But does anyone ever think about what it means for the black person (or kid) to be placed in a situation where he/she may be the only, or one of a handful, of blacks in an otherwise majority white population?
Based on my experience--10 yrs now living and working in an otherwise all Black community (and family)--I think we'd be better off tackling racism in the reverse: let white people and their kids come "down here" to live, learn and work in an all BLACK environment.
I suppose, if "our" kids ever hope to succeed in the world outside the "Hood" where they (and we) live, we're going to have to keep exposing them to white people. Otherwise, how are they ever going to figure out that there are indeed nice white people?
Course, it's always "enlightening" to see how "our" kids react to the amenities in white neighborhoods and schools (wow! they have carpeting in the library? Wow! look at how nice this school is! Wow! Wow! Wow!) And I cannot tell you how I wish it were not so that when I expose these kids to university environments, the student populations they see are 90% white. Because the message is: if you want to go to the good schools, if you want to go to college, if you want to live in the "nice" neighborhoods, you're going to have to learn to live work and deal with white people, not all of whom are going to be "nice". If you want to "succeed," you're going to have to learn to be a "minority" in a predominately white environment. And yes, we have had kids actually make this comment "Wow! White people sure know how to take care of their houses!" (After that one, we drove past Obama's house, btw, and said, "Here, this is where Barack Obama lives." --it's just a couple blocks from Farrakhan's place--and both of them are very nice houses! Thank goodness there are some predominately African American neighborhoods around here that are just as "nice" as the white suburbs.)
Sigh.
And further, in another comment:
Oddly enough, in our situation, hubby's the one who has most exposure to the white world--he's gotta go there to get the MONEY to fund what we do--I'm the one who's down here in the back alleys and such, literally!
Some of "my" kids get harassed for their involvement w/ me: once, when someone said, "Hey, what you doin' with that white B***?", the kids said, "What you talkin' about, Miss X ain't white!" Yo, kids say, and see the darndest things. At this point, when I go into schools and meet new kids for the first time, they are sincerely confused: this year I had this kid look at me in utter confusion and ask, "are you like mixed-blood or something?" (truth is, I actually AM, but let's not add another color to this scheme: fact is, I LOOK like a nice Jewish white girl--and let's make no mistake about it: I've got no problems with how I look even though, in many ways, with the work I do and the life I live....it's probably the ONE job in the world where being a black male might be an advantage.)
I'm always amazed by the way that people like us, after a while, are simply not seen by the rest of the community as being white anymore. The sad thing, I don't think that works in reverse: that is to say, I'm pretty sure my husband is still seen as "that black guy" at the office. And I don't think my husband would lose his job if anyone found out about me. lol.
To me it's sorta odd, because I'm always pretty conscious of the fact that I am the only white person around, which drives me crazy because I know that at this point I'm probably the only person who's thinking about that. Gotta wonder if it's the same way for blacks who live and/or work in predominately white communities?
Sadly, I have had to sacrifice just about ALL of my childhood and early college "associates", family included....one by one, they've just faded from view, fallen out of contact....I guess they never figured they'd have to deal with someone from "that" community. Oh. Well. From my end, our worlds are just too far apart, and I get too tired of trying to make certain things clear...always having to explain, explain, explain, or justify, or whatever.
Flash forward to Today. “Post-racial” America. Yes, We Can!-America! Yes, We Did-America! Hey, we’ve got a Black president, what more do you want? A Black president from Chicago no less! Kumbaya, my Lord, Kumbaya.
Yesterday, to kick off our Black History Month marathon, we took the kids out to a suburban elementary school. Needless to say, the school population was 90% white. There were a few African American students in the audience—5 maybe, 6?—a number of Hispanics, and some kids of Asian and or East Indian descent. For most of them, our presentation of traditional West African culture was the most “exotic” experience they’d had in their lifetimes (the PTA person who invited us confirmed this: “these kids’ parent would never expose them to something like this.”) And it’s a good thing at least one parent saw the need to bring us in. It’s a start. For many of those kids, I know it will stick. That one-hour presentation will come back to them someday—like maybe when they’re interviewing some Black guy for a job, or deciding whether or not to give a loan to some family looking to take out a mortgage on a home (in their neighborhood?...one can hope, right?)
It’s long since ceased to “shock” me, I guess. I sometimes wish it would cease to upset me. I’m in this gymnasium filled with kids, grades K-6. With me on stage: five African American males—all of them, my “students”. One of them, my husband. The rest: boys from the “Hood.”
We have come to their school from our classroom on the South Side of Chicago--just a stone’s throw from what has since been dubbed the “Center of the Presidential Universe”—Barack Obama’s Kenwood home on Greenwood Avenue. Until they closed off the street, we used to drive by there on our way to and from rehearsals. We spent about an hour on the road getting to this suburban school: driving down McMansion-lined streets (absent the potholes we’ve learned to skillfully swerve to avoid, absent the boarded-up buildings, businesses with bars on the windows) to arrive at the school, with all its amenities: toilet paper in the bathrooms, carpeted hallways, fully-equipped computer labs, and (most conspicuous of all, perhaps), no armed security guard on duty.
I joked with the kids: “See, this is why your principal can’t stand me: he’s afraid I’m going to show you what a real school looks like!”
One of them objected: “Hey! My school is a real school.”
“Yeah, it is,” I said, “But there is no reason on God’s green earth that your school should not have all the amenities this one does!”
Before the presentation began, the shoe dropped: a 7-year old popped the question: “Where did all these Black people come from?”
All these Black people. Five of them. Five African American males. Where did they come from? I couldn’t help but wonder: what is the quota here? What is the capacity? How many Black people does it take to make white people (regardless of age) feel uncomfortable. We know that the country can take one. “That one.” (And if you count the family, well, maybe we’re reaching the limit?)
I suppose if I’d been on my toes, I might have said: “Barack Obama sent them!” or something like that. But I didn’t. I just said, “Well, they’re from Chicago—and they’re with me.” As if my whiteness were some kind of stamp of approval?
All this takes me back to that comment I made in September:
Usually, when people talk about "diversity" and "multiculturalism", they talk about it in terms of how white people would benefit from "exposure" or interaction with Blacks. I always cringe at that--so, now black folk are supposed to do the dirty work of cleaning up residual (and or overt) racism? And usually, that means bringing a couple of Black people, as tokens, into otherwise majority white environments, whether in schools or workplaces. Rarely does this occur in the interest of giving those few (token) blacks exposure to white environments--it's done in the interest of helping white people (or white people's children) overcome racism. I guess the idea is that if the experiment succeeds, at some point black people will benefit because racism will be eliminated. But does anyone ever think about what it means for the black person (or kid) to be placed in a situation where he/she may be the only, or one of a handful, of blacks in an otherwise majority white population?
I’m glad my kids didn’t overhear the exchange between me and the little white boy, and I didn’t tell them about it.
But this little incident has convinced me that we are going about this business of “reversing racism” in the wrong way, and, as I recently said to some friends of mine:
If I were king of the forest, "integration" would mean that kids from suburban schools would be required to spend one year of their education in OUR schools, where they would learn to understand what it means to be in the "minority" in a "culturally diverse" (cough!) environment. I mean, really, why is it when we talk about integrating schools, we always talk about bussing black kids into white schools? How about bussing some white kids into black schools for a change? (Somehow, I suspect that plan would bring about real change a lot faster!)
On the other hand, I’m not so sure I’m ready to risk the sacrifice this would entail for me and my community here on the South Side of Chicago. This is the place that produced the likes of Michelle Obama. A recent article in the The Atlantic about Michelle Obama and her South Side Chicago roots highlights what I already know from life “down here” on the south side:
Like its New York counterparts—Harlem in Manhattan, Jamaica in Queens, and Bedford-Stuyvesant in Brooklyn—the South Side is a black island in a mostly white city. But if the South Side were an island, it would be huge. Unlike Harlem, the South Side isn’t one neighborhood, but a collection of smaller neighborhoods covering 60 percent of the city. All told, the sprawling South Side is arguably the country’s largest black enclave.
(Timuel) Black’s memories of Chicago strivers draw from a deep well of myth and fact. The black power struggle in Chicago literally dates back to the city’s founding by the 18th-century trader Jean Baptist Point Du Sable, who, like the president-elect, was a biracial black man. The South Side has been home to the largest black insurance companies in the North, such as Supreme Liberty Life and Chicago Metropolitan Assurance. Ditto for black banks like Seaway National and Independence. Half of the first 14 black CPAs came out of Chicago. The publications that defined black Americans—the Chicago Defender, Ebony, and Jet—were also products of Chicago.
The first black congressmen elected in the 20th century were South Siders Oscar De Priest and his successor Arthur Mitchell. For years, they were the only black congressmen. The only two serious African American presidential campaigns—those of Jesse Jackson and Barack Obama—came out of the South Side. Indeed, Barack Obama, Louis Farrakhan, and Jesse Jackson all lived or worked within a 10-minute drive of each other.
Chicago in the early 20th century was racist and segregated, but whereas in the South black voters were violently suppressed, in the North they were encouraged—the better to feed Chicago’s infamous machine. Moreover, Chicago’s industry was booming, and the Defender painted the city to southerners in typical immigrant fashion—streets paved with gold, and jobs for all who wanted them. For years, the saying among Timuel Black’s peers was a reverse of the old Frank Sinatra riff—“If you can’t make it in Chicago,” they’d say, “you can’t make it anywhere.”
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In 1948, Chicago’s method of segregating housing—restrictive covenants—was struck down in court, triggering white flight. The South Side suffered, but unlike in other neighborhoods in other cities, the black middle class in Chicago did not follow whites to the suburbs. The result is that while the South Side bears a disproportionate share of the city’s poverty, it also has several steady working- to middle-class neighborhoods.
Michelle Obama’s South Shore, for example, held on to its basic economic makeup. “When we moved over, the neighborhood was changing,” Robinson said. “There were good schools, that’s why people moved, and it was the reason we moved. I enjoyed living there. It was fine with me that it was changing. Some people felt the schools were too geared to whites. People were very conscious and wanted black artists in the schools. My point was just to go to school and learn what you have to learn.”
Robinson and her husband also had the advantage of a few overlooked attributes of Chicago. The South Side was almost a black world unto itself, replete with the economic and cultural complexity of the greater city. There were debutantes and cotillions as well as gangs and drug addicts. Mostly, there were men like Fraser Robinson, black people working a job, trying to get by. The diversity and the demographics allowed the Robinsons to protect their kids from the street life, and also from direct, personal racism. And then there was family life. The Robinsons played board games on the weekends. Michelle loved The Brady Bunch.
I’m not sure I want to sacrifice this “black world unto itself”. Would the white people move in here and start asking “Where did all these Black people come from?”
Again, harking back to the comments I made to Deoliver47’s diary in September, these statements from the Atlantic article make me wonder:
In fact, for the legions of black people who grew up like Michelle Obama—in a functioning, self-contained African American world—racial identity recedes in the consciousness. You know you’re black, but in much the same way that white people know they are white. Since everyone else around you looks like you, you just take it as the norm, the standard, the unremarkable. Objectively, you know you’re in the minority, but that status hits home only when you walk out into the wider world and realize that, out there, you really are different.
I came up in segregated West Baltimore. I understood black as a culture—as Etta James, jumping the broom, the Electric Slide. I understood the history and the politics, the debilitating effects of racism. But I did not understand blackness as a minority until I was an “only,” until I was a young man walking into rooms filled with people who did not look like me. In many ways, segregation protected me—to this day, I’ve never been called a nigger by a white person, and although I know that racism is part of why I define myself as black, I don’t feel that way, any more than I feel that the two oceans define me as American. But in other ways, segregation left me unprepared for the discovery that my world was not the world. In her book Michelle: A Biography, Liza Mundy quotes another South Sider explaining the predicament:
“When you grow up in a black community with a warm black family, you are aware of the fact that you are black, but you don’t feel it … After a certain point you do just kind of think you’re in your own world, and you become very comfortable in that world, and to this day there are African Americans who feel very uncomfortable when they step out of it … This is a society that never lets you forget that you are black.”
Do I really want the people I love to sacrifice their south side home to the cause of reversing racism? Atlantic author Ta-Nehisi Coates continues:
In most black people, there is a South Side, a sense of home, that never leaves, and yet to compete in the world, we have to go forth. So we learn to code-switch and become bilingual. We save our Timberlands for the weekend, and our jokes for the cats in the mail room. Some of us give ourselves up completely and become the mask, while others overcompensate and turn every dustup into the Montgomery bus boycott.
I’m not so sure I’m ready to fill “my kids” in on that. Not sure I’m ready to let them know, “Yep. They’re wondering where ‘all those Black people come from.” They’ll figure it out soon enough.
Either way, it seems, it’s the whites who benefit most from “integration”—at least for now. Personally, with an intimate view of “both sides of the tracks”—with what Deoliver47 described as “you have a unique window into the community that few white folks ever get”, and with what I know is not such a unique view of the White community—one that Black folks almost always get as soon as they venture outside that “Black world unto itself” “with a warm black family”—I’d like to see what might happen if we ever took “separate but equal seriously.”
Supply our schools with toilet paper. Supply them with computer labs, carpeting and libraries. Stock them with good teachers—the kind of people Marian Robinson refers to when she says:
Michelle, Barack, and my son are not abnormal,” Marian Robinson said. “All my relatives, all my friends, all their friends, all their parents, almost all of them have the same story. It’s just that their families aren’t running for president. It bothers me that people see Michelle and Barack as so phenomenal, because there’s so much of that in the black neighborhood. They went to the same schools we all did. They went through the same struggles.”
Accept that our cities are (and our schools) segregated. Level the playing field. Then let’s see how many “Barack Obamas” the South Side produces in the next 20 years, and let some suburban kid figure out for himself “where all these Black people came from.” He'll figure it out soon enough.