Koritha Mitchell's Blog, page 2
December 11, 2011
Black Art ��� Protest Art: A Contrarian View, Indeed
In the 2 months that my book Living with Lynching has been in print, readers have asked questions that have stayed with me, partly because I wish I had given more complete answers in the moment. One such question came from Mark Anthony Neal, Duke University professor of African and African American Studies and host of the weekly webcast
Left of Black
. Because I insist that protest is too limiting a framework for understanding the lynching plays that I examine, he asked why I think scholars so often use a protest literature lens. My answer was way too tentative and vague. I have very clear ideas about why this pattern persists. In short: because it has become ���common sense��� to think of black art as a reaction.
However, what parades as ���common sense��� sometimes creates a barrier to critical thinking. Michael Omi and Howard Winant have shown this very clearly regarding race in the United States. Because ideas supporting the racial status quo pass as common sense, certain assumptions and conclusions seem natural, despite not being even close to accurate. This has certainly become the case with approaches to black art.
The degree to which ���black art = protest art��� has become the kind of common sense that hinders critical thinking is perhaps best exemplified by the disproportionate attention that Kenneth Warren���s What Was African American Literature? has received. Somehow, it works for Harvard University Press, The Chronicle of Higher Education, The LA Review of Books, and respected scholars, such as Werner Sollors, that Warren defines a vast body of literature as simply a ���response to the disfranchisement of blacks in the south, which set the stage for the consolidation of Jim Crow segregation.��� Warren claims that resisting oppression was the only reason that countless literary works emerged, and too many have accepted this as a legitimate assertion. Of course, many have done so with the understanding that this overstated rhetoric simply makes his polemic possible, but even that acknowledgment (and the recognition that Warren's stature gives him cultural capital within the publishing industry), does not fully explain the solemnity with which this book is being engaged. I therefore humbly submit that an important reason for this book���s existence, and people���s willingness to have earnest discussions of it, is this: most in the United States accept as common sense that black artists who embrace that identity can only respond.
The tagline for Mark Anthony Neal���s show Left of Black is "A Contrarian View of Blackness," and thinking about his question has reminded me that a similar perspective produced Living with Lynching. I argue that lynching plays were not so much responses to white-authored violence as they were efforts to preserve community insights. These playwrights worked to equip African Americans to continue to believe in what they already knew about their communities, that they were made up of men and women who lived according to the standards that the nation claimed to respect. Even though these dramas acknowledge that the mob is a threat, they are not about convincing white people that racial violence is wrong. Contrary to what so many believe, not everything that black artists, philosophers, and even activists do is about white people.
Unfortunately, this is an argument that americans seldom hear and that few feel empowered to make. In fact, while writing this book, I kept encountering people who not only had trouble accepting my claim, but they also feared for my career because I was making it. With my best interests at heart, one colleague warned, ���Well, we���re talking about lynching, Koritha. Can you really say that it���s not about responding to whites?���
There is no doubt in my mind, though: blacks who lived and wrote in the midst of mob violence do not simply teach us about anti-lynching efforts; they teach us a great deal about lynching itself. If you want to understand lynching, you cannot just look at the evidence that perpetrators left. You also need to pay attention to what targeted communities had to say. And one of the things that they said, if we will only listen, is that mob violence was a response to black achievement.
The plays show that African Americans were busy minding their own business, and sometimes, this led them not only to survive but also thrive in the ���Progressive Era.��� When they achieved certain kinds of success, white supremacists reacted violently. So, the literature preserves evidence of black community activities, but because those activities beckoned the mob, most scholars now claim that the art itself was a response to the mob. Not so! And, as my book demonstrates, lynching playwrights were not the only ones who made this clear.
I allowed myself to be tentative and vague regarding these issues on Left of Black, and I am haunted by what I did not say while being interviewed. So, I will now be bold enough to reveal the loftiest goal I had while writing this book. I hope that Living with Lynching will do for the study of lynching, racial violence, and the Jim Crow Era what books like John Blassingame���s The Slave Community (1972) did for the study of ���the peculiar institution.��� Blassingame���s research, and the work of those inspired by it, made it unacceptable to teach slavery using only documents produced by slave masters and other whites. Historians began recognizing that understanding the institution required new methodologies that allowed them to engage the perspectives of the enslaved.
If readers are at all convinced by what I present in Living with Lynching, it should be very hard to claim that you understand racial violence unless you can see black art as much more than protest.
However, what parades as ���common sense��� sometimes creates a barrier to critical thinking. Michael Omi and Howard Winant have shown this very clearly regarding race in the United States. Because ideas supporting the racial status quo pass as common sense, certain assumptions and conclusions seem natural, despite not being even close to accurate. This has certainly become the case with approaches to black art.
The degree to which ���black art = protest art��� has become the kind of common sense that hinders critical thinking is perhaps best exemplified by the disproportionate attention that Kenneth Warren���s What Was African American Literature? has received. Somehow, it works for Harvard University Press, The Chronicle of Higher Education, The LA Review of Books, and respected scholars, such as Werner Sollors, that Warren defines a vast body of literature as simply a ���response to the disfranchisement of blacks in the south, which set the stage for the consolidation of Jim Crow segregation.��� Warren claims that resisting oppression was the only reason that countless literary works emerged, and too many have accepted this as a legitimate assertion. Of course, many have done so with the understanding that this overstated rhetoric simply makes his polemic possible, but even that acknowledgment (and the recognition that Warren's stature gives him cultural capital within the publishing industry), does not fully explain the solemnity with which this book is being engaged. I therefore humbly submit that an important reason for this book���s existence, and people���s willingness to have earnest discussions of it, is this: most in the United States accept as common sense that black artists who embrace that identity can only respond.
The tagline for Mark Anthony Neal���s show Left of Black is "A Contrarian View of Blackness," and thinking about his question has reminded me that a similar perspective produced Living with Lynching. I argue that lynching plays were not so much responses to white-authored violence as they were efforts to preserve community insights. These playwrights worked to equip African Americans to continue to believe in what they already knew about their communities, that they were made up of men and women who lived according to the standards that the nation claimed to respect. Even though these dramas acknowledge that the mob is a threat, they are not about convincing white people that racial violence is wrong. Contrary to what so many believe, not everything that black artists, philosophers, and even activists do is about white people.
Unfortunately, this is an argument that americans seldom hear and that few feel empowered to make. In fact, while writing this book, I kept encountering people who not only had trouble accepting my claim, but they also feared for my career because I was making it. With my best interests at heart, one colleague warned, ���Well, we���re talking about lynching, Koritha. Can you really say that it���s not about responding to whites?���
There is no doubt in my mind, though: blacks who lived and wrote in the midst of mob violence do not simply teach us about anti-lynching efforts; they teach us a great deal about lynching itself. If you want to understand lynching, you cannot just look at the evidence that perpetrators left. You also need to pay attention to what targeted communities had to say. And one of the things that they said, if we will only listen, is that mob violence was a response to black achievement.
The plays show that African Americans were busy minding their own business, and sometimes, this led them not only to survive but also thrive in the ���Progressive Era.��� When they achieved certain kinds of success, white supremacists reacted violently. So, the literature preserves evidence of black community activities, but because those activities beckoned the mob, most scholars now claim that the art itself was a response to the mob. Not so! And, as my book demonstrates, lynching playwrights were not the only ones who made this clear.
I allowed myself to be tentative and vague regarding these issues on Left of Black, and I am haunted by what I did not say while being interviewed. So, I will now be bold enough to reveal the loftiest goal I had while writing this book. I hope that Living with Lynching will do for the study of lynching, racial violence, and the Jim Crow Era what books like John Blassingame���s The Slave Community (1972) did for the study of ���the peculiar institution.��� Blassingame���s research, and the work of those inspired by it, made it unacceptable to teach slavery using only documents produced by slave masters and other whites. Historians began recognizing that understanding the institution required new methodologies that allowed them to engage the perspectives of the enslaved.
If readers are at all convinced by what I present in Living with Lynching, it should be very hard to claim that you understand racial violence unless you can see black art as much more than protest.
Black Art ≠ Protest Art: A Contrarian View, Indeed
In the 2 months that my book Living with Lynching has been in print, readers have asked questions that have stayed with me, partly because I wish I had given more complete answers in the moment. One such question came from Mark Anthony Neal, Duke University professor of African and African American Studies and host of the weekly webcast
Left of Black
. Because I insist that protest is too limiting a framework for understanding the lynching plays that I examine, he asked why I think scholars so often use a protest literature lens. My answer was way too tentative and vague. I have very clear ideas about why this pattern persists. In short: because it has become “common sense” to think of black art as a reaction.
However, what parades as “common sense” sometimes creates a barrier to critical thinking. Michael Omi and Howard Winant have shown this very clearly regarding race in the United States. Because ideas supporting the racial status quo pass as common sense, certain assumptions and conclusions seem natural, despite not being even close to accurate. This has certainly become the case with approaches to black art.
The degree to which “black art = protest art” has become the kind of common sense that hinders critical thinking is perhaps best exemplified by the disproportionate attention that Kenneth Warren’s What Was African American Literature? has received. Somehow, it works for Harvard University Press, The Chronicle of Higher Education, The LA Review of Books, and respected scholars, such as Werner Sollors, that Warren defines a vast body of literature as simply a “response to the disfranchisement of blacks in the south, which set the stage for the consolidation of Jim Crow segregation.” Warren claims that resisting oppression was the only reason that countless literary works emerged, and too many have accepted this as a legitimate assertion. Of course, many have done so with the understanding that this overstated rhetoric simply makes his polemic possible, but even that acknowledgment (and the recognition that Warren's stature gives him cultural capital within the publishing industry), does not fully explain the solemnity with which this book is being engaged. I therefore humbly submit that an important reason for this book’s existence, and people’s willingness to have earnest discussions of it, is this: most in the United States accept as common sense that black artists who embrace that identity can only respond.
The tagline for Mark Anthony Neal’s show Left of Black is "A Contrarian View of Blackness," and thinking about his question has reminded me that a similar perspective produced Living with Lynching. I argue that lynching plays were not so much responses to white-authored violence as they were efforts to preserve community insights. These playwrights worked to equip African Americans to continue to believe in what they already knew about their communities, that they were made up of men and women who lived according to the standards that the nation claimed to respect. Even though these dramas acknowledge that the mob is a threat, they are not about convincing white people that racial violence is wrong. Contrary to what so many believe, not everything that black artists, philosophers, and even activists do is about white people.
Unfortunately, this is an argument that americans seldom hear and that few feel empowered to make. In fact, while writing this book, I kept encountering people who not only had trouble accepting my claim, but they also feared for my career because I was making it. With my best interests at heart, one colleague warned, “Well, we’re talking about lynching, Koritha. Can you really say that it’s not about responding to whites?”
There is no doubt in my mind, though: blacks who lived and wrote in the midst of mob violence do not simply teach us about anti-lynching efforts; they teach us a great deal about lynching itself. If you want to understand lynching, you cannot just look at the evidence that perpetrators left. You also need to pay attention to what targeted communities had to say. And one of the things that they said, if we will only listen, is that mob violence was a response to black achievement.
The plays show that African Americans were busy minding their own business, and sometimes, this led them not only to survive but also thrive in the “Progressive Era.” When they achieved certain kinds of success, white supremacists reacted violently. So, the literature preserves evidence of black community activities, but because those activities beckoned the mob, most scholars now claim that the art itself was a response to the mob. Not so! And, as my book demonstrates, lynching playwrights were not the only ones who made this clear.
I allowed myself to be tentative and vague regarding these issues on Left of Black, and I am haunted by what I did not say while being interviewed. So, I will now be bold enough to reveal the loftiest goal I had while writing this book. I hope that Living with Lynching will do for the study of lynching, racial violence, and the Jim Crow Era what books like John Blassingame’s The Slave Community (1972) did for the study of “the peculiar institution.” Blassingame’s research, and the work of those inspired by it, made it unacceptable to teach slavery using only documents produced by slave masters and other whites. Historians began recognizing that understanding the institution required new methodologies that allowed them to engage the perspectives of the enslaved.
If readers are at all convinced by what I present in Living with Lynching, it should be very hard to claim that you understand racial violence unless you can see black art as much more than protest.
However, what parades as “common sense” sometimes creates a barrier to critical thinking. Michael Omi and Howard Winant have shown this very clearly regarding race in the United States. Because ideas supporting the racial status quo pass as common sense, certain assumptions and conclusions seem natural, despite not being even close to accurate. This has certainly become the case with approaches to black art.
The degree to which “black art = protest art” has become the kind of common sense that hinders critical thinking is perhaps best exemplified by the disproportionate attention that Kenneth Warren’s What Was African American Literature? has received. Somehow, it works for Harvard University Press, The Chronicle of Higher Education, The LA Review of Books, and respected scholars, such as Werner Sollors, that Warren defines a vast body of literature as simply a “response to the disfranchisement of blacks in the south, which set the stage for the consolidation of Jim Crow segregation.” Warren claims that resisting oppression was the only reason that countless literary works emerged, and too many have accepted this as a legitimate assertion. Of course, many have done so with the understanding that this overstated rhetoric simply makes his polemic possible, but even that acknowledgment (and the recognition that Warren's stature gives him cultural capital within the publishing industry), does not fully explain the solemnity with which this book is being engaged. I therefore humbly submit that an important reason for this book’s existence, and people’s willingness to have earnest discussions of it, is this: most in the United States accept as common sense that black artists who embrace that identity can only respond.
The tagline for Mark Anthony Neal’s show Left of Black is "A Contrarian View of Blackness," and thinking about his question has reminded me that a similar perspective produced Living with Lynching. I argue that lynching plays were not so much responses to white-authored violence as they were efforts to preserve community insights. These playwrights worked to equip African Americans to continue to believe in what they already knew about their communities, that they were made up of men and women who lived according to the standards that the nation claimed to respect. Even though these dramas acknowledge that the mob is a threat, they are not about convincing white people that racial violence is wrong. Contrary to what so many believe, not everything that black artists, philosophers, and even activists do is about white people.
Unfortunately, this is an argument that americans seldom hear and that few feel empowered to make. In fact, while writing this book, I kept encountering people who not only had trouble accepting my claim, but they also feared for my career because I was making it. With my best interests at heart, one colleague warned, “Well, we’re talking about lynching, Koritha. Can you really say that it’s not about responding to whites?”
There is no doubt in my mind, though: blacks who lived and wrote in the midst of mob violence do not simply teach us about anti-lynching efforts; they teach us a great deal about lynching itself. If you want to understand lynching, you cannot just look at the evidence that perpetrators left. You also need to pay attention to what targeted communities had to say. And one of the things that they said, if we will only listen, is that mob violence was a response to black achievement.
The plays show that African Americans were busy minding their own business, and sometimes, this led them not only to survive but also thrive in the “Progressive Era.” When they achieved certain kinds of success, white supremacists reacted violently. So, the literature preserves evidence of black community activities, but because those activities beckoned the mob, most scholars now claim that the art itself was a response to the mob. Not so! And, as my book demonstrates, lynching playwrights were not the only ones who made this clear.
I allowed myself to be tentative and vague regarding these issues on Left of Black, and I am haunted by what I did not say while being interviewed. So, I will now be bold enough to reveal the loftiest goal I had while writing this book. I hope that Living with Lynching will do for the study of lynching, racial violence, and the Jim Crow Era what books like John Blassingame’s The Slave Community (1972) did for the study of “the peculiar institution.” Blassingame’s research, and the work of those inspired by it, made it unacceptable to teach slavery using only documents produced by slave masters and other whites. Historians began recognizing that understanding the institution required new methodologies that allowed them to engage the perspectives of the enslaved.
If readers are at all convinced by what I present in Living with Lynching, it should be very hard to claim that you understand racial violence unless you can see black art as much more than protest.
September 8, 2011
Why I love AWKWARD BLACK GIRL
As a literary historian and cultural critic committed to understanding how targeted communities survive racial violence, my work seldom focuses on comedy. But, of course, humor has been important for the survival of those grappling with colonialism, slavery, and their many legacies. Without making claims about its ties to these larger historical trajectories, I want to make a declaration: The Mis-adventures of Awkward Black Girl, a comedy series available on YouTube, is one of the few things that has made me laugh out loud in a long time.
What I find most brilliant about this show is its refusal to invest in any sort of propriety. Yet, it is not driven by the cliché premise of Oh, look. I’m being shocking and irreverent! Instead, the web series simply explores everything that its protagonist, J (portrayed by the show’s creator Issa Rae), would find vexing. In the process, hilarity emerges from sheer honesty. J asks questions that many of us have wanted to ask. For example, “What’s the protocol for repeatedly running into someone at a stop sign? (Episode 1). And, “How many fake laughs are acceptable before it becomes too much?” (Episode 1). Or, when unable to escape an annoying conversation, “Did I die and go to simple bitch hell?” (Episode 6).
The refusal to invest in propriety strikes a chord because it enables the show to represent a black woman protagonist with much more complexity than mainstream outlets allow. Perhaps the best example is that which opens the series: J’s voice-over introduces her character, and we quickly find that she enjoys violent rap songs saturated with Ns and Bs. She asks, “Am I the only one who pretends I’m in a music video when I’m by myself?,” and we find her driving while performing along with a song about Ns wanting to sex her from behind (Episode 1). Clearly, this character’s portrayal is not going to be governed by whether or not this is a “positive” image of a black woman.
The music only gets worse—in every way—when J is responsible for its creation! As a coping mechanism, she composes violent rap lyrics. She despises one of her co-workers, and her songs reveal what she would like to do to this woman. No need for viewers to be concerned, though. As J explains, “it’s not violence if you don’t act on it” (Episode 6).
Because the writing focuses on the truth of J’s character, the episodes are all about situations that she finds awkward, and her workplace proves to be a treasure trove. Once again, J’s voice-over offers much of the comedy; her tone is very matter-of-fact, giving the impression that she is simply making observations. J describes the company she works for: “Basically, we sell bulimia in pill form” (Episode 2). Among her co-workers is “The Loud Black Bitch.” Though we only briefly encounter this character, her disregard for others encourages viewers to accept the description. The show is not so scared of a stereotype that it avoids suggesting that a few such people might exist. But, one of my favorite characters is “Boss Lady,” the white woman supervisor who loves to bond with J by speaking slang, wearing her hair in cornrows, and talking about her attraction to black men. Then, of course, there is Amir, the “walking rainbow of racism” who gets away with it “because no one knows what he is” (Episode 3).
The show engages interracial dating in Episode 7, and J’s new best friend (her awkward soulmate, Cece) declares herself “an interracial expert” and gives J horrible advice. Still, non-verbal communication is the most amusing element of this episode. For example, when J and her white date walk into a restaurant, they draw lots of stares. As the camera scans the room, a black man with his arm around his white girlfriend shakes his head and rolls his eyes. There is no voice-over commentary, no additional dialogue to underscore it—just the facial expression and clear message of the gesture. Beautiful! The well executed acting creates a moment that instantly brings to mind every conversation I have had about the frequency with which black men date white women and the very different reactions inspired when black women consider exploring similar options.
This first date with a white man does not go so well, partly because he takes J to a spoken word showcase. Again, we see evidence that this comedy series will not be governed by what “should” or “should not” be said. Via voice-over, J declares, “Rap and poetry had a baby called Spoken Word. I wish I could abort that baby.” And later, “God invented liquor because He foresaw spoken word. Praise Him!” (Episode 7). J’s disdain for the form is not a blanket statement. It has everything to do with the quality of work in this particular showcase—a fact that is undeniable as the episode features some of the performed pieces in their entirety.
You must see the short episodes on YouTube for yourself because there is no way to capture the show’s genius here. There have already been insightful articulations of why people love the series so much that viewers contributed more than $44K to ensure that Episode 7 would not be the last one. I simply wanted to add that the show’s “improper” elements are crucial because they enable a nuanced portrait of the protagonist. This works so well because the truth about people of color is that we are complex and often contradictory, despite the mainstream media’s centuries-long habit of portraying us in narrow and simplistic ways.
These complexities can come through when we can free ourselves, even momentarily, from a bias toward perfection. This is difficult, I know. After all, those whom U.S. society marginalizes are constantly told that propriety is the ticket to social acceptance and full citizenship. Thus, people who are homosexual, of color, and/or poor are taught to invest in standards of propriety and morality that privileged folk can disregard without losing acceptance or basic rights. No wonder we so rarely encounter characters—who are not white, heterosexual, and middle-class—that are allowed to simply be themselves and experience life, whether what they do, think, and say is admirable or not.
When I see J, I am thoroughly amused for more reasons than I can name, but I know that the show’s tendency to avoid shoulds and should nots is at the top of the list. Though I understand the investment in propriety, we need more artists who will let their characters of color have their complete experiences and all of their messy behavior and quirky thoughts. Too often, our stories are all about moralizing, as if there is no room for anything else—as if black communities (especially) are so lost that everything that engages black characters must also come with a guidebook for living. That's not the case. Despite mainstream depictions (including those on the news), we have plenty of strong families in the community that fit the traditional mold. And, we have some that don't fit the traditional mold but are still quite nurturing and full of role models. Healthy, loving families headed by gays and lesbians constitute just one of many examples.
So, I don't believe that every bit of artistic expression involving folk who are not white and/or heterosexual and/or solidly middle-class must offer life lessons. Some can just make us laugh out loud, which The Mis-adventures of Awkward Black Girl does exceptionally well.
What I find most brilliant about this show is its refusal to invest in any sort of propriety. Yet, it is not driven by the cliché premise of Oh, look. I’m being shocking and irreverent! Instead, the web series simply explores everything that its protagonist, J (portrayed by the show’s creator Issa Rae), would find vexing. In the process, hilarity emerges from sheer honesty. J asks questions that many of us have wanted to ask. For example, “What’s the protocol for repeatedly running into someone at a stop sign? (Episode 1). And, “How many fake laughs are acceptable before it becomes too much?” (Episode 1). Or, when unable to escape an annoying conversation, “Did I die and go to simple bitch hell?” (Episode 6).
The refusal to invest in propriety strikes a chord because it enables the show to represent a black woman protagonist with much more complexity than mainstream outlets allow. Perhaps the best example is that which opens the series: J’s voice-over introduces her character, and we quickly find that she enjoys violent rap songs saturated with Ns and Bs. She asks, “Am I the only one who pretends I’m in a music video when I’m by myself?,” and we find her driving while performing along with a song about Ns wanting to sex her from behind (Episode 1). Clearly, this character’s portrayal is not going to be governed by whether or not this is a “positive” image of a black woman.
The music only gets worse—in every way—when J is responsible for its creation! As a coping mechanism, she composes violent rap lyrics. She despises one of her co-workers, and her songs reveal what she would like to do to this woman. No need for viewers to be concerned, though. As J explains, “it’s not violence if you don’t act on it” (Episode 6).
Because the writing focuses on the truth of J’s character, the episodes are all about situations that she finds awkward, and her workplace proves to be a treasure trove. Once again, J’s voice-over offers much of the comedy; her tone is very matter-of-fact, giving the impression that she is simply making observations. J describes the company she works for: “Basically, we sell bulimia in pill form” (Episode 2). Among her co-workers is “The Loud Black Bitch.” Though we only briefly encounter this character, her disregard for others encourages viewers to accept the description. The show is not so scared of a stereotype that it avoids suggesting that a few such people might exist. But, one of my favorite characters is “Boss Lady,” the white woman supervisor who loves to bond with J by speaking slang, wearing her hair in cornrows, and talking about her attraction to black men. Then, of course, there is Amir, the “walking rainbow of racism” who gets away with it “because no one knows what he is” (Episode 3).
The show engages interracial dating in Episode 7, and J’s new best friend (her awkward soulmate, Cece) declares herself “an interracial expert” and gives J horrible advice. Still, non-verbal communication is the most amusing element of this episode. For example, when J and her white date walk into a restaurant, they draw lots of stares. As the camera scans the room, a black man with his arm around his white girlfriend shakes his head and rolls his eyes. There is no voice-over commentary, no additional dialogue to underscore it—just the facial expression and clear message of the gesture. Beautiful! The well executed acting creates a moment that instantly brings to mind every conversation I have had about the frequency with which black men date white women and the very different reactions inspired when black women consider exploring similar options.
This first date with a white man does not go so well, partly because he takes J to a spoken word showcase. Again, we see evidence that this comedy series will not be governed by what “should” or “should not” be said. Via voice-over, J declares, “Rap and poetry had a baby called Spoken Word. I wish I could abort that baby.” And later, “God invented liquor because He foresaw spoken word. Praise Him!” (Episode 7). J’s disdain for the form is not a blanket statement. It has everything to do with the quality of work in this particular showcase—a fact that is undeniable as the episode features some of the performed pieces in their entirety.
You must see the short episodes on YouTube for yourself because there is no way to capture the show’s genius here. There have already been insightful articulations of why people love the series so much that viewers contributed more than $44K to ensure that Episode 7 would not be the last one. I simply wanted to add that the show’s “improper” elements are crucial because they enable a nuanced portrait of the protagonist. This works so well because the truth about people of color is that we are complex and often contradictory, despite the mainstream media’s centuries-long habit of portraying us in narrow and simplistic ways.
These complexities can come through when we can free ourselves, even momentarily, from a bias toward perfection. This is difficult, I know. After all, those whom U.S. society marginalizes are constantly told that propriety is the ticket to social acceptance and full citizenship. Thus, people who are homosexual, of color, and/or poor are taught to invest in standards of propriety and morality that privileged folk can disregard without losing acceptance or basic rights. No wonder we so rarely encounter characters—who are not white, heterosexual, and middle-class—that are allowed to simply be themselves and experience life, whether what they do, think, and say is admirable or not.
When I see J, I am thoroughly amused for more reasons than I can name, but I know that the show’s tendency to avoid shoulds and should nots is at the top of the list. Though I understand the investment in propriety, we need more artists who will let their characters of color have their complete experiences and all of their messy behavior and quirky thoughts. Too often, our stories are all about moralizing, as if there is no room for anything else—as if black communities (especially) are so lost that everything that engages black characters must also come with a guidebook for living. That's not the case. Despite mainstream depictions (including those on the news), we have plenty of strong families in the community that fit the traditional mold. And, we have some that don't fit the traditional mold but are still quite nurturing and full of role models. Healthy, loving families headed by gays and lesbians constitute just one of many examples.
So, I don't believe that every bit of artistic expression involving folk who are not white and/or heterosexual and/or solidly middle-class must offer life lessons. Some can just make us laugh out loud, which The Mis-adventures of Awkward Black Girl does exceptionally well.
July 29, 2011
The American Way: Mediocrity, When White, Looks Like Merit
A couple years ago, I attended a meeting with a high-ranking administrator about diversifying the faculty and graduate student population. The administrator had recently hired someone to focus on diversity, and she was also at the meeting. Early in the conversation, someone asked about the racial composition of the administrator's unit. The newly hired diversity officer reported that the staff of nearly 100 people was 98% white. I really appreciated her wording. Rather than say that there were only 1 or 2 people of color, she emphasized that there were 98 whites. When we talk about diversity, we don't do this enough. We leave whiteness unmarked—as if its presence is never up for discussion and certainly not to be questioned. Missing her point, the very powerful administrator later said, sure that he was being reasonable, "Well, we have to be careful because people wanting to get minorities into positions may relax standards."
His comment reflects the accepted way of understanding what most Americans call "affirmative action." However, this view depends on a bold-faced lie, that "race" is a factor only when people of color are involved. Yet, real affirmative action has always been for whites. Whether the rules governing who could own land in Colonial times (these policies certainly didn't favor Native Americans) or the practices ensuring that whites received 98% of FHA loans between 1932 and 1962, real affirmative action has always been for those deemed white.
Do you end up with a staff that is almost 100% white because they are the most qualified the country has to offer? That's certainly the hype that we're taught to believe. However, I have been surrounded by whites all my life, and that has not translated into being surrounded by excellence. When a candidate is white, they can be considered a "good fit" even when their qualifications are not all that impressive, but a candidate of color has to be exceptional (and put whites at ease) in order to get the same designation.
Of course, I am not saying anything new, but the intractability of American -isms makes saying it as relevant today as ever. For the same reason, it is always helpful to re-visit books that have stated the case better than I can. For example, if you have questions about the validity of the term "white" and claims about the benefits that follow "whiteness" in the U.S. context, please see George Lipsitz's The Possessive Investment in Whiteness: How White People Profit from Identity Politics . It discusses (among other things) how maintaining the whiteness of institutions often hinges on an investment in pretending that whiteness has nothing to do with how the institution works.
Recognizing the same dynamic, cultural critic Dwight McBride has argued that when you look at African American faculty members in the top English departments around the country, you find—with very few exceptions— scholars who "by any measure of 'quality' are achieving at the highest levels of distinction in the field." However, "canvass those same English departments of the same top institutions and consider the white faculty members there. What you will find is a range of faculty members from the very distinguished to the mediocre...." Therefore, "...one of the ways in which we will know when black people in the United States are truly liberated and equal to their fellow white citizens will be when there are as many mediocre blacks in academia as there are currently mediocre whites" (2005: 8).
McBride's words have long resonated with me, but my experiences keep telling me how far the United States is from that moment. In the five years before coming up for tenure review, I won two postdoctoral fellowships in competitions among PhD's throughout the nation and from every scholarly discipline. Though neither of the competitions that I won exclude white candidates, they are designed to address the fact that white men are over-represented in the academy. I get the impression that, in the history of my very large and established English department, I am the first person to have won two national fellowships before tenure review. This has not always been treated as an honor for me and the university, though; sometimes, it has caused hostility.
The hostility has often been subtle and it has taken many forms; I will give only the most recent example. I was told by a very senior colleague that my fellowships were more like financial aid because they allowed me to get my first scholarly book written. The book will be the real sign of whether I have done my job well, he explained.
It is incredibly difficult to win fellowships, especially the kind that I earned: that which requires no teaching. These fellowships are an honor and a straightforward investment in the potential that the foundation sees in you as a scholar. Therefore, the foundation essentially pays to relieve you of your teaching obligations to your home institution.
How does such an acknowledgment of the quality of my research get interpreted as financial aid??? In short, the unearned arrogance that comes with white privilege. It's like magic! This man believes that his achievements have had nothing to do with his whiteness, but he cannot imagine that my accomplishments are about anything but someone "cutting me a break" because I am black and a woman.
If I had been a white man who studies Shakespeare, these fellowships would have been deemed an honor to me and the entire department and university; there would have been NO suggestion that this was anything like financial aid.
So, I agree with McBride that we will have made some progress when a wide range of merit is tolerable for people of color, as it currently is for whites. They can be anything from distinguished to mediocre and not have people question their qualifications. Yet, to the majority of those in power, even excellence—if it's not white—does not seem like merit. No wonder our institutions look like they do.
His comment reflects the accepted way of understanding what most Americans call "affirmative action." However, this view depends on a bold-faced lie, that "race" is a factor only when people of color are involved. Yet, real affirmative action has always been for whites. Whether the rules governing who could own land in Colonial times (these policies certainly didn't favor Native Americans) or the practices ensuring that whites received 98% of FHA loans between 1932 and 1962, real affirmative action has always been for those deemed white.
Do you end up with a staff that is almost 100% white because they are the most qualified the country has to offer? That's certainly the hype that we're taught to believe. However, I have been surrounded by whites all my life, and that has not translated into being surrounded by excellence. When a candidate is white, they can be considered a "good fit" even when their qualifications are not all that impressive, but a candidate of color has to be exceptional (and put whites at ease) in order to get the same designation.
Of course, I am not saying anything new, but the intractability of American -isms makes saying it as relevant today as ever. For the same reason, it is always helpful to re-visit books that have stated the case better than I can. For example, if you have questions about the validity of the term "white" and claims about the benefits that follow "whiteness" in the U.S. context, please see George Lipsitz's The Possessive Investment in Whiteness: How White People Profit from Identity Politics . It discusses (among other things) how maintaining the whiteness of institutions often hinges on an investment in pretending that whiteness has nothing to do with how the institution works.
Recognizing the same dynamic, cultural critic Dwight McBride has argued that when you look at African American faculty members in the top English departments around the country, you find—with very few exceptions— scholars who "by any measure of 'quality' are achieving at the highest levels of distinction in the field." However, "canvass those same English departments of the same top institutions and consider the white faculty members there. What you will find is a range of faculty members from the very distinguished to the mediocre...." Therefore, "...one of the ways in which we will know when black people in the United States are truly liberated and equal to their fellow white citizens will be when there are as many mediocre blacks in academia as there are currently mediocre whites" (2005: 8).
McBride's words have long resonated with me, but my experiences keep telling me how far the United States is from that moment. In the five years before coming up for tenure review, I won two postdoctoral fellowships in competitions among PhD's throughout the nation and from every scholarly discipline. Though neither of the competitions that I won exclude white candidates, they are designed to address the fact that white men are over-represented in the academy. I get the impression that, in the history of my very large and established English department, I am the first person to have won two national fellowships before tenure review. This has not always been treated as an honor for me and the university, though; sometimes, it has caused hostility.
The hostility has often been subtle and it has taken many forms; I will give only the most recent example. I was told by a very senior colleague that my fellowships were more like financial aid because they allowed me to get my first scholarly book written. The book will be the real sign of whether I have done my job well, he explained.
It is incredibly difficult to win fellowships, especially the kind that I earned: that which requires no teaching. These fellowships are an honor and a straightforward investment in the potential that the foundation sees in you as a scholar. Therefore, the foundation essentially pays to relieve you of your teaching obligations to your home institution.
How does such an acknowledgment of the quality of my research get interpreted as financial aid??? In short, the unearned arrogance that comes with white privilege. It's like magic! This man believes that his achievements have had nothing to do with his whiteness, but he cannot imagine that my accomplishments are about anything but someone "cutting me a break" because I am black and a woman.
If I had been a white man who studies Shakespeare, these fellowships would have been deemed an honor to me and the entire department and university; there would have been NO suggestion that this was anything like financial aid.
So, I agree with McBride that we will have made some progress when a wide range of merit is tolerable for people of color, as it currently is for whites. They can be anything from distinguished to mediocre and not have people question their qualifications. Yet, to the majority of those in power, even excellence—if it's not white—does not seem like merit. No wonder our institutions look like they do.
April 26, 2011
Grappling with Midwestern Memories: A New Lynching Play
American dramatist Charles Smith has given the nation a new lynching play of remarkable nuance and beauty. The Gospel According to James was commissioned by the Indianapolis Repertory Theatre as a way of engaging the state's history—specifically, the lynching in Marion, Indiana that James Cameron survived, later founding the Black Holocaust Museum. The show ran at IRT from March 22 to April 10, 2011. From May 14 to June 12, 2011, the same cast and crew will bring it to life for Chicago audiences. Though inspired by racial violence in the Midwest, The Gospel According to James focuses on the role of memory in all accounts of history.
As Smith says in the author's note, "[the play] is not about the lynching. The lynching is only the starting point." Therefore, from the moment that he began facing the challenge of writing about this violent event, Smith had been sure about one thing: "I knew that I did not want to reproduce the lynching on stage."
In this way, his work resembles the earliest black-authored lynching plays. Scripts about racial violence written in the 1910s and 1920s—such as Angelina Weld Grimké's Rachel (1914/1916), Alice Dunbar-Nelson's Mine Eyes Have Seen (1918), Mary Burrill's Aftermath (1919), and Georgia Douglas Johnson's A Sunday Morning in the South (1925) and Safe (1929)—refuse to describe, let alone portray, physical violence.
Adding to this tradition, Smith creates a fictional meeting between the black man who escaped the mob's wrath and the white woman who had been with him that night. It is now the early 1980s—more than fifty years after the double lynching of Cameron's friends Abe Smith and Tommy Shipp. James Cameron (André De Shields) asks Mary Ball, who now goes by "Marie" (Linda Kimbrough), to speak to a man who wants to make a documentary about the events that changed their lives. Marie is not at all interested in this project.
Still, the play unfolds as Marie and Cameron share what they remember about the events that led to the mob dragging the black teenagers through town. As they tell their stories, 16-year-old James Cameron (Anthony Peeples) and young Mary (Kelsey Brennan) appear downstage, along with the others involved. Mirroring the audience, the mature characters watch their younger selves in each other's versions, sometimes learning details that they had no way of knowing in their teens. More crucial to the playwright's purpose, though, they often disagree with each other's accounts even when they had been privy to the exact same information.
The Gospel According to James confronts its audience with the impossibility of knowing exactly what happened that night. Indeed, the play suggests that (pace some historians' claims) facts are never simply facts; all historical narratives are shaped by perspective. And this is especially true of histories wrought with the complexities that always attend race, sex, and violence in the United States.
From the very beginning of the action, Marie repeatedly calls Cameron a liar. She insists that he knows that events did not unfold as he claims in his autobiography and in interviews. Indeed, she is sarcastic as she declares that he has given the nation "the gospel according to James."
It is not until much later that the audience discovers why Marie insists that Cameron lied. In a moment of empathy, she admits understanding why he said that her boyfriend Claude, who died that night in 1930, had been "a good white man." If Cameron had told the truth about how low-down, dirty, and cruel Claude had been (to her and to others), there is no way that town whites would have let Cameron live.
From beginning to end, Smith's work maintains a palpable tension. Painful stories contradict each other as they vie for space in the world, as they compete to survive and to be remembered. The play never offers its audience the comfort that comes with feeling certain…about what happened or about what motivated those involved. And Smith suggests that this uncertainty clings to all histories. History is shaped by memory. It therefore reflects what people are willing to remember and what they insist upon forgetting.
Smith's work also suggests that language—the medium through which we create and convey history—sometimes reveals an investment in a particular image. After Cameron's teenage friends are murdered, Mary's father, Hoot Ball (Christopher Jon Martin), goes home and tells his wife Bea (Diane Kondrat) what has happened. He had been a member of the mob, and using that position of privilege, he had also helped save Cameron's life. Still, his wife is shocked to discover that teenagers were lynched in her town. Hoot immediately corrects her: "Lynched? This ain't Mississippi. This is Indiana. They were hanged!"
After James and Marie have finished sharing what they remember about that night and how it affected the rest of their lives, they have more compassion for each other. And they ultimately agree that when people face the past, they must decide either to bear witness to their truth or shirk that responsibility by trying to forget. Marie chooses the latter. She gives Cameron a necklace, her only memento from that night, and leaves him to grapple with his memories and hers.
Alone, Cameron faces all of the people whose stories were told as he and Marie shared their memories of that night in 1930. Charles Smith leaves his audience with an appreciation of the responsibility that Cameron shouldered. Having survived what his friends did not, Cameron refused to forget; he preserved stories that help make our nation's history. He spent the rest of his life encouraging the country to face all of its truths so that all of its citizens might heal.
As Smith says in the author's note, "[the play] is not about the lynching. The lynching is only the starting point." Therefore, from the moment that he began facing the challenge of writing about this violent event, Smith had been sure about one thing: "I knew that I did not want to reproduce the lynching on stage."
In this way, his work resembles the earliest black-authored lynching plays. Scripts about racial violence written in the 1910s and 1920s—such as Angelina Weld Grimké's Rachel (1914/1916), Alice Dunbar-Nelson's Mine Eyes Have Seen (1918), Mary Burrill's Aftermath (1919), and Georgia Douglas Johnson's A Sunday Morning in the South (1925) and Safe (1929)—refuse to describe, let alone portray, physical violence.
Adding to this tradition, Smith creates a fictional meeting between the black man who escaped the mob's wrath and the white woman who had been with him that night. It is now the early 1980s—more than fifty years after the double lynching of Cameron's friends Abe Smith and Tommy Shipp. James Cameron (André De Shields) asks Mary Ball, who now goes by "Marie" (Linda Kimbrough), to speak to a man who wants to make a documentary about the events that changed their lives. Marie is not at all interested in this project.
Still, the play unfolds as Marie and Cameron share what they remember about the events that led to the mob dragging the black teenagers through town. As they tell their stories, 16-year-old James Cameron (Anthony Peeples) and young Mary (Kelsey Brennan) appear downstage, along with the others involved. Mirroring the audience, the mature characters watch their younger selves in each other's versions, sometimes learning details that they had no way of knowing in their teens. More crucial to the playwright's purpose, though, they often disagree with each other's accounts even when they had been privy to the exact same information.
The Gospel According to James confronts its audience with the impossibility of knowing exactly what happened that night. Indeed, the play suggests that (pace some historians' claims) facts are never simply facts; all historical narratives are shaped by perspective. And this is especially true of histories wrought with the complexities that always attend race, sex, and violence in the United States.
From the very beginning of the action, Marie repeatedly calls Cameron a liar. She insists that he knows that events did not unfold as he claims in his autobiography and in interviews. Indeed, she is sarcastic as she declares that he has given the nation "the gospel according to James."
It is not until much later that the audience discovers why Marie insists that Cameron lied. In a moment of empathy, she admits understanding why he said that her boyfriend Claude, who died that night in 1930, had been "a good white man." If Cameron had told the truth about how low-down, dirty, and cruel Claude had been (to her and to others), there is no way that town whites would have let Cameron live.
From beginning to end, Smith's work maintains a palpable tension. Painful stories contradict each other as they vie for space in the world, as they compete to survive and to be remembered. The play never offers its audience the comfort that comes with feeling certain…about what happened or about what motivated those involved. And Smith suggests that this uncertainty clings to all histories. History is shaped by memory. It therefore reflects what people are willing to remember and what they insist upon forgetting.
Smith's work also suggests that language—the medium through which we create and convey history—sometimes reveals an investment in a particular image. After Cameron's teenage friends are murdered, Mary's father, Hoot Ball (Christopher Jon Martin), goes home and tells his wife Bea (Diane Kondrat) what has happened. He had been a member of the mob, and using that position of privilege, he had also helped save Cameron's life. Still, his wife is shocked to discover that teenagers were lynched in her town. Hoot immediately corrects her: "Lynched? This ain't Mississippi. This is Indiana. They were hanged!"
After James and Marie have finished sharing what they remember about that night and how it affected the rest of their lives, they have more compassion for each other. And they ultimately agree that when people face the past, they must decide either to bear witness to their truth or shirk that responsibility by trying to forget. Marie chooses the latter. She gives Cameron a necklace, her only memento from that night, and leaves him to grapple with his memories and hers.
Alone, Cameron faces all of the people whose stories were told as he and Marie shared their memories of that night in 1930. Charles Smith leaves his audience with an appreciation of the responsibility that Cameron shouldered. Having survived what his friends did not, Cameron refused to forget; he preserved stories that help make our nation's history. He spent the rest of his life encouraging the country to face all of its truths so that all of its citizens might heal.
March 13, 2011
Anna Deveare Smith: Lessons on Living and Dying
Anna Deveare Smith's Let Me Down Easy once again demonstrates that the usual terms are not sufficient for what she accomplishes on stage. As in her most famous theatrical work, Twilight: Los Angeles, 1992, Smith portrays many real-life characters, but "one-woman show" is not quite right. She places Lance Armstrong before us with as much force as she depicts Eve Ensler or Rev. Peter Gomes, and she does so by impeccably reproducing their accents, inflections, and gestures, and yet "impersonation" is not what we witness.
Part of what takes Smith's work to another level is its commitment to testimony. As countless theorists have found, testimony is life-affirming because, by definition, it involves direct address. When a human being shares her story and another listens, the interlocutor becomes a witness.
In signature Smith style, Let Me Down Easy is composed of a series of monologues based on verbatim excerpts from face-to-face conversations. The twenty stories represented on stage are drawn from 320 interviews that Smith conducted on three continents. The monologues address the power of the human body as well as its limitations. They also explore the mental and spiritual aspects of both maximizing one's physical potential and facing one's mortality. Taken together, the monologues offer a powerful commentary on health care, the lack of it, and the implications of both. Smith became a witness for all 320 interviewees. And, she gives audiences an opportunity to bear witness to the humanity of the twenty people featured in this incarnation of the show—people who "have come through something."
Because these are stories of real life, Let Me Down Easy highlights inequalities. For example, in the monologue titled "Heavy Sense of Resignation," Kiersta Kurtz-Burke, a doctor at Charity Hospital in New Orleans, shares her experience of Hurricane Katrina. She explains that she had always insisted that limited financial resources did not keep the hospital from offering quality care. However, when it was clear that Charity was not being evacuated so that patients could avoid danger—while other hospitals were—she found it more difficult to maintain a cheerful bedside manner. Still, what she remembers most vividly is that her (mostly black) staff and patients were not surprised that authorities had apparently forgotten them. She confessed, "the fact that it wasn't a shock was a shock for me." As she shares her story, she still seems stunned: "It was the first time that I'd been abandoned by my government." Very clearly, she was surrounded by people for whom this was not the first time.
While Smith channels Kurtz-Burke, we see the profound effect of stepping into another person's point of view. With both her head and heart, she acknowledges that the country of her birth claims to value equality while treating its citizens very differently. More than that, she actually stopped to consider what that reality might feel like when, for an entire lifetime, one is not on the privileged end of that differential treatment.
Yet, without fail, Let Me Down Easy resists sentimentality; every emotion serves to inspire thought long afterward. This is particularly true of the show's insistence that living and dying are inextricably linked. As palliative care specialist Eduardo Bruera puts it, people generally face death like they faced life. That is, if you were angry, you will probably be angry. Those who tend to retreat will probably withdraw, and those who blame will probably blame.
Having been touched by these stories, I went home thinking. If we die as we lived, then I am happy with many of the priorities I have kept, but there is always room for improvement. So, as I strive to live life in a way that will allow me to greet death with grace, Let Me Down Easy has inspired me to be more deliberate about becoming a witness for the experiences of my fellow human beings. How can I listen better today? How can I learn from others with both my head and heart? And how can I let that learning not only inform my outlook, but also shape what I believe merits saying out loud?
Let Me Down Easy has been recorded and will air on PBS during the 2011-2012 season of Great Performances. I hope it inspires you to take a similar challenge to live with intention.
Part of what takes Smith's work to another level is its commitment to testimony. As countless theorists have found, testimony is life-affirming because, by definition, it involves direct address. When a human being shares her story and another listens, the interlocutor becomes a witness.
In signature Smith style, Let Me Down Easy is composed of a series of monologues based on verbatim excerpts from face-to-face conversations. The twenty stories represented on stage are drawn from 320 interviews that Smith conducted on three continents. The monologues address the power of the human body as well as its limitations. They also explore the mental and spiritual aspects of both maximizing one's physical potential and facing one's mortality. Taken together, the monologues offer a powerful commentary on health care, the lack of it, and the implications of both. Smith became a witness for all 320 interviewees. And, she gives audiences an opportunity to bear witness to the humanity of the twenty people featured in this incarnation of the show—people who "have come through something."
Because these are stories of real life, Let Me Down Easy highlights inequalities. For example, in the monologue titled "Heavy Sense of Resignation," Kiersta Kurtz-Burke, a doctor at Charity Hospital in New Orleans, shares her experience of Hurricane Katrina. She explains that she had always insisted that limited financial resources did not keep the hospital from offering quality care. However, when it was clear that Charity was not being evacuated so that patients could avoid danger—while other hospitals were—she found it more difficult to maintain a cheerful bedside manner. Still, what she remembers most vividly is that her (mostly black) staff and patients were not surprised that authorities had apparently forgotten them. She confessed, "the fact that it wasn't a shock was a shock for me." As she shares her story, she still seems stunned: "It was the first time that I'd been abandoned by my government." Very clearly, she was surrounded by people for whom this was not the first time.
While Smith channels Kurtz-Burke, we see the profound effect of stepping into another person's point of view. With both her head and heart, she acknowledges that the country of her birth claims to value equality while treating its citizens very differently. More than that, she actually stopped to consider what that reality might feel like when, for an entire lifetime, one is not on the privileged end of that differential treatment.
Yet, without fail, Let Me Down Easy resists sentimentality; every emotion serves to inspire thought long afterward. This is particularly true of the show's insistence that living and dying are inextricably linked. As palliative care specialist Eduardo Bruera puts it, people generally face death like they faced life. That is, if you were angry, you will probably be angry. Those who tend to retreat will probably withdraw, and those who blame will probably blame.
Having been touched by these stories, I went home thinking. If we die as we lived, then I am happy with many of the priorities I have kept, but there is always room for improvement. So, as I strive to live life in a way that will allow me to greet death with grace, Let Me Down Easy has inspired me to be more deliberate about becoming a witness for the experiences of my fellow human beings. How can I listen better today? How can I learn from others with both my head and heart? And how can I let that learning not only inform my outlook, but also shape what I believe merits saying out loud?
Let Me Down Easy has been recorded and will air on PBS during the 2011-2012 season of Great Performances. I hope it inspires you to take a similar challenge to live with intention.
February 2, 2011
Blind Spots Created by Privilege
Over the years, I have been struck by the assumption that those who are not white, male, and heterosexual do not have professional standards. Of course, no one comes out and says this, but the power of this belief is everywhere apparent. The environment I know best is academia—the supposed bastion of intelligence and critical thinking. Yet, it is in this environment that I have heard
several
versions of the following:
A white male who does feminist scholarship explains why he has had problems getting his work published: "Well, women are suspicious of me. It's annoying, but I get it."
On the surface, this sounds liberal and critically engaged. After all, he seems to be acknowledging what feminist scholarship does not shy away from admitting: that gender matters. However, what really motivates this comment is, in my view, the height of sexism. The speaker assumes that women scholars could not possibly have intellectual reasons for not being impressed with his work. Supposedly, they only respond to gender. What is the basis of this assumption? Why, the fact that they can't see his brilliance, of course! Only anti-male prejudice can explain his not having been catapulted to the top of his field. He cannot even imagine the possibility that his work is simply not that impressive—that when readers encounter his work, it doesn't at all strike them as brilliant.
What allows such a blind spot, such unjustified arrogance? Partly, it is a refusal to admit that being white and male has helped with every achievement. Whites are constantly assumed to be qualified, so before they even start, much of their job is done for them; people have few problems deferring to them, and it seldom enters anyone's mind to question their qualifications.
There are very few professions in which those who are white (especially if they are also male) do not seem to be the obvious best choice, so when whites venture into those arenas, they are susceptible to deeming themselves to be especially admirable. An understandable self-image forms: I don't have to care about minority issues and/or women's issues, so the fact that I do means I'm exceptionally enlightened. (Again, that's understandable.) Unfortunately, it is also easy for those in this position to fancy themselves oppressed. When their whiteness does translate into an automatic assumption of competence, they think that they are encountering hostility. They think that the injustices about which women and "minorities" complain are happening to them. But there is an enormous difference between discrimination and not being assumed qualified because you are white and/or male and/or heterosexual.
A white male who does feminist scholarship explains why he has had problems getting his work published: "Well, women are suspicious of me. It's annoying, but I get it."
On the surface, this sounds liberal and critically engaged. After all, he seems to be acknowledging what feminist scholarship does not shy away from admitting: that gender matters. However, what really motivates this comment is, in my view, the height of sexism. The speaker assumes that women scholars could not possibly have intellectual reasons for not being impressed with his work. Supposedly, they only respond to gender. What is the basis of this assumption? Why, the fact that they can't see his brilliance, of course! Only anti-male prejudice can explain his not having been catapulted to the top of his field. He cannot even imagine the possibility that his work is simply not that impressive—that when readers encounter his work, it doesn't at all strike them as brilliant.
What allows such a blind spot, such unjustified arrogance? Partly, it is a refusal to admit that being white and male has helped with every achievement. Whites are constantly assumed to be qualified, so before they even start, much of their job is done for them; people have few problems deferring to them, and it seldom enters anyone's mind to question their qualifications.
There are very few professions in which those who are white (especially if they are also male) do not seem to be the obvious best choice, so when whites venture into those arenas, they are susceptible to deeming themselves to be especially admirable. An understandable self-image forms: I don't have to care about minority issues and/or women's issues, so the fact that I do means I'm exceptionally enlightened. (Again, that's understandable.) Unfortunately, it is also easy for those in this position to fancy themselves oppressed. When their whiteness does translate into an automatic assumption of competence, they think that they are encountering hostility. They think that the injustices about which women and "minorities" complain are happening to them. But there is an enormous difference between discrimination and not being assumed qualified because you are white and/or male and/or heterosexual.
December 6, 2010
Plays about Lynching in 2010: Recognizing History’s Presence
This year’s New York International Fringe Festival received applications from 800 theatre groups. Approximately 200 shows were accepted and would be staged in August 2010. Within the wide array of offerings, one presentation proved especially compelling: Kym Gomes’s By Hands Unknown, which consists of seven one-act plays about lynching, many of which I examine in my forthcoming book. Having studied these plays for many years, I was eager to see them staged for the first time, but I was also nervous. How would these scripts fit together to make a coherent show? They were all written in the 1920s and 1930s, when dramatic conventions were different from today’s. Would they seem melodramatic and unrealistic? Would they even be recognized as “good” plays? As importantly, would the content feel relevant in 2010?
All of these questions could be answered with a resounding yes because the directors were so creative and resourceful, and the actors executed so well. My more detailed performance review should appear in the May 2011 issue of Theatre Journal (Johns Hopkins University Press), but I want to share a few thoughts here. The power of the presentation can be understood with a focus on its opening and closing moments.
The show began with a single light shining on Safiya Fredericks as she recited “Strange Fruit” from memory. Though a musician accompanied her on guitar, she shared it as a poem, not a song. However, most people know the lines because Billie Holiday made them famous with her 1939 recording, so the audience could instantly feel a sense of familiarity. Beginning this way drew audience members in; we were reassured that we knew something about the subject matter. There is always comfort in feeling like one has a way in, like one is not on the outside of an experience.
This powerfully rendered poem gave way to Georgia Douglass Johnson’s one-act play A Sunday Morning in the South, in which a 19-year-old who aspires to be a lawyer is falsely accused of rape. The action begins with Tom’s grandmother and younger brother teasing him about having fallen asleep at 8 o’clock the night before. They laugh, recalling that he was snoring so loudly that they thought he might choke. Soon, officers barge into the house, demanding to know where Tom had been at 10 o’clock the previous night. The play dramatizes the moment when his testimony, and that of his family members, is disregarded. The officers insist that they already have the case “figured out.”
Gomes’s choice to begin with a piece that emphasizes African Americans’ exclusion from basic citizenship rights, such as due process, proved especially poignant as the show approached its end. One by one, the actors emerged from the shadows to recite a portion of Resolution 39, the 2005 measure in which the U.S. Senate apologized for having never passed anti-lynching legislation. By the time that all 18 members of the ensemble cast had stepped forward, the entire resolution had been shared, and they covered the stage from left to right, directly facing the audience. Black and white, different ages and backgrounds, each actor took responsibility for recognizing that this is a history that we all share, encouraging audience members to do the same.
Knowing that the black rapist myth emerged only after slavery ended and black men had finally won the right to vote, I was especially struck by the challenge issued by the actors’ stance. By labeling black men “rapists,” mobs insisted that they were simply protecting white women. The charge overshadowed the real purpose of mob violence: to ensure that blacks remained terrified—and too preoccupied with basic survival—to claim full citizenship rights. This white supremacist strategy has remained popular and effective. Relentlessly labeling black and brown people “criminals” has always been a way of insisting that they are not entitled to civic inclusion. Given this history, and the many ways that it shapes the present, we must understand that serious political realities are reflected in the way that Americans feel comfortable talking about people.
It matters that many of us speak with disgust in our voices about “immigrants” who are black and brown—when all Americans are actually immigrants. It also matters that the word “criminal” has a hard time clinging to white offenders, even though crimes against the environment and crimes that have cheated thousands out of their life savings are widely publicized. The nation consistently demonizes black and brown citizens, but the stakes are becoming even higher with the growth of the prison industrial complex. As legal scholar Michelle Alexander has shown in The New Jim Crow , the privatized prison system offers incentives for creating “felons” with laws that essentially target those who are black, brown, and/or poor. However, laws addressing crimes mostly committed by whites, especially moneyed whites, ensure that they receive mild punishment and relatively little stigma. Meanwhile, the “felons” become an underclass that cannot vote and is otherwise ostracized and excluded.
The reactionary, sometimes violent politics that now coalesce around labels like “immigrant,” “criminal,” and “terrorist” resemble those justified by the earlier “black rapist” myth—especially because, when actual immigrants, criminals, and terrorists are white, they are somehow not known by those labels. Though not equivalent, the situation was similar at the last turn of the century: hysteria regarding the mythic black rapist made the documented rape of black women by white men a non-issue in mainstream discourse and public policy.
Because By Hands Unknown begins and ends its engagement with lynching by raising questions about basic rights, it urges us to think seriously about who comes to mind when we say “citizen” today.
More about By Hands Unknown:A Brava Company/Chelsea Rep LAB Production Conceived by Kym Gomes
Directed by Harvey Huddleston, Kym Gomes
Associate Directors: Carmen Balentine, Ravin Patterson
Music Director: Bruce Baumer
Costumes by Jennifer Anderson
Ensemble Cast: Carmen Balentine, Michael Bunin, Valerie Elizabeth Donaldson, Safiya Fredericks, Kym Gomes, Matt Hammond, Phil John, Nancy Keegan, Jamil Moore, Brett Pack, Alison Parks, Ravin Patterson, Jihan Ponti, Rick Schneider, Stefania Diana Schramm, Vonetta Steward, Temesgen Tocruray, Nathan Yates
All of these questions could be answered with a resounding yes because the directors were so creative and resourceful, and the actors executed so well. My more detailed performance review should appear in the May 2011 issue of Theatre Journal (Johns Hopkins University Press), but I want to share a few thoughts here. The power of the presentation can be understood with a focus on its opening and closing moments.
The show began with a single light shining on Safiya Fredericks as she recited “Strange Fruit” from memory. Though a musician accompanied her on guitar, she shared it as a poem, not a song. However, most people know the lines because Billie Holiday made them famous with her 1939 recording, so the audience could instantly feel a sense of familiarity. Beginning this way drew audience members in; we were reassured that we knew something about the subject matter. There is always comfort in feeling like one has a way in, like one is not on the outside of an experience.
This powerfully rendered poem gave way to Georgia Douglass Johnson’s one-act play A Sunday Morning in the South, in which a 19-year-old who aspires to be a lawyer is falsely accused of rape. The action begins with Tom’s grandmother and younger brother teasing him about having fallen asleep at 8 o’clock the night before. They laugh, recalling that he was snoring so loudly that they thought he might choke. Soon, officers barge into the house, demanding to know where Tom had been at 10 o’clock the previous night. The play dramatizes the moment when his testimony, and that of his family members, is disregarded. The officers insist that they already have the case “figured out.”
Gomes’s choice to begin with a piece that emphasizes African Americans’ exclusion from basic citizenship rights, such as due process, proved especially poignant as the show approached its end. One by one, the actors emerged from the shadows to recite a portion of Resolution 39, the 2005 measure in which the U.S. Senate apologized for having never passed anti-lynching legislation. By the time that all 18 members of the ensemble cast had stepped forward, the entire resolution had been shared, and they covered the stage from left to right, directly facing the audience. Black and white, different ages and backgrounds, each actor took responsibility for recognizing that this is a history that we all share, encouraging audience members to do the same.
Knowing that the black rapist myth emerged only after slavery ended and black men had finally won the right to vote, I was especially struck by the challenge issued by the actors’ stance. By labeling black men “rapists,” mobs insisted that they were simply protecting white women. The charge overshadowed the real purpose of mob violence: to ensure that blacks remained terrified—and too preoccupied with basic survival—to claim full citizenship rights. This white supremacist strategy has remained popular and effective. Relentlessly labeling black and brown people “criminals” has always been a way of insisting that they are not entitled to civic inclusion. Given this history, and the many ways that it shapes the present, we must understand that serious political realities are reflected in the way that Americans feel comfortable talking about people.
It matters that many of us speak with disgust in our voices about “immigrants” who are black and brown—when all Americans are actually immigrants. It also matters that the word “criminal” has a hard time clinging to white offenders, even though crimes against the environment and crimes that have cheated thousands out of their life savings are widely publicized. The nation consistently demonizes black and brown citizens, but the stakes are becoming even higher with the growth of the prison industrial complex. As legal scholar Michelle Alexander has shown in The New Jim Crow , the privatized prison system offers incentives for creating “felons” with laws that essentially target those who are black, brown, and/or poor. However, laws addressing crimes mostly committed by whites, especially moneyed whites, ensure that they receive mild punishment and relatively little stigma. Meanwhile, the “felons” become an underclass that cannot vote and is otherwise ostracized and excluded.
The reactionary, sometimes violent politics that now coalesce around labels like “immigrant,” “criminal,” and “terrorist” resemble those justified by the earlier “black rapist” myth—especially because, when actual immigrants, criminals, and terrorists are white, they are somehow not known by those labels. Though not equivalent, the situation was similar at the last turn of the century: hysteria regarding the mythic black rapist made the documented rape of black women by white men a non-issue in mainstream discourse and public policy.
Because By Hands Unknown begins and ends its engagement with lynching by raising questions about basic rights, it urges us to think seriously about who comes to mind when we say “citizen” today.
More about By Hands Unknown:A Brava Company/Chelsea Rep LAB Production Conceived by Kym Gomes
Directed by Harvey Huddleston, Kym Gomes
Associate Directors: Carmen Balentine, Ravin Patterson
Music Director: Bruce Baumer
Costumes by Jennifer Anderson
Ensemble Cast: Carmen Balentine, Michael Bunin, Valerie Elizabeth Donaldson, Safiya Fredericks, Kym Gomes, Matt Hammond, Phil John, Nancy Keegan, Jamil Moore, Brett Pack, Alison Parks, Ravin Patterson, Jihan Ponti, Rick Schneider, Stefania Diana Schramm, Vonetta Steward, Temesgen Tocruray, Nathan Yates
Plays about Lynching in 2010: Recognizing History's Presence
This year's New York International Fringe Festival received applications from 800 theatre groups. Approximately 200 shows were accepted and would be staged in August 2010. Within the wide array of offerings, one presentation proved especially compelling: Kym Gomes's By Hands Unknown, which consists of seven one-act plays about lynching, many of which I examine in my forthcoming book. Having studied these plays for many years, I was eager to see them staged for the first time, but I was also nervous. How would these scripts fit together to make a coherent show? They were all written in the 1920s and 1930s, when dramatic conventions were different from today's. Would they seem melodramatic and unrealistic? Would they even be recognized as "good" plays? As importantly, would the content feel relevant in 2010?
All of these questions could be answered with a resounding yes because the directors were so creative and resourceful, and the actors executed so well. My more detailed performance review should appear in the May 2011 issue of Theatre Journal (Johns Hopkins University Press), but I want to share a few thoughts here. The power of the presentation can be understood with a focus on its opening and closing moments.
The show began with a single light shining on Safiya Fredericks as she recited "Strange Fruit" from memory. Though a musician accompanied her on guitar, she shared it as a poem, not a song. However, most people know the lines because Billie Holiday made them famous with her 1939 recording, so the audience could instantly feel a sense of familiarity. Beginning this way drew audience members in; we were reassured that we knew something about the subject matter. There is always comfort in feeling like one has a way in, like one is not on the outside of an experience.
This powerfully rendered poem gave way to Georgia Douglass Johnson's one-act play A Sunday Morning in the South, in which a 19-year-old who aspires to be a lawyer is falsely accused of rape. The action begins with Tom's grandmother and younger brother teasing him about having fallen asleep at 8 o'clock the night before. They laugh, recalling that he was snoring so loudly that they thought he might choke. Soon, officers barge into the house, demanding to know where Tom had been at 10 o'clock the previous night. The play dramatizes the moment when his testimony, and that of his family members, is disregarded. The officers insist that they already have the case "figured out."
Gomes's choice to begin with a piece that emphasizes African Americans' exclusion from basic citizenship rights, such as due process, proved especially poignant as the show approached its end. One by one, the actors emerged from the shadows to recite a portion of Resolution 39, the 2005 measure in which the U.S. Senate apologized for having never passed anti-lynching legislation. By the time that all 18 members of the ensemble cast had stepped forward, the entire resolution had been shared, and they covered the stage from left to right, directly facing the audience. Black and white, different ages and backgrounds, each actor took responsibility for recognizing that this is a history that we all share, encouraging audience members to do the same.
Knowing that the black rapist myth emerged only after slavery ended and black men had finally won the right to vote, I was especially struck by the challenge issued by the actors' stance. By labeling black men "rapists," mobs insisted that they were simply protecting white women. The charge overshadowed the real purpose of mob violence: to ensure that blacks remained terrified—and too preoccupied with basic survival—to claim full citizenship rights. This white supremacist strategy has remained popular and effective. Relentlessly labeling black and brown people "criminals" has always been a way of insisting that they are not entitled to civic inclusion. Given this history, and the many ways that it shapes the present, we must understand that serious political realities are reflected in the way that Americans feel comfortable talking about people.
It matters that many of us speak with disgust in our voices about "immigrants" who are black and brown—when all Americans are actually immigrants. It also matters that the word "criminal" has a hard time clinging to white offenders, even though crimes against the environment and crimes that have cheated thousands out of their life savings are widely publicized. The nation consistently demonizes black and brown citizens, but the stakes are becoming even higher with the growth of the prison industrial complex. As legal scholar Michelle Alexander has shown in The New Jim Crow , the privatized prison system offers incentives for creating "felons" with laws that essentially target those who are black, brown, and/or poor. However, laws addressing crimes mostly committed by whites, especially moneyed whites, ensure that they receive mild punishment and relatively little stigma. Meanwhile, the "felons" become an underclass that cannot vote and is otherwise ostracized and excluded.
The reactionary, sometimes violent politics that now coalesce around labels like "immigrant," "criminal," and "terrorist" resemble those justified by the earlier "black rapist" myth—especially because, when actual immigrants, criminals, and terrorists are white, they are somehow not known by those labels. Though not equivalent, the situation was similar at the last turn of the century: hysteria regarding the mythic black rapist made the documented rape of black women by white men a non-issue in mainstream discourse and public policy.
Because By Hands Unknown begins and ends its engagement with lynching by raising questions about basic rights, it urges us to think seriously about who comes to mind when we say "citizen" today.
More about By Hands Unknown:A Brava Company/Chelsea Rep LAB Production Conceived by Kym Gomes
Directed by Harvey Huddleston, Kym Gomes
Associate Directors: Carmen Balentine, Ravin Patterson
Music Director: Bruce Baumer
Costumes by Jennifer Anderson
Ensemble Cast: Carmen Balentine, Michael Bunin, Valerie Elizabeth Donaldson, Safiya Fredericks, Kym Gomes, Matt Hammond, Phil John, Nancy Keegan, Jamil Moore, Brett Pack, Alison Parks, Ravin Patterson, Jihan Ponti, Rick Schneider, Stefania Diana Schramm, Vonetta Steward, Temesgen Tocruray, Nathan Yates
All of these questions could be answered with a resounding yes because the directors were so creative and resourceful, and the actors executed so well. My more detailed performance review should appear in the May 2011 issue of Theatre Journal (Johns Hopkins University Press), but I want to share a few thoughts here. The power of the presentation can be understood with a focus on its opening and closing moments.
The show began with a single light shining on Safiya Fredericks as she recited "Strange Fruit" from memory. Though a musician accompanied her on guitar, she shared it as a poem, not a song. However, most people know the lines because Billie Holiday made them famous with her 1939 recording, so the audience could instantly feel a sense of familiarity. Beginning this way drew audience members in; we were reassured that we knew something about the subject matter. There is always comfort in feeling like one has a way in, like one is not on the outside of an experience.
This powerfully rendered poem gave way to Georgia Douglass Johnson's one-act play A Sunday Morning in the South, in which a 19-year-old who aspires to be a lawyer is falsely accused of rape. The action begins with Tom's grandmother and younger brother teasing him about having fallen asleep at 8 o'clock the night before. They laugh, recalling that he was snoring so loudly that they thought he might choke. Soon, officers barge into the house, demanding to know where Tom had been at 10 o'clock the previous night. The play dramatizes the moment when his testimony, and that of his family members, is disregarded. The officers insist that they already have the case "figured out."
Gomes's choice to begin with a piece that emphasizes African Americans' exclusion from basic citizenship rights, such as due process, proved especially poignant as the show approached its end. One by one, the actors emerged from the shadows to recite a portion of Resolution 39, the 2005 measure in which the U.S. Senate apologized for having never passed anti-lynching legislation. By the time that all 18 members of the ensemble cast had stepped forward, the entire resolution had been shared, and they covered the stage from left to right, directly facing the audience. Black and white, different ages and backgrounds, each actor took responsibility for recognizing that this is a history that we all share, encouraging audience members to do the same.
Knowing that the black rapist myth emerged only after slavery ended and black men had finally won the right to vote, I was especially struck by the challenge issued by the actors' stance. By labeling black men "rapists," mobs insisted that they were simply protecting white women. The charge overshadowed the real purpose of mob violence: to ensure that blacks remained terrified—and too preoccupied with basic survival—to claim full citizenship rights. This white supremacist strategy has remained popular and effective. Relentlessly labeling black and brown people "criminals" has always been a way of insisting that they are not entitled to civic inclusion. Given this history, and the many ways that it shapes the present, we must understand that serious political realities are reflected in the way that Americans feel comfortable talking about people.
It matters that many of us speak with disgust in our voices about "immigrants" who are black and brown—when all Americans are actually immigrants. It also matters that the word "criminal" has a hard time clinging to white offenders, even though crimes against the environment and crimes that have cheated thousands out of their life savings are widely publicized. The nation consistently demonizes black and brown citizens, but the stakes are becoming even higher with the growth of the prison industrial complex. As legal scholar Michelle Alexander has shown in The New Jim Crow , the privatized prison system offers incentives for creating "felons" with laws that essentially target those who are black, brown, and/or poor. However, laws addressing crimes mostly committed by whites, especially moneyed whites, ensure that they receive mild punishment and relatively little stigma. Meanwhile, the "felons" become an underclass that cannot vote and is otherwise ostracized and excluded.
The reactionary, sometimes violent politics that now coalesce around labels like "immigrant," "criminal," and "terrorist" resemble those justified by the earlier "black rapist" myth—especially because, when actual immigrants, criminals, and terrorists are white, they are somehow not known by those labels. Though not equivalent, the situation was similar at the last turn of the century: hysteria regarding the mythic black rapist made the documented rape of black women by white men a non-issue in mainstream discourse and public policy.
Because By Hands Unknown begins and ends its engagement with lynching by raising questions about basic rights, it urges us to think seriously about who comes to mind when we say "citizen" today.
More about By Hands Unknown:A Brava Company/Chelsea Rep LAB Production Conceived by Kym Gomes
Directed by Harvey Huddleston, Kym Gomes
Associate Directors: Carmen Balentine, Ravin Patterson
Music Director: Bruce Baumer
Costumes by Jennifer Anderson
Ensemble Cast: Carmen Balentine, Michael Bunin, Valerie Elizabeth Donaldson, Safiya Fredericks, Kym Gomes, Matt Hammond, Phil John, Nancy Keegan, Jamil Moore, Brett Pack, Alison Parks, Ravin Patterson, Jihan Ponti, Rick Schneider, Stefania Diana Schramm, Vonetta Steward, Temesgen Tocruray, Nathan Yates
November 8, 2010
Tyler Perry’s ‘For Colored Girls’: Not the Disaster Predicted
Like so many who love Ntozake Shange’s For Colored Girls Who Have Considered Suicide/ When the Rainbow is Enuf, I was upset when I heard that Tyler Perry would direct an adaptation for the big screen. I was more infuriated to discover that a screenplay by a black woman author had been pushed aside to accommodate his. I went to the movie sure that I would hate it, but left surprised that so much of the original text had been preserved. I was also (dare I say it?) impressed with the methods used for fleshing out the women’s stories in order to make the fairly long monologues of Shange’s choreopoem work well in the film’s scenes. Perry’s For Colored Girls is far from perfection, but the criticism that his leadership sparked led him to seek extensive help from collaborators. The result? The film is not the disaster that so many just knew it would be.
Having read Shange’s original and seen it staged, I wondered why it would seem appealing as a potential film. The Broadway revival that fell prey to the most recent economic crisis made sense. A movie? Not so much. In theatrical productions, the text’s focus on the women’s monologues is easily maintained; there is little need for props and changing scenery. In film, the minimalism would have to be replaced, and men would be present in many scenes that would not have required them on stage. Thus, I anticipated unnecessary distractions from the beauty and music of Shange’s poetic language. Yet, the film succeeds by not trying to do the same kind of work achieved by the original text and stage productions of it.
The movie does not keep intact the women’s individual stories. Shange’s original represents the journeys of The Lady in Brown, The Lady in Yellow, The Lady in Purple, …Red, …Green, …Blue, and …Orange. Though Gilda (Phylicia Rashad) and Alice (Whoopi Goldberg) do not represent women in the play, their words sometimes come directly from it. Yet, Perry prepares viewers for the variation in that Gilda often wears black and Alice is always in white—colors that are not featured in the original. Besides creating characters associated with colors not highlighted in Shange’s text, the film emphasizes color through props more than wardrobe. For instance, Crystal (Kimberly Elise) rarely wears yellow, but she serves beverages in yellow mugs and her children’s stuffed animals are often yellow.
Even those characters associated with Shange’s colors do not match the text. Juanita (Loretta Divine) is always in green in the film, but she delivers a monologue that the play assigns to The Lady in Red. Outside of her unreliable lover’s door, Juanita ends the relationship declaring that it has been an experiment to see “if i waz capable of debasin’ my self for the love of another.” Similarly, Jo (Janet Jackson) is most often associated with red, but she is the one who insists, “one thing i dont need is any more apologies,” which The Lady in Blue says in the play. Jackson’s rendition is extraordinarily constrained. She has a very staid demeanor throughout the film, and this speech makes her emotional fatigue palpable. Jackson’s soft-spoken but unwavering declarations wonderfully contrast the way that “the betrayed black woman” is typically represented in the nation’s popular imagination.
Interestingly, though film offers the flexibility to place characters is several settings, the scope of Shange’s vision is reigned in, not expanded. The choreopoem begins with each of the women naming their locations: “outside of” Chicago, Detroit, Houston, Baltimore, San Francisco, Manhattan, St. Louis. In the film, they are all in the New York metropolitan area and several live in or visit the same apartment building. More strikingly, Shange’s diasporic vision is largely excised from the film. The play’s incorporation of Latin music, and dance of all kinds, is all but missing from the movie. Also, the film reduces the importance that Shange’s work places on Haiti and Toussaint L'Ouverture to a distraction for frightened children. The story is creatively woven into the movie’s plot, but much detail is sacrificed, as is the dominant role that this story played for the female character in the original.
Perhaps the most lamentable missing element is one that could have been predicted. Many of us feared that the original work’s black feminist orientation could not survive when placed in Perry’s hands. I would certainly join the chorus of those who would suggest that there is little nuance in his work where black women are concerned. In the play, one of the clearest moments of women supporting women emerges when The Ladies in Blue, Red, and Purple each take a part in pinpointing the assumptions that keep rapists safe and women vulnerable. Together, they reject the myth that rapists are strangers, not friends. Shange uses several women, not a lone voice, to assert that “the nature of rape has changed.” Yet, in the film, it is largely in isolation that Yasmine (Anika Noni Rose) bears witness to rape and struggles to survive its trauma. The movie does not lose sight of the injustice of Yasmine’s experience, but its linear narrative is not conducive to preserving the communion that Shange made possible on stage.
As someone invested in the insurgent possibilities of black performance, I nevertheless remain convinced that whenever black performance appears in the mainstream, sacrifices are made. The popularity of movies featuring black men in over-the-top drag indicates that Americans do not tire of stereotypes and denigration. (The previews preceding For Colored Girls included another Big Momma movie from Martin Lawrence.) Big ticket entertainment that tells black people’s stories is far from plentiful, and the movies with the best chances for commercial success come in the “plum foolishness” variety. As the late Marlon Riggs might say, the country’s “ethnic notions” continue to guarantee this trend.
For this and so many other reasons, Tyler Perry has secured a position that allows him to be one of the few people who could have made this film the success that it is. (It’s a must-see, even if you go expecting to hate it.) Furthermore, because the nation continues to devalue black actors, especially black women actors, much of the talent that Perry assembles would not otherwise enjoy major roles. A very American state of affairs.
I left the movie in awe—once again—of the actor’s craft. Even though Shange’s original language requires performers to deliver relatively long speeches, her words are often uttered verbatim. As a result, the actors gave me opportunity to re-consider lines that already meant so much. As mentioned, Janet Jackson’s rendition of the “i got sorry greetin me at my front door” speech is refreshingly powerful. Likewise, Loretta Divine’s “somebody almost walked off wid alla my stuff” takes full advantage of the life created for her in the film as a woman’s group instructor in a community center. Her delivery beautifully melds the humor and solemnity of that monologue.
Similarly, Kimberly Elise’s “I found god in myself & I loved her” maximizes the fact that the film represents more of her journey than we see in the play. Because the audience has witnessed her interactions with her husband as he struggled with mental illness and alcoholism, as well as her painful journey without him and her children, her shrieking delivery of “fiercely” at film’s end works. (I have to add that the back-story that the film creates for Crystal's husband Beau makes untenable assertions that black men are being bashed. As much as I agree with the concern that the movie may fuel “down-low hysteria,” the claim that it denies the existence of good black men demonstrates the lasting relevance of Ann duCille’s warning against “phallocentric” reading practices, which are preoccupied with how black men are figured and show little regard for how accurately black women’s lives are represented.)
Ultimately, having Perry at the helm did not create the disaster expected because he clearly consulted many people in this process. And the film will surely help create interest in supporting the Broadway revival that so nearly came to fruition before. Even better, it will get more of us to turn back to the original text. If you’re anything like me, you’ll find that you love what Ntozake Shange accomplished in the mid-1970s even more than you remembered. If I have Tyler Perry and the empire that he has built with Madea (a character that I could do without) to thank for that, I’ll have to accept it as yet another American contradiction that makes being black and a woman “a metaphysical dilemma/ i havent conquered yet.”
Having read Shange’s original and seen it staged, I wondered why it would seem appealing as a potential film. The Broadway revival that fell prey to the most recent economic crisis made sense. A movie? Not so much. In theatrical productions, the text’s focus on the women’s monologues is easily maintained; there is little need for props and changing scenery. In film, the minimalism would have to be replaced, and men would be present in many scenes that would not have required them on stage. Thus, I anticipated unnecessary distractions from the beauty and music of Shange’s poetic language. Yet, the film succeeds by not trying to do the same kind of work achieved by the original text and stage productions of it.
The movie does not keep intact the women’s individual stories. Shange’s original represents the journeys of The Lady in Brown, The Lady in Yellow, The Lady in Purple, …Red, …Green, …Blue, and …Orange. Though Gilda (Phylicia Rashad) and Alice (Whoopi Goldberg) do not represent women in the play, their words sometimes come directly from it. Yet, Perry prepares viewers for the variation in that Gilda often wears black and Alice is always in white—colors that are not featured in the original. Besides creating characters associated with colors not highlighted in Shange’s text, the film emphasizes color through props more than wardrobe. For instance, Crystal (Kimberly Elise) rarely wears yellow, but she serves beverages in yellow mugs and her children’s stuffed animals are often yellow.
Even those characters associated with Shange’s colors do not match the text. Juanita (Loretta Divine) is always in green in the film, but she delivers a monologue that the play assigns to The Lady in Red. Outside of her unreliable lover’s door, Juanita ends the relationship declaring that it has been an experiment to see “if i waz capable of debasin’ my self for the love of another.” Similarly, Jo (Janet Jackson) is most often associated with red, but she is the one who insists, “one thing i dont need is any more apologies,” which The Lady in Blue says in the play. Jackson’s rendition is extraordinarily constrained. She has a very staid demeanor throughout the film, and this speech makes her emotional fatigue palpable. Jackson’s soft-spoken but unwavering declarations wonderfully contrast the way that “the betrayed black woman” is typically represented in the nation’s popular imagination.
Interestingly, though film offers the flexibility to place characters is several settings, the scope of Shange’s vision is reigned in, not expanded. The choreopoem begins with each of the women naming their locations: “outside of” Chicago, Detroit, Houston, Baltimore, San Francisco, Manhattan, St. Louis. In the film, they are all in the New York metropolitan area and several live in or visit the same apartment building. More strikingly, Shange’s diasporic vision is largely excised from the film. The play’s incorporation of Latin music, and dance of all kinds, is all but missing from the movie. Also, the film reduces the importance that Shange’s work places on Haiti and Toussaint L'Ouverture to a distraction for frightened children. The story is creatively woven into the movie’s plot, but much detail is sacrificed, as is the dominant role that this story played for the female character in the original.
Perhaps the most lamentable missing element is one that could have been predicted. Many of us feared that the original work’s black feminist orientation could not survive when placed in Perry’s hands. I would certainly join the chorus of those who would suggest that there is little nuance in his work where black women are concerned. In the play, one of the clearest moments of women supporting women emerges when The Ladies in Blue, Red, and Purple each take a part in pinpointing the assumptions that keep rapists safe and women vulnerable. Together, they reject the myth that rapists are strangers, not friends. Shange uses several women, not a lone voice, to assert that “the nature of rape has changed.” Yet, in the film, it is largely in isolation that Yasmine (Anika Noni Rose) bears witness to rape and struggles to survive its trauma. The movie does not lose sight of the injustice of Yasmine’s experience, but its linear narrative is not conducive to preserving the communion that Shange made possible on stage.
As someone invested in the insurgent possibilities of black performance, I nevertheless remain convinced that whenever black performance appears in the mainstream, sacrifices are made. The popularity of movies featuring black men in over-the-top drag indicates that Americans do not tire of stereotypes and denigration. (The previews preceding For Colored Girls included another Big Momma movie from Martin Lawrence.) Big ticket entertainment that tells black people’s stories is far from plentiful, and the movies with the best chances for commercial success come in the “plum foolishness” variety. As the late Marlon Riggs might say, the country’s “ethnic notions” continue to guarantee this trend.
For this and so many other reasons, Tyler Perry has secured a position that allows him to be one of the few people who could have made this film the success that it is. (It’s a must-see, even if you go expecting to hate it.) Furthermore, because the nation continues to devalue black actors, especially black women actors, much of the talent that Perry assembles would not otherwise enjoy major roles. A very American state of affairs.
I left the movie in awe—once again—of the actor’s craft. Even though Shange’s original language requires performers to deliver relatively long speeches, her words are often uttered verbatim. As a result, the actors gave me opportunity to re-consider lines that already meant so much. As mentioned, Janet Jackson’s rendition of the “i got sorry greetin me at my front door” speech is refreshingly powerful. Likewise, Loretta Divine’s “somebody almost walked off wid alla my stuff” takes full advantage of the life created for her in the film as a woman’s group instructor in a community center. Her delivery beautifully melds the humor and solemnity of that monologue.
Similarly, Kimberly Elise’s “I found god in myself & I loved her” maximizes the fact that the film represents more of her journey than we see in the play. Because the audience has witnessed her interactions with her husband as he struggled with mental illness and alcoholism, as well as her painful journey without him and her children, her shrieking delivery of “fiercely” at film’s end works. (I have to add that the back-story that the film creates for Crystal's husband Beau makes untenable assertions that black men are being bashed. As much as I agree with the concern that the movie may fuel “down-low hysteria,” the claim that it denies the existence of good black men demonstrates the lasting relevance of Ann duCille’s warning against “phallocentric” reading practices, which are preoccupied with how black men are figured and show little regard for how accurately black women’s lives are represented.)
Ultimately, having Perry at the helm did not create the disaster expected because he clearly consulted many people in this process. And the film will surely help create interest in supporting the Broadway revival that so nearly came to fruition before. Even better, it will get more of us to turn back to the original text. If you’re anything like me, you’ll find that you love what Ntozake Shange accomplished in the mid-1970s even more than you remembered. If I have Tyler Perry and the empire that he has built with Madea (a character that I could do without) to thank for that, I’ll have to accept it as yet another American contradiction that makes being black and a woman “a metaphysical dilemma/ i havent conquered yet.”
