Did John Howard Griffin (Black Like Me) capture what it was like to be black or did he fool himself as well as everyone else? I am defining being ‘black’ not only as a skin colour but to include a black heritage. In this essay I will demonstrate that John Howard Griffin only got a glance at what it was like to be black and therefore did not capture what it meant to be an African-American. Furthermore, I will example that Griffin did not fool himself into thinking he was black as he was constantly aware that he had the safety net of returning to being white. Nor did he fool everybody else into believing he captured what it was like to be black as whilst African-Americans would have understood the Griffin’s experiences they would also know …show more content…
that the only way to understand negro problems was to be a negro. Black Like Me is not about being black, its about being white and not seeing the injustices suffered daily by blacks. This essay will first look at themes that indicate that Griffin had an insight into being black such as physical appearance and discrimination, whilst showing that ultimately he was not black.
This essay will also look at themes that demonstrate that although blackened, Griffin did not have a comprehensive understanding of being a African-American including black past and future, opportunities, economics, sex, communism and resistance. To make these comparisons I will also compare Griffin's experiences to the experiences of Rowan and Williams, two black men who wrote similar books around the same time. Griffin notes his blackened appearance in the mirror several times whereas Rowan, a black man, looks in mirror and makes no comment regarding his appearance as his appearance is what it always has been. However, further on Rowlands notes that black faces mirrored joy and sadness which corresponds with Griffin noting that his reflection in the mirror changed from defiant to passive and that the negro before him in no way resembled himself. This implies that Griffin saw dark skin as separating himself from who he really was, that is a white man with prospects. He states that “The black man is wholly a negro, regardless of what he once may have been”. This implies that with the change of skin tone Griffin now feels black, however, it is worth remembering that Griffin was
an experienced writer. Griffin knew how to shock through writing and the objective of his writing was to highlight to white people, the negative conditions for negroes and therefore it was imperative that the white reader believed he had become black. However, it is shown that Griffin still thinks like a white man as his concern is not in what blacks think of him, but what whites think of him. What Griffin says, countless negroes have said before yet because he is white he thinks maybe white society will listen to him. Baldwin calls Griffin's time as a black man as a stunt. Griffin although blackened had retained his classically Caucasian features. In viewing himself in the mirror with his caucasian features blackened, Griffin was forced to realise his own racist assumptions that all African Americans had ‘Stereotype’ features. What he goes on to discover is the contours of blackness for whites: contours he has externalized and thus indulges in his very disguise. This emphasises that regardless of physical appearance Griffin still thought of himself as a white man who deserved to be listened to. Black like me brought home to millions of white americans the misery and injustice endured daily by american blacks - It opened eyes, and seized hearts and mind. Yet Griffin's Seems unaware that his disguise was only external, and although blackened he was not really negro yet his imagination coloured him more than the physical effect for the duration of his time as a black man - Griffin had no intention of permanently being black. Black like me is a personal essayist showing personal observations and encounters therefore it is not a broad look at African-Americans though many daily issues such as discrimination that encumbered Griffin’s daily activities, are shown through his observations. Griffin discovers many issues of racial discrimination whilst blackened including not being able to find work fitting to his qualifications; the only work he is able to attain is manual work. Not being able to attain work corresponds with Williams who states that he was refused state employment due to his skin colour. However, the fact that Griffin's expected to be able to find work suiting to his qualifications states he was thinking like a white man. Griffin talks about discrimination on buses including segregation and racial discrimination by bus drivers, this corresponds with Rowan who notes segregation on buses and that a driver being nice to him was a rarity. Other discriminations mentioned by all three authors include, hate stares, lack of trust, refusal of service, white only areas such as beaches and parks, segregated toilets, water fountains, waiting rooms, cafes and hotels. Often places such as toilets, hotels and medical facilities were simply not provided for blacks and if they were they were of much lower quality than those provided for whites. Whilst these discriminations are noted in Griffin, Williams and Rowland, it is only Griffin who seems astonished by them. As Williams notes, he was born black and had never known any different treatment. Whereas Griffin comments that “the Negro is treated not even as second class citizen, but as a tenth-class one”. This reinforces that whilst Griffin was physically black in appearance he was not black as he was not accustomed to and therefore was shocked by such blatant discrimination. Comparisons between Griffin, Rowland and Williams illustrates that Griffin's experiences in his short-lived period as a black man did reflect other black mens experience of discrimination. However, Griffin could not be a black man as he had not black past, no black future and no concern for his childrens future based on skin colour - all Griffin had was his black present. According to Kaplan and Pease to ‘black up’ is to express a belief in the complete suturing together of the markers of ‘blackness’ and the black culture. Griffin could become black, but never negro, colour and culture are two separate entities; Griffin was able to change his colour but not his heritage. For blacks in the United States, there was memory of slavery, segregation, lynching, humiliation and for many it was not just memory it was part of everyday life this is noted by Williams. Rowlands states that he was born in the jim crow south and white superiority was all he had ever known whereas Williams notes that he has grown up being judged on his skin colour.Griffin is unable to talk about his black past as he was not born black and is not from a black heritage, hence he does not know what it feels like to be black. Griffin was never a victim of the violence to which Southern blacks routinely were subjected in those days, although he was threatened post publication this was not because he was black, it was because he had highlighted racial discrimination, consequently he can not fully understand what it is to be black. Furthermore, Griffin was only black for a few short weeks so he has no black future. The civil rights activist, Dr King had a dream that his children would one day live in a nation where they were not judged on their skin colour but instead by the content of their character. This was reflective of the dream of many blacks as shown in Griffin and Williams. Griffin only had to think of himself as his children were not black. He does not have to think of the disadvantages to negro children in education or economics. Even in the present Griffin did not have the full experience of being a black man. Griffin was warned by his publisher of how dangerous it would be to be a black man, not only for the major cultural change of being black but for having no experience of how to avoid certain situations. Griffin was not accustomed to the required physical and mental travel preparations based on his skin colour whereas Williams carried a travel guide written for blacks and expected every negro to be rebuffed for being black and Rowland is aware that the knack to getting by as an African-American in the south is to remember the rules for each area.Griffin is not prepared with travel guides or knowledge of rules of each area and instead asks a shoe shine man for lessons in the ways of negro life - it Griffin was black he would not need these lessons and would have known of the preparations such as travel guides needed before touring the south. Griffin had fooled himself into believing that the only requirement needed to gain black insight was to physically become black. His concern was with whether his physical appearance would pass him off as black, he gave no thought to the lack of his black history or other preparations. Even post publication his claims to understanding blackness were based on personal present experiences and did not include a black history emphasizing that ultimately, Griffin was white. Griffin had many opportunities that black men could ill afford. Griffin was a gifted student , he studied medicine and humanities in France - education was an luxury that many blacks did not have. Whilst, technically education in America was separate but equal their were often not enough places for blacks and surplus places for whites. In a conversation with a black man Griffin hears that white boys go to college get good jobs, whereas a black boy, if he makes it to college, still can not expect to gain dutiful employment. This is reflected in the fact the educated Griffin could not attain employment suitable to his education level. Rowland and Williams note that there are very few opportunities for black due to discrimination and economics. Griffin as a white man had opportunities in his past and expected opportunities in his future including respect, trust, employment and medical treatment. This signifies that Griffin was thinking of as a white man. Furthermore, when Griffin got to Hattiesburg, a Mississippi town where racial tensions were especially high, he revealed his disguise to P.D. East, a courageous (white) newspaper editor thus demonstrating that Griffin knew he could return to being a white man. No black man has ever had this luxury. Griffin mentions the economic power of black people in relation to Atlanta and negroes joining forces to have control of eighty-million dollars of industry and education. However, he is an outsider looking in. Whilst this uniting of funds to give negroes economic power sounds great, the reality was that many negroes were living in filth, poverty, squalid slums ridden with disease. Economic poverty meant that many negroes could not get decent housing and even if they had money many places would not rent good housing to blacks. Limited work opportunities for negroes usually at or below minimum wage meant that many were reduced to living in drafty shacks. Or as Williams puts it, he was poor before the depression and poor after. Many blacks could simply not afford to be civil rights advocates or even to complain about inequality - a family has to eat and complaining would result in unemployment. Griffin, was aware of this problem as it is stated that he seeks out the poor area of town to find negroes, this also reflects ’respectable racism’ and demonstrates a white mans view as to what constitutes being a negro. This further reinforces Griffin’s whiteness as at no point did he have to make the choice between fighting for a politically and socially equal future and being able to feed his family. People protested where they could, the boycotting of city buses showed the economic power of blacks. This is not to state that all blacks in the south were famished, their was a black middle class; Griffin's assumption that blacks would automatically live in the poorer area of town is exampling a white stereotype of blackness. The concept of equality contains five separate ideas, political equality, equality before the law, equality of opportunity, economic equality and social equality. Griffin in being a white man does not seem to realise that civil right laws did not change the root condition of black people. Rowan heard a near impoverished negroes say “I don’t want social equality. What i want is opportunity -food, clothing, and shelter for my family. I want my children to live better than I did.” The more a person has, the more a person wants. For those in the lower strata’s of society their main concern was not social or legal equality but equality of opportunity which could then lead to equality of economics. Once these things had been achieved they would be in a position to look at other equalities including political, legal and social equality. Griffin being a white man does not address these issues of equality on an individual basis, he holds an outside opinion that blacks should have equality without having the insight of what it is like to be a African-American of any class. Much of Griffin’s ‘ experience’ of being a black man outside of daily discrimination is based on what he has heard other African-Americans say, not on his own thoughts thus showing him as a white man with an insight to being black.
The test he had so eagerly taken identified him as every single race except African. He is, according to the test, 0 percent African. The life he had built was made under an assumed race. He had been passing for black for over fifty years. The discovery sent his world into a spiral and he began questioning what he should consider himself. He had been a part of a community forged through blood, sweat, and tears only to find out that he did not belong. He was now excluded due to the one-drop rule. He had lost his community, but it was all he knew.
Coates wrote a 176 page long letter to his 14 years old son to explain what the African American society were going through at the time being. In the book, Coates used himself as an example to demonstrate the unjust treatment that had been cast upon him and many other African Americans. Readers can sense a feeling of pessimism towards African American’s future throughout the entire book although he did not pointed it out directly.
The use and repetition of the word “nigger” suggest both physical and psychological boundaries for Griffin, which, of course, also extend to the black population of the mid-twentieth century. In identifying himself with the term, Griffin becomes overwhelmed by its dehumanizing and de-individualizing effect: “I knew I was in hell. Hell could be no more lonely or hopeless, no more agonizingly estranged from the world of order and harmony” (66). Griffin’s internalization of discrimination and his repression as “Other” allows Griffin to convey the “wrong-doing” by the white middle class, forcing a truthful realization of the detrimental effect of racism on the
The transition of being a black man in a time just after slavery was a hard one. A black man had to prove himself at the same time had to come to terms with the fact that he would never amount to much in a white dominated country. Some young black men did actually make it but it was a long and bitter road. Most young men fell into the same trappings as the narrator’s brother. Times were hard and most young boys growing up in Harlem were swept off their feet by the onslaught of change. For American blacks in the middle of the twentieth century, racism is another of the dark forces of destruction and meaninglessness which must be endured. Beauty, joy, triumph, security, suffering, and sorrow are all creations of community, especially of family and family-like groups. They are temporary havens from the world''s trouble, and they are also the meanings of human life.
In Kiese Laymon “How to Slowly Kill yourselves and others in America” and Brent Staples “Black Men and Public Spaces” both essays deal with being an African American man but the authors respond in a different ways. At one point in history being an African American wasn’t always the easiest but two Authors shared their stories about the experiences they had which were very different. Although the color of their skin is the same and how they treated was as well both authors take different precaution’s to handle the situations they were in to persuade the audience on how to deal with the effects of racism. Both authors show their hidden message through the actions presented throughout the essays. Laymon`s casual tone and will to fight make him more relatable
The two concepts are perhaps the most powerful writing of the sheer burden of African-American in our society. Ever though the story was written many decades ago, many African-American today reflect on how things haven’t changed much over time. Still today American will conceptualize what is “Black” and what is “American”.
America have a long history of black’s relationship with their fellow white citizens, there’s two authors that dedicated their whole life, fighting for equality for blacks in America. – Audre Lorde and Brent Staples. They both devoted their professional careers outlying their opinions, on how to reduce the hatred towards blacks and other colored. From their contributions they left a huge impression on many academic studies and Americans about the lack of awareness, on race issues that are towards African-American. There’s been countless, of critical evidence that these two prolific writers will always be synonymous to writing great academic papers, after reading and learning about their life experience, from their memoirs.
One examples is, even before his surgery was complete and he had not made the full transition from white to black yet, he was startled at what he heard from his doctor. At the time of his surgery, he spoke with the dermatologist who was changing his skin color, and found out that even this man had prejudices over black people. The doctor was insistent that the “lighter-skinned Negroes” were more ethical and more sensible than the darker-skinned ones. This man, with a high intellectual IQ and much schooling, also claimed that, as a whole group and race, blacks are always violent. Griffin, horrified that he let this man be in charge of his operation, was utterly and completely appalled that a liberal man could indulge in such hateful fallacies. Not only before and during his surgery does Griffin find himself being appalled by white people, but also during his time as a black man in the south he experienced many harsh and unfriendly situations, he never would have experienced if he was a white man. For example, on his first day as a black man he goes into a drugstore forgetting his skin color and that he now, since he is black, he forbidden from ordering a fountain drink, but after a few mean and disgusted looks from the white workers he realizes, he wasn’t even allowed in the store. His first day hit him hard when he figured out that everywhere he went whites seemed to look at him with suspicion and hostility. Also, after having the word nigger seem to never escape his ears its implications almost became unbearable. Hearing this really made me think about all of the black people in the south that have had to put up this and even worse things every day of their lives and how strong they all were; a white man has been through this one day and can barely take it; how have these people put up with this for so
In John Howard Griffin's novel Black Like Me, Griffin travels through many Southern American states, including Mississippi. While in Mississippi Griffin experiences racial tension to a degree that he did not expect. It is in Mississippi that he encounters racial stereotypical views directed towards him, which causes him to realize the extent of the racial prejudices that exist. Mississippi is where he is finally able to understand the fellowship shared by many of the Negroes of the 50's, because of their shared experiences. Although Griffin travels throughout the Southern States, the state of
Although he learned of his true identity at an early age, it seems as though the narrator preferred to be white. This could have possibly been influenced by his upbringing during his early childhood and the mistreating of blacks as opposed to the higher regards for whites. He seems to accept a white, and sometimes often racist view of the world in general. This can be noted in ways such as when he states he never forgave the teacher that led him to understand he was black. Also, in his travels throughout the South, the way he observes his surroundings is often like those made through the eyes of a racist white man. He picks out the "unkempt appearance, the shambling, slouching gait, and loud talk and laughter” of the lower-class blacks that he meets (p. 40). He also admits that he never really enjoyed seeing a rich white widow have a black companion. Then, after partaking in a debate about race among several white passengers on a train, the narrator expresses his admiration for the most racist man that was involved in the discussion. It also seems as though he only had eyes for white women and he eventually married one and had children with her. Although he may have preferred to
Racism is not only a crime against humanity, but a daily burden that weighs down many shoulders. Racism has haunted America ever since the founding of the United States, and has eerily followed us to this very day. As an intimidating looking black man living in a country composed of mostly white people, Brent Staples is a classic victim of prejudice. The typical effect of racism on an African American man such as Staples, is a growing feeling of alienation and inferiority; the typical effect of racism on a white person is fear and a feeling of superiority. While Brent Staples could be seen as a victim of prejudice because of the discrimination he suffers, he claims that the victim and the perpetrator are both harmed in the vicious cycle that is racism. Staples employs his reader to recognize the value of his thesis through his stylistic use of anecdotes, repetition and the contrast of his characterization.
Ralph Ellison’s short story, Battle Royal, is mainly a description of the African American struggle for equality and identity. The narrator of the story is an above average youth of the African American community [Goldstein-Shirlet, 1999]. He is given an opportunity to give a speech to some of the more prestigious white individuals. His expectations of being received in a positive and normal environment are drastically dashed when he is faced with the severity of the process he must deal with in order to accomplish his task. The continuing theme of Battle Royal is that of a struggle for one’s rights against great odds. Instances of this struggle are found throughout the story. Ellison highlights the vastness of the problems faced by the African American community to claim themselves. This is done by the extreme nature of the incidents described in the Battle Royal. A short analysis of the major theme found in Ellison’s Battle Royal, supported by a literary criticism dealing with the tone and style of the story.
Within the autobiography Black Boy, written by Richard Wright, many proposals of hunger, pain, and tolerance are exemplified by Wright’s personal accounts as a child and also as an adolescent coming of manhood. Wright’s past emotions of aspirations along with a disgust towards racism defined his perspective towards equality along with liberal freedom; consequently, he progressed North, seeking a life filled with opportunity as well as a life not judged by authority, but a life led separately by perspective and choices.
“The history of the American Negro is the history of this strife, – this longing to attain self-consciousness, manhood, to merge his double self into a better and truer self. In this merging he wishes neither of the older selves to be lost. He would not Africanize America, for America has too much to teach the world and Africa. He would not bleach his Negro soul in a flood of white Americanism, for he knows that Negro blood has a message f...
Baldwin and his ancestors share this common rage because of the reflections their culture has had on the rest of society, a society consisting of white men who have thrived on using false impressions as a weapon throughout American history. Baldwin gives credit to the fact that no one can be held responsible for what history has unfolded, but he remains restless for an explanation about the perception of his ancestors as people. In Baldwin?s essay, his rage becomes more directed as the ?power of the white man? becomes relevant to the misfortune of the American Negro (Baldwin 131). This misfortune creates a fire of rage within Baldwin and the American Negro. As Baldwin?s American Negro continues to build the fire, the white man builds an invisible wall around himself to avoid confrontation about the actions of his ?forefathers? (Baldwin 131). Baldwin?s anger burns through his other emotions as he writes about the enslavement of his ancestors and gives the reader a shameful illusion of a Negro slave having to explai...