Every ethnicity has developed specific tendencies that permeate and maintain from generation to the next. Throughout the first month of class we have read and discussed the emergence of the African American identity, which formed separately from white or Latino culture. This process has relied heavily on oral tradition and maintained via the socio-economic status of African Americans throughout their history here in the US. "Structural Integration vs. Cultural Assimilation: A Distinction with a Difference” and “Introduction,” Black Talk: Words and Phrases form the Hood to the Amen Corner" approach this topic in both similar and different ways. Both articles examine the cultural assimilation of African Americans in the United States, but …show more content…
“Integration vs. Assimilation” examines how “Blackness” formed as a result of both systemic, external forces (the world outside the black community that imposes social structures and values on African Americans) and thematic, internal forces (all the opposition to the external within us). External forces have historically oppressed and shaped African American culture, while internal forces are “reconciling the irreconcilable.” In other words, internal forces battle against the external forces that attempt to lessen the value of being black. This is the collective rejection of the stigma associated with African Americans within their culture. However, this duality results in internal tensions and divisions. It also has lead to the development of cultural sensibilities; this article argues these unique characteristics formed through a “self-consciously constructed” framework and have been allowed to maintain through “unselfconscious internalization.” African American’s consciously assembled a cultural framework then unconsciously internalized this same system. Smitherman also recognizes this marvel by quoting W.E.B. Du Bois, “One ever feels his two-ness—an American, a Negro” (19). These are virtually the same ideas; African Americans have a double consciousness about themselves, which is ever present. Both this article and “Introduction” …show more content…
Smitherman claims, “Black Talk… all comes from the same source: the African American Experience and the oral tradition embedded in that experience” (1). During slavery, the vast majority of African Americans were illiterate, since it was illegal to be a literate slave. Only free blacks could voice their opinions through words on a page. This certainly was an intentional form of cultural suppression unjustly perpetrated on the African American community. As a result, orality was the main force used to pass cultural sensibilities to the next generation. A strong oral tradition has lead to the development of many things, including folklore, Ebonics, and a variety of different musical genres. Slaves in the field working hours on end would sing “work songs” to lift their spirits. In their limited free time, slaves often listened and danced to religious and recreational songs accompanied by foot stamping and handclapping. This maintained for years because slaves lived in groups large enough to create a sense of collectivity and were isolated from urban areas, where mainstream socialization was likely to take place. I certainly don’t know to what degree these songs helped, but I still remember the lyrics to “Wade in the Water” I learned as a fifth grader. Never had I heard anything similar to the rhythmic, serene beat of this era. Indeed, orality played a large role in the
African-American slaves may not have had the formal education that many of their white slave owners possessed, but they intuitively knew that the labor they toiled through each and every day was unjust. This dynamic of unfairness brought about a mindset in which slaves would critique the workings of slavery. To many people’s understanding, slavery was an invasively oppressive institution; Levine however, noted, “for all its horrors, slavery was never so complete a system of psychic assault that it prevented the slaves from carving out independent cultural forms” . Slave spirituals were a part of the independent cultural form that enslaved African-Americans produced; these songs had numerous functions and critiquing slavery served as one of
The movie 'Ethnic Notions' describes different ways in which African-Americans were presented during the 19th and 20th centuries. It traces and presents the evolution of the rooted stereotypes which have created prejudice towards African-Americans. This documentary movie is narrated to take the spectator back to the antebellum roots of African-American stereotypical names such as boy, girl, auntie, uncle, Sprinkling Sambo, Mammy Yams, the Salt and Pepper Shakers, etc. It does so by presenting us with multiple dehumanized characters and cartons portraying African-Americans as carefree Sambos, faithful Mammies, savage Brutes, and wide-eyed Pickaninnies. These representations of African-Americans roll across the screen in popular songs, children's rhymes, household artifacts and advertisements. These various ways to depict the African ?American society through countless decades rooted stereotypes in the American society. I think that many of these still prevail in the contemporary society, decades after the civil rights movement occurred.
Everyone is raised within a culture with a set of customs and morals handed down by those generations before them. Most individual’s view and experience identity in different ways. During history, different ethnic groups have struggled with finding their place within society. In the mid-nineteen hundreds, African Americans faced a great deal of political and social discrimination based on the tone of their skin. After the Civil Rights Movement, many African Americans no longer wanted to be identified by their African American lifestyle, so they began to practice African culture by taking on African hairdos, African-influenced clothing, and adopting African names. By turning away from their roots, many African Americans embraced a culture that was not inherited, thus putting behind the unique and significant characteristics of their own inherited culture. Therefore, in an African American society, a search for self identity is a pervasive theme.
The Souls of Black Folk by W.E.B Dubois is a influential work in African American literature and is an American classic. In this book Dubois proposes that "the problem of the Twentieth Century is the problem of the color-line." His concepts of life behind the veil of race and the resulting "double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one's self through the eyes of others," have become touchstones for thinking about race in America. In addition to these lasting concepts, Souls offers an evaluation of the progress of the races and the possibilities for future progress as the nation entered the twentieth century.
The African-American Years: Chronologies of American History and Experience. Ed. Gabriel Burns Stepto. New York: Charles Scribner 's Sons, 2003.
Burton, O. V. (1998, April). African American Status and Identity in a Postbellum Community: An Analysis of the Manuscript Census Returns. Retrieved December 1, 2013, from
In The Soul of Black Folk, W.E.B. Du Bois talks about the struggles that the African Americans faced in the twentieth century. Du Bois mentions the conflict that concepts such as the “double consciousness” (or duality), “the veil” and the “color-line” posed for Black Americans. In his book he says that African Americans struggle with a double consciousness. He explicates that African American are forced to adopt two separate identities. First they are black, and that identity pertains to the color of their skin, the second identity is the American identity. However, he continues that the American identity is tainted because it is that if being American now but were slaves first. In other words, the double consciousness is saying that black people
The aspect of African-American Studies is key to the lives of African-Americans and those involved with the welfare of the race. African-American Studies is the systematic and critical study of the multidimensional aspects of Black thought and practice in their current and historical unfolding (Karenga, 21). African-American Studies exposes students to the experiences of African-American people and others of African descent. It allows the promotion and sharing of the African-American culture. However, the concept of African-American Studies, like many other studies that focus on a specific group, gender, and/or creed, poses problems. Therefore, African-American Studies must overcome the obstacles in order to improve the state of being for African-Americans.
In Du Bois' "Forethought" to his essay collection, The Souls of Black Folk, he entreats the reader to receive his book in an attempt to understand the world of African Americans—in effect the "souls of black folk." Implicit in this appeal is the assumption that the author is capable of representing an entire "people." This presumption comes out of Du Bois' own dual nature as a black man who has lived in the South for a time, yet who is Harvard-educated and cultured in Europe. Du Bois illustrates the duality or "two-ness," which is the function of his central metaphor, the "veil" that hangs between white America and black; as an African American, he is by definition a participant in two worlds. The form of the text makes evident the author's duality: Du Bois shuttles between voices and media to express this quality of being divided, both for himself as an individual, and for his "people" as a whole. In relaying the story of African-American people, he relies on his own experience and voice and in so doing creates the narrative. Hence the work is as much the story of his soul as it is about the souls of all black folk. Du Bois epitomizes the inseparability of the personal and the political; through the text of The Souls of Black Folk, Du Bois straddles two worlds and narrates his own experience.
In the novels Black No More and Passing addressed the issue of race identity and how race function in the normality of society. The novels depicted African-Americans finding stability during the time where white supremacy created social barriers. The narratives explored the authenticity of the disadvantages of a cultural norm that African-Americans encounter and why assimilation should be the standard or accepted. The texts inquiries on race and culture can be viewed in the context of perception, manipulation, and reality.
A main theme in this novel is the influence of family relationships in the quest for individual identity. Our family or lack thereof, as children, ultimately influences the way we feel as adults, about ourselves and about others. The effects on us mold our personalities and as a result influence our identities. This story shows us the efforts of struggling black families who transmit patterns and problems that have a negative impact on their family relationships. These patterns continue to go unresolved and are eventually inherited by their children who will also accept this way of life as this vicious circle continues.
Roy claims that musical socialization between blacks and whites began with the influence of the minstrel culture, where slaveowners used slaves to entertain at dances during the Antebellum period. He claims that, although the image of the minstrel was a vehemently racist one, the spirituals that minstrels sang were comparable to the spirituals sung with their peers on slave plantations. Nevertheless, Roy claims that these songs were also sung with European influence due to the fact that the slaveowners who employed the minstrels to perform also had these minstrels learn musical instruments. In order to do this, these slaves had to learn European practice techniques and notation styles, such as the diatonic scale, in order to be considered “successful” as a minstrel. This undoubtedly had an influence on the nature of the minstrel figure, and this began the white American’s influence on the musical form of black spirituals (Roy 33). This, according to Roy, also formulated the genre of American folk music, which was collaborative and synergetic. While I do not necessarily rebuke this particular claim, Roy ignores the fact that this new genre was formulated years after slaves began to sing spirituals. This
The inescapable reality of the Negro existence in America is color which is inherent in the concept of self, manifest in race-consciousness.2 This is significant because a Negro establishes his identity with other individuals, known or unknown, on the basis of a similarity of color and features, thus making his racial group membership the nexus of his self identity.3 In 1915, the Association for the study of Negro life and history made special endeavours to convince the Negroes that they could never acquire respectability in society if they despised their history and looked upon themselves as inferior. It was felt that "the American Negro must remake its past in order to make his future."4
Small, Christopher. Music of the Common Tongue: Survival and Celebration in African American Music. Hanover, NH: U of New England, 1998. Print
Through the incessant occurrences of racism, one can examine society’s perpetuation of the black individuals’ internal conflict with identity. For instance, at the very beginning of Adichie’s novel, the reader can see the way Ifemelu, in white America, is unhappy and unfulfilled, smothered by the blanket of racial standards created by American society. Therefore, “when [one] makes a choice to come to America, [one] becomes black” and he or she will everlastingly hold that label which contributes to his or her loss of identity. Whether one is “Jamaican” or “Ghanaian,” “America does not care.”