Blacked Out Chapter Summaries

Alice McIntyre talks about how whites view racism in many different examples and stories of white talk. McIntyre defines white talk throughout the reading, “Talk that serves to insulate white people from examining their/our individual and collective roles in the perpetuation of racism. It is a result of whites talking uncritically with/to other whites all the while, resisting critique and massaging each other’s racist attitude, beliefs, and actions” (McIntyre, 45-46). McIntyre talks about the themes that were discussions of white talk: “(1) How the participants constructed differences from “the Other,” (2) how they reconstructed myths about white and people of color, and (3) how they privileged their own feelings and affect over the lived

This book is about two main characters Jason Moreland and his online Facebook friend, Lacey Gray. They have lots of things in common such as a love for playing the guitar. There is just a problem that starts to form. Despite the fact that they basically spend hours talking to each other, Jason always requests a time and place to actually communicate with each other face to face, she never replies.

The central theme for “Against the Dark: Antiblackness in Education Policy and Discourse” is on multiculturalism and the theoretical work on antiblackness in education and policies. It starts out by talking about multiculturalism and how black people are excluded from it. How they are seen as not human and instead a problem. I believe that purpose of this writing is to, “explain how a theorization of antiblackness allows one to more precisely identify and respond to racism in education discourse and in the formation and implementation of education policy.” The author uses segregation in schools and slaves as an example. When talking about slaves, the author states that we are living in the afterlife of slavery. Black people are still looked

With a background affected tremendously by the dark history of African Americans, language has become a significant problem to what the term Black English really means to different people. In If Black Language Isn’t a Language, Then Tell Me, What Is, James Baldwin attempts to analyze what a language really means and how Black English evolved to fulfill an important role for Americans. Black English sounds proper to blacks, but to whites it may not be a proper use of language. Throughout this essay, Baldwin uses a specific tone and relates to his audience by opening his mind to both emotion and logic while still upholding his credibility. Baldwin tries to persuade the audience to respect the language of Black English using his personal experience. The history of different languages mentioned in the essay is used to help convince the audience of thinking about the term language from a new perspective. Whites and Blacks both may speak the same language, but that does not mean that they understand each other because the language can be spoken in different matters. As Baldwin states, “The white man could not possibly understand, and that, indeed, he cannot understand, until today”. A white man or black man had to be careful about the words they used in front of each other because some words would be considered offensive for one another. Baldwin uses African American language and culture to reveal the impact that the English language Americans use has created.

(p 64). The author states, “This interior space of self-definition draws us into the complicated gender and class spaces of racial othering. Thus, conceiving of Black people, men and women, as historical and material subjects,” (p 64).

Carter used the phrase “acting white” to express how the African American and Latino students, in her study, view other students who act and dress outside their culture. When a student speaks using standard English, they are thought to be “acting white” because they have rejected the use of black English. When a student goes to school and is seen to being wearing clothes that are deemed “preppy”, they are said to be “acting white”. In the African American and Latino student culture, black English and a certain style of dress are expected and when you go against the expected way, you are called out. “Acting white” is normally associated with the honors classes and working hard. Some of the students that are said to be “acting white” are not necessarily trying to be white. They are just trying to get good grades so that they can graduate and then go off to college.

The author explains in the chapter, So You Think You’re White? Explains how black people who have interest in white culture have questions about their own culture. The author states that “That parochial blackness is dangerous as hell. It steals your joy.” It is well explained in the book about what results into parochial blackness. The black people are intact with their traditions and culture to be able to survive and empower themselves. The authors writes, black people grouped as weak people in the era of civil war. They lobby for political and social

Kinship is the cornerstone for how people within a society relate to others and race lineages. Many societies trace their lineage through the father, which is called patrilineal, or through the mother which is called matrilineal. The Iroquois nation traced their kinship through the matrilineal decent lines. Kinship directly relates to how family groups think, act and live along side each other. The culture of the Iroquois can also be compared to how many American families relate to one another as well.

In the study of agronomy, it is the basic understanding that the root is the most important component of any plant. In the dictionary, the word root is defined as the part of the plant that latches to the ground for support, growth, and nutrition. Now any reader maybe wondering where my mind is wondering to, when I start a paper with such an obvious fact. However, in this case it is not just a fact, it is an analogy for something much deeper. In the African American culture, it is not uncommon to refer to someone as a “fictive kin”. Fictive kin is a term dubbed for someone who is either not related or indirectivity related to oneself. So, in other terms if the individual is not either a direct sibling, guardian, uncle, aunt, grandparent, or cousin, but they have left a positive impact on oneself they are considered fictive kin. This term was formed back in the slave trafficking days, when families where torn apart, and individuals were forced to form bonds with individuals who were not directly related to them. In today’s world, this word is still popular in this demographic, but has morphed in meaning and expanded into other living segments as well. Even though, I am not African American, I still share a similar experience of dubbing someone I love my fictive kin.

Take for example the lives of refugees from North Korea moving to the South. The refugees seeked a better home to live in since most women were forced to be prostitutes. Although they hoped their lives would be better in South Korea, they were completely wrong. After arriving in South Korea, they noticed that the only way to survive was to have some kind of kinship or network in such a capitalist and advanced society. An outsider status was anyone who didn’t fit the “social networks and social capital required for negotiating the competitive environment” (Markus Bell, 245). Though there are strict regulations on creating any kind of relationships such as marriage, employment, and socializing. This is only if one does not integrate oneself accordingly since the North Korean aspect is different. According to many anthropologists, the link to Korean kinship is well connected to even South Africa's and the Chinese. The Korean kinship is known to be based on “local lineage” or close relationships-even ones that are not biological. There is another kind of relationship where it is not necessarily intimate, but still considered as some kind of kinship: pseudo-kinship. In a pseudo-kinship, the relationship is a “lasting emotional significance” (Bell, 246). These are in enhanced especially in areas where the environment is extremely hostile and and radical. To many people, kinships are supposed to

The author uses language as a tool to show the characters’ status in society as black or white. Various language techniques are used to display the classes of society. The words “blanker” (used by blacks to describe whites) and “dagger” (used

Rios’ chapter, “Dummy Smart”, he illustrates a contemporary analysis on the interpretation of working-class culture, and the emergence of “resistance identities” that these youth of color assume in order to resist the structures that constantly criminalizes and marginalizes them. To further this discussion on culture, he also interweaves Ann Swindler’s idea of “culture as repertoire”, successfully adding another layer on how youth of color purposefully act out in order to respond to the system that ostracizes them so frequently. When explaining how mainstream society shuns mainly Black males, Rios recounts the disheartening experience of Ronny in an attempt to getting a job and exclaims, “The youths demonstrated a yearning for being accepted by mainstream society and used the resources available to them in an attempt to do so [...] their actions were misinterpreted as acts of deviance” (Rios 105). Ronny’s painful experience demonstrates how culture is similar to a “toolbox” that can be either beneficial or detrimental to one’s socioeconomic mobility. In this particular case, Ronny was unable to successfully adhere to mainstream culture because he interpreted that a handshake would be disrespectful to a white woman, underlining the historical undertones of Whites demonizing black

Thesis: Even with the creation of Black Studies as an academic discipline, the culture and influence of white dependency still seem to block people of color’s mental potential, and inherently their ability to progress as a group.

Additionally, the family of choice consists of people one feels as obligated to as if one was of blood relation. These self-constructed families are no less real or less meaningful than conventional families. In fact, they are known as one’s fictive kin. The bond of this type of family can be formed through several ways. Natalie writes, “for some people, voluntary kinship filled a void left by death or estrangement from biological family, while for others the relationships were supplemental or temporary.” It can be a friendship that turns into a family or a group that one relates to as a family. Either way, the fictive kin family is a blossoming family type. Increasingly, people refer to this as their second family. Some choose it to be their first family when they feel

Kinship is how cultures define relationships with people who they think of as family. All