The Strange Career Of Jim Crow Summary

“Race as Civic Felony” by Loic Wacquant: In this reading, the US conception of “race” is a direct outcome of the unique status of the United States as a slave holding republic (page 127). While slavery itself has long been abolished, its dynamics were replicated in Jim Crow segregation and later in the urban ghetto. In page 127, The Jim Crow regime reworked the racial boundary between slaves and free into some segregated societies. Despite the he abolition of “statues segregation”, it seems that new ways have been thought to hold minorities from the mainstream society. Another ‘peculiar institution’, born of the adjoining of the hyperghetto with the cerebral system, is reorganizing the social meaning and significance of ‘race’ in agreement with the dictates of the deregulated economy and the post-Keynesian state. In page 128, white people fear and mistrust people of color. They think of black people’s

“Until justice is blind to color, until education is unaware of race, until opportunity is unconcerned with the color of men's skins, emancipation will be a proclamation but not a fact.”(Lyndon Johnson). For generations in the United Stated, ethnic minorities have been discriminated against and denied fair opportunity and equal rights. In the beginning there was slavery, and thereafter came an era of racism which directly impacted millions of minorities lives. This period called Jim Crow was the name of the racial caste system up in till mid 1960s. Jim Crow was more than just a series of severe anti-Black laws, it became a way of life. Under Jim Crow, African Americans were positioned to the status of second class citizens. What Jim Crow

In today’s modern world, many people would be surprised to find out that there is still a racial caste system in America. After witnessing the election of a black president, people have started believing that America has entered a post-racial society. This is both a patently false and dangerous mindset. The segregation and stigma of race is still very much alive in our society. Instead of a formalized institution such as slavery or Jim Crow, America has found a new way to continue the marginalization of blacks by using the criminal justice system. In Michelle Alexander’s book “ The New Jim Crow”, she shows how America’s “ War on Drugs “ has become a tool of racial segregation and how the discretionary enforcement of drug laws has

The Jim Crow laws were local and state laws that were supposedly “separate but equal,” but instead blacks were inferior to the whites due that to the social, educational, and economical disadvantages that they caused. In Woodward’s greatly influential book, The Strange Career of Jim Crow, he shows supporters of segregation that this was not the way that it had always been, but instead segregation took time to develop after the Civil war and that the acceptance of the Jim Crow laws was not just because of race, but also included politic aspects. Woodward proves his thesis by showing how the state between the two races was right after the race the war and how slavery required interaction between blacks and whites. Woodward continues to

The Strange Career of Jim Crow by C. Vann Woodward explains the development of Jim Crow Laws starting in the period of Reconstruction until its legal demise in 1965. The book puts an argument against the question whether or not segregation had been around before the civil war, and argues that segregation had not always been that way. Before the Civil War, a close proximity was crucial between the societies in the South to maintain white supremacy above blacks. After the Civil War, a period known as Reconstruction began the physical separation of the blacks and whites to maintain white supremacy by keeping blacks and whites separated in physical facilities like schools, bathrooms, and all types of transportation. Although there was a physical separation between blacks and whites, there was not any kind of social strife between the races until the Compromise of 1877 and the forcible integration of the races. The period after Reconstruction began the push to set in laws known as Jim Crow Laws to legally separate the races, but because of the certain laws poor whites were also affected by things like literacy tests and poll taxes. The total effect of the Jim Crow Laws only benefited white elites like before the Civil War. Woodward breaks up his book between the different phases Jim Crow went through and explains the different reactions people took towards the growing segregation.

In The New Jim Crow, Michelle Alexander develops a compelling analogy on how mass incarceration is similar to the Jim Crow era, and is a “race-making institution.” She begins her work with the question, “Where have all the black men gone?” (Alexander, 178) She demonstrates how the media and Obama have failed to give an honest answer to this question, that the large majority of them or in prison. She argues that in order to address this problem, we must be honest about the fact that this is happening, and the discrimination with the African American communities that is putting them there.

There were very few Jim Crow laws in existence in the South before the 1890s. Before that, African Americans could, theoretically, be seated in trains and buses with whites, as well as attend the same places of entertainment and stay at the same hotels. Woodward demonstrates this by using the accounts of one African American reporter from the North who traveled south to see if there was prejudice against him in public accommodations, and was surprised that he could find no difference in the way that he was treated in the South than the way he was treated in New England. In the end, the reporter stopped corresponding as he could find nothing incriminating to say about his treatment in the South.

Racism is a thing of the past, or is it? Michelle Alexander’s, “The New Jim Crow,” main focus is on mass incarceration and how it occurs in an era of color blindness. Alexander also focuses on the social oppressions that African Americans have suffered throughout the years, until now. In this essay, I will discuss how the system of control was constructed, Alexander’s compelling historical analysis, and if the current system would be easier to dismantle. I would like to start by delving into how the system of control was constructed.

Answering this radical turn of events, Woodward published a third edition of Strange Career in 1974 to discuss the ambiguity faced by many African Americans in opposing the principles of Jim Crow laws while maintaining a distinctive racial identity. His research and continual revisions made The Strange Career of Jim Crow an undeniable force of the time with praise hailing from civil rights leader Martin Luther King, Jr. who referred to it as “the historical bible of the civil rights movement.”

This “war on drugs,” which all subsequent presidents have embraced, has created a behemoth of courts, jails, and prisons that have done little to decrease the use of drugs while doing much to create confusion and hardship in families of color and urban communities.1,2Since 1972, the number of people incarcerated has increased 5-fold without a comparable decrease in crime or drug use.1,3 In fact, the decreased costs of opiates and stimulants and the increased potency of cannabis might lead one to an opposing conclusion.4 Given the politics of the war on drugs, skyrocketing incarceration rates are deemed a sign of success, not failure. I don’t totally agree with the book (I think linking crime and black struggle is even older than she does, for instance) but I think The New Jim Crow pursues the right line of questioning. “The prison boom is not the main cause of inequality between blacks and whites in America, but it did foreclose upward mobility

Michelle Alexander’s The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Age of Colorblindness goes into great detail on race related issues that were specific to black males, the mass incarceration, and how that lead to the development of institutionalized racism in the United States. She compares the Jim Crow with recent phenomenon of mass incarceration and points out that the mass incarceration is a network of laws, policies, customs and institutions that have been working together to warrant the subordinating status of black males. In this paper I will go into a brief examination of the range of issues that she mentions in her book that are surrounding the mass incarceration of black male populations.

Activism, as defined by Merriam-Webster, is “a doctrine or practice that emphasizes direct vigorous action especially in support of or opposition to one side of a controversial issue.” While this definition is pretty accurate, activism does not have to be a direct action; it can be a subtle, indirect action as well. African Americans engaged in activism directly and indirectly between the Civil War and the 1920s. While African Americans were perceived to be “ignorant and lazy” , they proved to be intuitive and industrious. They were motivated by their imaginations of equality in all aspects – politically, socially, and economically. African Americans imagined desegregated schools, economic opportunities that could provide for them and their

The Strange Career of Jim Crow by Van Woodward is based on the time period surrounding the Civil Rights Movement. This book is an accurate account of events that occurred during this time. It shows how the 1896 US Supreme Court Ruling affected blacks and the obstacles they faced to overcome. This book shows how the rights of African Americans have evolved over time. Van Woodward did an excellent job illustrating the events of history with The Strange Career of Jim Crow and created a factual account of history that is still used in classrooms today.

To start off, it might seem that African Americans feel that they are inferior to whites. Some might claim that our country has not overcome the Jim Crow Era, proving this by bringing up an example of an African American actress who did not get a part “because she doesn’t quite look the part” (Schwab). But the one actress that did not get a part does not compare to the countless amount of successful African Americans. “Obama, the first black president, Oprah, Samuel Jackson” and so many more are just examples of blacks that are successful in today’s eyes. This uncountable list of blacks in jobs equal to whites just proves that they are not inferior, but that they are in fact, equal. If that reasoning is not enough, take the fact that we have

In The New Jim Crow: Mass Incarceration in the Modern Age of Colorblindness by Michelle Alexander, the author argues the legal system doing its job “perfectly” well—the United States has simply replaced one caste system, the Jim Crow laws instituted in the 1880s and designed to oppress recently freed black slaves, for another—a system which uses the War on Drugs, which was instituted in the 1970s, to imprison, parole, and detain people of color, keeping the majority of minorities in the United States in a permanent state of incarceration. This an important issue because it affects the everyday lives of people around the nation. Alexander looks in detail at what economists normally miss—the entire legal structure of the courts, parole, probation and laws that effectively turn a person who may have done the crime into a person who is unworthy or “incapable” of rehabilitation. Alexander does a wonderful job of telling the truth, and blaming the right people, who can be liberal or conservative, white or black, who inflict this injustice on others. Alexander’s writing, however, does lack a structure that the reader can follow, which ultimately weakens her overall case.