Why The Black Table Still Exists Essay

Melton McLaurin, in his book, “Separate Pasts,” recalls memories of growing up in his hometown of Wade, North Carolina. During this time, McLaurin works in his grandfather’s store in the segregated South. McLaurin writes of his interactions with the black community and observes the segregated lifestyle of black and whites. In his book “Separate Pasts,” McLaurin describes the black citizens of Wade that have influenced and changed his views of segregation and racism.

What does it mean to you to be a black girl? If you aren’t one, what do you see when you visualize a black girl? If your imagination limits you to just an afro-centric featured, loud and slang-loving, uneducated woman, then this piece is addressed to you. The persistence of the stereotypes concerning average black girls have chained us all to the earlier listed attributes. One side effect of this dangerous connection is the wide opening for a new form of discrimination it creates. Whether it is depicted through slave owners allocating the preferable duties to lighter-skinned black woman, or in modern times where a dislike in rap music categorizes you as not really black, segregation within black communities occur. Tracing all the way back to elementary school, my education on the subject of racial segregation has been constricted to just the injustices routed by dissimilarities between racial groups. What failed to be discussed was the intragroup discrimination occurring in the black society from both outside observers and inside members. Unfortunately, our differences in the level of education, in physical appearance, and in our social factors such as our behaviour, personality or what we believe in have been pitted against each other to deny the variety of unique identities that we as black individuals carry.

Segregation had had many effects on the black nation, to the point that it started building up ones character, “See the depressing clouds of inferiority begin to form in her little mental sky and see her begin to distort her little personality by unconsciously developing a bitterness towards white people”, King shows readers that segregation is even affecting little children, that it is starting to build up a young girls character and is contributing to the child developing hatred “bitterness” towards the white Americans. King makes readers imagine a black cloud settling in a young girls brain mentally, when instead she should have an image of a colorful blue sky with a rainbow, isn’t that suppose to be part of a 6 year-old’s imagination? King gives readers an image of destruction civil disobedience had created in the black community, especially in the young innocent little children.

Possessing different physical attributes and cultural customs to the majority can make it difficult to feel like one belongs to a certain group. Groups are formed on opinion and common interests, not feeling like a person shares any of these things with another can make a person feel like an outsider especially a migrant.

Author, Dr. Beverly Tatum a clinical psychologist whose main study of interest is Black children’s racial identity development wrote the text Why Are All the Black Kids sitting Together in the Cafeteria? After receiving a letter from a school principal in New Jersey applauding her on her reason of why, in racially mixed schools all over the country, Black kids were still sitting together in school cafeterias. In the text Tatum shares her thoughts about the development of racial identity faced by the African American population and how it is interrelated to racism at the turn of the twentieth century while highlighting the Black-White relation in childhood and adolescence age group. The book entails controversy in that, Dr. Tatum understanding of racism is centered heavily on race. Tatum’s explanation of racism suggest that Blacks cannot be racist based on the fact their racial bigotry do not stand or rest on a structure of advantage.

The life of the Negro is still sadly crippled by the manacles of segregation and the chains of discrimination… the Negro is still languished in the corners of American society and finds himself in exile in his own land (qtd. in W.T.L. 235).

Analysis of Why are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria by Beverly Daniel Tatum

The discriminating social stratification in 1950’s developed a set of servile behavior on the blacks. They were thought to be inferior to whites, and were treated accordingly. Moreover, different parts of the country had various ranges of sensitivities while dealing with the blacks. For example, in Mississippi things were particularly tense after the Parker lynch case. No black man would dare look into any white man’s eyes in fear of the repercussions. On the bus, a man warned Griffin to watch himself closely until he caught onto Mississippi’s ways. In an extreme case like this, it was vital to learn about their roles and behave accordingly.

In the beginning chapters of the book, we get a glimpse of the typical home and community of an African American during segregation. Many Africans Americans were too adjusted to the way of living, that they felt

Since our nation has such diverse qualities and characteristics, you would think that everyone who lives in such a country, we would all come and stick together. With people who are so different, in so many different types of ways, being a united and unified nation would be knowledgeable. But instead our country consists of "people making strenuous efforts to group themselves with people who are basically like themselves" (Brooks 62). When taking a deeper look, and basically breaking down the nation piece by piece, we see segregation that happens to go unnoticed. There are neighborhoods that have a reputation for being where "African Americans live," “Asians Live," "Caucasians live," "Mexicans live" etc. which is not a good thing. People tend to not go out of their comfort zone and expand on what they are used to, to try new things, which is usually only

I believe Tatum answers the question “Why are all the Black kids sitting together in the cafeteria?” not only through her description of William Cross’s Black racial identity model, but through James Marcia’s four identity statuses and Rosabeth Moss Kanter’s A Tale of O. Tatum follows up the question through Marcia’s four stages that an individual undergoes to discover their identity: diffuse, foreclosed, moratorium, and achieved (Tatum 53). Marcia’s identity statuses can be seen in more detail through Cross’s Model. Cross’s Model begins with a person developing self-awareness of the world’s perception about themselves. Consequently, the individual comes in contact with the preencounter stage. Hence, their instinct is to assimilate by rejecting who they are and accepting what the majority sees as acceptable. At least one event may cause the person to enter the encounter stage, in which they become aware of racism and how it impacts their life.

Blindly, our nation’s black population fought, not always knowing what for, just as the boys in this story fought. The segregation of schools, restaurants, and other public facilities were issues that were fiercely fought over.

He explains how it’s easy for people who have never seen or felt segregation to say wait but they have never got to see their vicious mob kill their mom or your brothers. They’ve never had police hit them or people drown your sister at a whim. When you must see your twenty million brothers smothering in an airtight cage of poverty amid an affluent society who constantly degrades them just based on the color of their skin. These explicit and emotional experiences offer an insight to people who don’t understand the pain of segregation to see what black people must deal with in their life on the

"Whenever I thought of the essential bleakness of black life in America, I knew that Negroes had never been allowed to catch the full spirit of Western civilization, that they lived somehow in it but not of it. And when I brooded upon the cultural barrenness of black life, I wondered if clean, positive tenderness, love, honor, loyalty, and the capacity to remember were native with man. I asked myself if these human qualities were not fostered, won, struggled and suffered for, preserved in ritual from one generation to another." This passage written in Black Boy, the autobiography of Richard Wright shows the disadvantages of Black people in the 1930's. A man of many words, Richard Wrights is the father of the modern

Fourteen years after graduating from the junior school, Graham visits the school where he finds out and explains that “all black table” alongside other segregated tables in the cafeteria were still there. From the story, the author clarifies that in the school cafeteria, there were different segregated tables where the students had grouped themselves according to their racial and ethnic characteristics, an aspect that discouraged their integration. The division