I really enjoyed this reading from Gates. It definitely addresses issues that are still being noted today. We still have incidents where who and what created a piece of literature matters. For instance in book stores and award ceremonies there are books that are categorized by who the author is. Books by African writers, Irish writers etc. The incident where the young African girl gets orally examined was very eye opening to me (p 3). she was basically questioned about her ability to write. I guess it strikes me to the fact that in my eyes it made the African girl seem more foreign. Them not believing that she was capable of writing such made it seem like she was less human, and not capable of learning skills and adapting to them.
It ties to the racial stereotypes that we have today. If an African American man talks proper in many instances it is heard that he is talking "white". If a European American woman is dancing to hip hop music or talking with slang, its referenced sometimes that she wants to be "black". Which explains to me that many no matter what you do, even being yourself you will be racially profiled. This goes back to the terministic screens. Are we limiting ourselves by judging others with the notions of what we think a race should react or not? Should we leave out opinions on others and just go with the flow?
1 comment:
I completely agree, the most interesting aspect of his paper was the ideas of how racial stereotypes survive via the racial slurs. The terms black and white hardly even represent skin color in our definition of it now. They have become signifiers for racism. He talked about how the words white and black become a trope because of this.
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