scholarly journals Understanding Ta-Nehisi Coates’ Rejection of Hope

2021 ◽  
Vol 4 ◽  
pp. 22-30
Author(s):  
Maanvi Dhillon
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
American Dream ◽  
Black Americans ◽  
Literary Analysis ◽  
Black American ◽  
White Americans ◽  
Personal Experiences ◽  
The World ◽  
History Of ◽  
Work First

Ta-Nehisi Coates’ book Between the World and Me is written as a letter to his son, but serves many roles: a collection of personal experiences as an African American man, a history of black people’s exploitation and oppression in America, and advice for navigating the country and its historical, systematic, expansive and deeply embeddedd racism. Readers and critics have noted the pessimism of the work, as Coates writes pragmatically and coldly with no optimism about the potential to end the racist oppression of black Americans. This essay analyzes Coates’ rejection of hope by parsing through the audiences he addresses and the respective messages underlying his work. First, the essay considers how Coates urges readers to think critically about the hopeful narrative of the American Dream and see how it obscures the racism underlying and determining both white Americans’ economic, political and social successes, as well as the struggles and cyclic obstacles afflicting black American communities. Using literary analysis, the essay argues that Coates’ rebuke of the American dream is meant to be addressed towards white Americans, as they are more susceptible to accepting its tempting and convenient narrative. Coates provides his son and the black American community with a different critique of hope; he shows the futility of maintaining optimism about the achievement of racial equality when that outcome depends on their nation and white peers who demonstrate no interest in ending the racist structures and systems that privilege them. Coates’ argument is clarified in the essay by framing it as a form of literary theorist Lauren Berlant’s conception of cruel optimism. Ultimately, by exploring the nuance in Coates’ pessimistic work, the essay reveals how Coates’ rejection of hope is both an effective message in addressing his various audiences and a justified sentiment, particularly given the high cost of holding on to hope for black Americans.

African American Dreams

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jonathan W. White
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
African Americans ◽  
American Dream ◽  
Black Americans ◽  
White Americans ◽  
Colonial Era ◽  
Free African Americans

The experience of slavery had an indelible effect on the dreams of black Americans. Some slaves dreamt of escape, or of loved ones who had been sold away. Former slaves sometimes had vivid dreams of being returned into slavery. Whether slave or free, African Americans often looked to their dreams as signs from God or as confirmation of their conversion to Christianity. White Americans tended to look down on African American dream practices as superstitious, but in fact, white and black Americans had a shared dream culture that stretched back into the colonial era.

scholarly journals HEGEMONIC DISCRIMINATION AS SEEN IN ERNEST J. GAINES’ A LESSON BEFORE DYING

2018 ◽  
Vol 13 (1) ◽  
pp. 12
Author(s):  
Achmad Naufal Irsyadi ◽  
Itsna Syahadatud Dinurriyah
Keyword(s):  
Civil Rights ◽  
Theoretical Foundation ◽  
Black Americans ◽  
White Americans ◽  
Antonio Gramsci ◽  
Black Africans ◽  
The World ◽  
History Of

<p class="Abstrak">The progress history of Black Africans in America remains a slice of the history of minority struggle in the world of inferiority. Racism becomes a brand topic in every sector of Blacks live in America. War and act of reformation as ways against racism are almost routinely done by Black Americans to reach their civil rights as Americans. Although the war against racism has ended, but racism atmosphere can still be felt, and it seems to have been felt by Ernest J. Gaines in his novel entitled <em>A Lesson Before Dying. </em>Therefore, this writing would like to analyze and describe hegemonic discrimination by White Americans. Hegemonic discrimination is a new phenomenon for Black Americans in the Southern. This theoretical foundation refers to the theory of Hegemony by Antonio Gramsci that is applied to see how discriminative hegemony is implemented smoothly and comfortably.</p>

Rethinking Racial, Ethnoracial, and Imperial Categories: Key Concepts in Comparative Race Studies in the History of Education

2020 ◽  
Vol 60 (4) ◽  
pp. 657-669
Author(s):  
Kim Cary Warren
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Native American ◽  
Cultural Practices ◽  
Educational Leaders ◽  
White Americans ◽  
Equal Rights ◽  
History Of ◽  
Native American Tribes ◽  
American Teacher ◽  
American Educator

While researching racially segregated education, I came across speeches delivered in the 1940s by two educational leaders—one a black man and the other a Native American man. G. B. Buster, a longtime African American teacher, implored his African American listeners to work with white Americans on enforcing equal rights for all. A few years before Buster delivered his speech, Henry Roe Cloud (Winnebago), a Native American educator, was more critical of white Americans, specifically the federal government, which he blamed for destroying American Indian cultures. At the same time, Roe Cloud praised more recent federal efforts to preserve cultural practices, study traditions before they completely disappeared, and encourage self-government among Native American tribes.

Researching World Englishes in HEL Courses

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Carol Percy
Keyword(s):  
English Language ◽  
American English ◽  
Code Switching ◽  
World Englishes ◽  
Literary Analysis ◽  
Online Newspapers ◽  
The World ◽  
The Status ◽  
History Of ◽  
Final Essay

This chapter describes assignments used to teach the History of the English Language (HEL) and its contemporary counterpart the English Language in the World. In both of these courses, linguistic concepts can be linked to literary analysis, which helps students learn how to analyze code-switching and/or style-shifting in the context of a literary argument. For discovering and interpreting issues about the status and use of English around the world, students have a number of options. For example, after reading specific articles about slang generally and analyzing examples chosen in class, some students choose to write a final essay on slang or jargon used within online newspapers or films that represent different World Englishes (e.g., in Nigerian “Nollywood” films). Thus, World Englishes become realer for students rather than exotic abstractions or curious variants of English or American English.

scholarly journals Jim Crow Downunder? African American Encounters with White Australia, 1942––1945

2002 ◽  
Vol 71 (4) ◽  
pp. 607-632 ◽  
Author(s):  
Sean Brawley ◽  
Chris Dixon
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
African Americans ◽  
Jim Crow ◽  
American South ◽  
Black Americans ◽  
Armed Forces ◽  
White Americans ◽  
American Experience ◽  
The American South ◽  
The U.S

Between 1941 and 1945, as the U.S. military machine sent millions of Americans——and American culture——around the world, several thousand African Americans spent time in Australia. Armed with little knowledge of Australian racial values and practices, black Americans encoutered a nation whose long-standing commitment to the principle of "White Australia" appeared to rest comfortably with the segregative policies commonly associated with the American South. Nonetheless, while African Americans did encounter racism and discrimination——practices often encouraged by the white Americans who were also stationed in Australia during the war——there is compelling evidence that their experiences were not always negative. Indeed, for many black Americans, Australians' apparent open-mindedness and racial views of white Britons and others with whom African Americans came into contact during the war. Making use of U.S. Army censors' reports and paying attention to black Americans' views of their experiences in Australia, this article not only casts light on an aspect of American-Australian relations that has hitherto recieved scant scholarly attention and reveals something about the African American experience, but also offers insights into race relations within the U.S. armed forces.

scholarly journals Psychiatric Disorders Among Older Black Americans: Within- and Between-Group Differences

2020 ◽  
Vol 4 (3) ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert Joseph Taylor ◽  
Linda M Chatters
Keyword(s):  
Mental Health ◽  
African American ◽  
Risk Factor ◽  
African Americans ◽  
Literature Review ◽  
Psychiatric Disorders ◽  
Black Americans ◽  
Black American ◽  
American Population ◽  
The Impact

Abstract Psychiatric disorders impose significant personal, social, and financial costs for individuals, families, and the nation. Despite a large amount of research and several journals focused on psychiatric conditions, there is a paucity of research on psychiatric disorders among Black Americans (i.e., African Americans and Black Caribbeans), particularly older Black Americans. The present literature review examines research on psychiatric disorders among older Black Americans and provides a broad overview of research findings that are based on nationally representative studies. Collectively, this research finds: (1) older African Americans have lower rates of psychiatric disorders than younger African Americans; (2) family support is not protective of psychiatric disorders, whereas negative interaction with family members is a risk factor; (3) everyday discrimination is a risk factor for psychiatric disorders; (4) both older African Americans and African American across the adult age range have lower prevalence rates of psychiatric disorders than non-Latino whites; (5) Black Caribbean men have particularly high rates of depression, posttraumatic stress disorder, and suicide attempts; and (6) a significant proportion of African American older adults with mental health disorders do not receive professional help. This literature review also discusses the “Race Paradox” in mental health, the Environmental Affordances Model, and the importance of investigating ethnicity differences among Black Americans. Future research directions address issues that are directly relevant to the Black American population and include the following: (1) understanding the impact of mass incarceration on the psychiatric disorders of prisoners’ family members, (2) assessing the impact of immigration from African countries for ethnic diversity within the Black American population, (3) examining the impact of racial identity and racial socialization as potential protective factors for psychiatric morbidities, and (4) assessing racial diversity in life-course events and their impact on mental health.

The Unacknowledged War: Dunbar’s History of White Revisionism

2020 ◽  
Author(s):  
T. Austin Graham
Keyword(s):  
Civil War ◽  
Historical Fiction ◽  
Black Americans ◽  
Historical Consciousness ◽  
White Americans ◽  
Persistent Problem ◽  
Intellectual Interest ◽  
History Of

Abstract “The Unacknowledged War” is an inquiry into the phenomenon of Civil War revisionism, focusing on the tendency of white Americans to deny, against all available evidence, that the “war between the states” was waged over slavery. In doing so, the essay turns to Paul Laurence Dunbar’s grievously understudied 1901 novel The Fanatics, a historical fiction of the war years that focuses on the white North and argues that the Unionists who battled the Confederacy did so only because they wrongly believed that the war’s purpose had nothing to do with enslaved Black Americans. The essay also shows how Dunbar’s novel contributes to several fields of contemporary intellectual interest, among them Civil War studies, Afropessimist thought, and a cross-disciplinary investigation of negative epistemologies known as “ignorance studies.” Ultimately, the essay concludes that Civil War revisionism has yet to show signs of ebbing in American historical consciousness and that ignorance-oriented novels like Dunbar’s are indispensable partners for approaching this persistent problem.

Foreword

2021 ◽  
pp. 1-6
Author(s):  
Doris Kadish
Keyword(s):  
New York ◽  
21St Century ◽  
Jewish Studies ◽  
Literary Analysis ◽  
Eastern European ◽  
Love Affair ◽  
The World ◽  
History Of ◽  
Historical Accounts ◽  
Point Of Departure

This chapter begins with the book’s point of departure, the love affair my mother had with Philip Greenberg, who adopted the pen name Philip Rahv. It presents the book as part biography, part history, part literary analysis, part cultural studies, and part memoir. It identifies the key components of the book: textual analyses woven together with historical accounts, genealogy, memoirs by Rahv’s colleagues, friends, and associates, interviews with persons who knew him, and the abundant body of secondary scholarship devoted to the New York intellectuals, the history of Partisan Review, and Jewish studies. In keeping with the feminist notion of positionality, this chapter addresses the issue of what it means for a 21st-century woman to write about an author who unquestionably belongs to “the world of our fathers,” to use the title of Irving Howe’s magisterial study of Eastern European Jews in America.

Conclusion: “It was not a story to pass on”

2020 ◽  
pp. 187-196
Author(s):  
Nancy K. Bristow
Keyword(s):  
State Violence ◽  
People Of Color ◽  
White Americans ◽  
Law And Order ◽  
White Supremacist ◽  
Communities Of Color ◽  
The World ◽  
Police Shootings ◽  
History Of

The May 1970 shootings at Jackson State had an enduring impact for many of its victims. Many dedicated themselves to fighting the racism that had killed James Earl Green and Phillip Gibbs. others ensured the story would not be forgotten. For some the injuries and trauma were long-lasting. Their tragic experiences were not unique, but part of a long history of state violence against communities of color, a history routinely absent from most white Americans’ educations and consciousness. Ongoing state violence against people of color—both police shootings and the growth of the largest prison system in the world—has required evading the history of white supremacist violence and an ongoing embrace of the law and order narrative. The conclusion illustrates how the role of race in the shootings at Jackson State provides context for understanding more recent police shootings and the emergence of the Black Lives Matter movement.

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