Collegiate Times

Negative assertions of race continue to oxygenate the sense of blackness as a single entity at the expense of a complicated diversity among blacks. This should not surprise us. The examples of whites acting together to exclude blacks have come from corporations and institutions invested in groupthink with a small and powerful coterie of whites at the helm. The moment the decision-making becomes democratic among whites is when racism loses out to innovation and talent, as the last election aptly demonstrated.

BHM should continue to showcase the creativity of the various ethnicities within the clumsy, catch-all category of race and it must continue to point the way toward cross-cultural exchanges between the races. The responsible BHM model (see the Africana Studies speaker series) must include raising awareness among college students of the many factors that continue to hold back blacks, even as those same students find themselves locked in a personal struggle to succeed and contribute creatively to the nation in global recession. 

The experiment of nation building is an unending one. BHM can continue to be a useful tool in raising awareness about the work that remains to be done for greater participation by the poor and disenfranchised in the largesse of the country.

I know race counts but it must stop being a negative marker of black being, it must be confined to aesthetics rather than rabid politics. I’ve had phone conversations with all manner of Americans who tell me that they did not realize I was black when I meet them because I did not sound black. How can such a stereotype (no matter how large a grain of truth to it) ever work to anyone’s advantage? This means that whether blacks like it or not they have been constructed in white consciousness in certain persistent unhealthy ways, rooted, no doubt, in a history of slavery. It is not simply a question of skin. Culture counts, but it is just part of the picture. Language denotes race to a certain extent but it includes class and location, education and religion, and, of course, power.

I’m interested in the extent to which blackness is performance in how far it is a mimetic identity and how far a matter of genealogy and being. That sounds heavy but is means that the humanity we hold in common must be foregrounded by all groups if race is to be less of a negative factor in the American psyche. Post-race may have nothing to do with blacks. Post-race may well mean that whites have to surrender the privilege and assumptions that come with white skin and enter a more neutral space of communality with other Americans.

Meanwhile let’s make Black History Month at Virginia Tech one step toward acknowledging one vital part of the American tapestry, devoting as we do most of the rest of the year to heralding the dominant group.

So what’s to celebrate? I think at the college level there is the usual mix of the arts and politics spread across concerts and panel discussions, but this BHM is extraordinary with the tragedy of Haiti. Perhaps it may call for a more international flavor to the month with a special look at our neighbor Haiti in need of a big helping hand.

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A version of this article appeared in the Feb 5 issue of the Collegiate Times.