Class Notes 2/7

This is what I am furiously typing away at during class :)
In class notes 2/7

  1. Discussion Questions
    1. How does Coates position African-Americans within this book? Are there only victims of “the dream”?
    2. What is significant at Coates’ transition from parent to child?
    3. In Coates’ view, how should we view the police?
    4. What sort of resistance is possible?
    5. In class activity (lyrics from Kendrick Lamar’s song)
  2. “To sing a song that acquire me to have faith/ As the record spin I should pray”
  3. “Gang files, but that don’t matter because the matter is racial profile” end of page 78 into top of page 79 on Coates discussion of racial profiling
  4. Mid of page 82
  5. Discussion on profiling-
  6. Discussing Coates getting pulled over by the police
    1. How does this relate back to the book and his argument?
      1. Fear is instilled in him even though they didn’t really do anything physical to scare him
        1. However
    2. Power, racism, police all intertwined
      1. Structural racism and Individual racism
        1. Institutions that discriminate against a certain population that sustain a certain kind of inequality based on our race.
          1. Example prisons, schools, healthcare
            1. There are the same amount of white and black citizens that use drugs but there is a substantially higher rate of black citizens in prison for drugs than white
    3. Circling back to the idea of “The Dream”
      1. If they treat other black people poorly, they think they will fit in and move up to a better class
        1. Page 83
          1. The police officer that killed Prince Jones was black
            1. How does this complicate our narrative?
        2. Page 132
          1. Black life is cheap but in America black bodies are a natural source of incomparable value
        3. Is it just the police? Is it just the government?
          1. It is the BROKEN SYSTEM
          2. Page 78 going into page 79
            1. You can’t just look at one person and say they’re a racist, it’s a system of layers.
            2. Our country has had a racist system at its origin since its earliest days
            3. The people in the dream are setting this up
            4. Repetition of fears
              1. Fear of what? Tease this out.
            5. What is the fear that has marked the country since birth? The same fear that killed Prince Jones?
              1. Fear of loss of social position
                1. Fear that black people would gain some kind of power over the people in power (White)
              2. Talking about the fear of difference
                1. You force someone who is non white to adapt to ‘OUR’ culture
              3. Fear of black criminality
              4. Institutionalized personas of black body
                1. Larger black man on streets has different associations with someone who has the same body type and race in the NFL
          3. Going back to Lamar’s lyrics
            1. Juxtaposition of vulnerability of black body and the police
              1. “And you ask, “lift up your shirt”/….bulletproof vest”
                1. Is this long held history of fear that puts black bodies at risk?
                  1. Yes this contributes to the fears that are consistent across the black community
        4. Black life is cheap
          1. As we see with PJ, it’s looked at is “it happens”
        5. Black bodies are a resource of incomparable value
          1. Prisons make a lot of money for the country, hard labor, less pay
            1. Go back to the streets and sell drugs because they aren’t
        6. Going back to black people being complicit in “the dream” themselves
      2. Page 131-32
        1. “Our bodies have refinanced the Dream of being white”
        2. The dream is dependant on the idea of being safe
          1. You have to believe you’re safe
        3. Being black in America is to be always at the risk of having your body taken
    4. The precariousness of life and grieveability
      1. Bringing up the example of getting pulled over
        1. Her life wasn’t as precarious as it would be if she wasn’t white.
      2. What lives deserve grieveability?
        1. “Step on my neck” line in Lamar’s song parallel to police power
      3. How likely are you to be injured or killed when you wake up in the morning?
        1. Some if it gendered or racialized
      4. The theme of escape
        1. From where to what?
        2. Page 114
          1. Disembodiment
        3. Page 84-85
          1. “My curiosity….that sent them”
          2. Prince Jones did not pose a threat but still victim to losing his body
        4. Page 77
          1. “Prince Jones had made it through and they still had taken him”
        5. Page 81-82
          1. “But I now knew the limits…  back to the earth”.
    5. Example from Coates’ son getting pushed at the movie theatre
      1. He wants to protect his son’s body from the white woman, but then he puts his own body at risk
        1. He has to respond in a certain way because he is in the white man’s environment
        2. The precarity of black lives
      2. Intersectionality
        1. Black people think they have made it is a class issue
          1. Maybe moved out of their neighborhood
          2. Think it's okay for the police haggling other people if it's not him or his family
        2. Breeds the continuation of injustice and the vulnerability of black body
    6. Is there any hope in this book?
      1. Paris made him have an out of body experience
        1. Not everywhere is like the U.S.
      2. Giving his son some hope
        1. He has the opportunity to experience the world hopefully in a different way than he has
      3. Page 115-116
        1. “If my life ended today……….perhaps more than the answers.”
        2. This is more of a realization of “the dream”
          1. The dream is a social construct and isn’t something that you can really go for
          2. The dream is what YOU make it
      4. Page 103-104
        1. “It is not necessary to believe….. Husk from corn.”
          1. Incredible quote!!!
      5. Page 10
        1. “Racism is a visceral experience..body.”

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Freedom Riders 3/26

As I watched the “Freedom Riders” documentary, the more disgusted I become at that racial injustices in American history. At the beginning of the documentary, there is a small montage of bigots giving poor excuses as to why the South should remain segregated. However, there was one quote that stuck out that stated, “You can not change a way of life overnight. The more they try to force us into doing something, the worse the reaction is going to be.” Racism should not be a way of life anyone wants to live through or put onto someone else. The Freedom Riders and many nonviolent protesters weren’t physically imposing on others, so why was the reaction of segregationists to worsening as “they try to force” them into a realistic way of life? Watching the documentary and listening to how the Riders were willing to be martyrs for the Movement as they were physically attacked, their property was destroyed via molotov and mentally drained daily makes me appreciate activism a great deal more, ...
Read more
After reading the rest of Kwame Ture and Charles V. Hamilton's Black Power and then reflecting about what we talked about in class on Tuesday, I still cannot put my finger on an exact definition of "black power." I do believe, though, that "black power" cannot be achieved without a change in the political structure of America. When reading the fourth chapter of this book, the idea that people in power control the law is brought up. I, almost, one hundred percent agree with this. The quote from the book that stood out to me was "Law is the agent of those in political power; it is the product of those powerful enough to define right and wrong and to have that definition legitimized by "law." This is not to say that "might makes right," but it is to say that Might makes Law." This quote shows how political leaders shape the law. Those in power get to make the laws, whether they are just or not. I still believe this today. I believe...
Read more

What It's Like to Be Black on Campus Now

In Melissa Harris-Perry’s article, “What It’s Like to Be Black on Campus Now”, she discusses the issues behind race in education and institutions through ten black student journalists who tell their personal experiences. She gives an example from the University of Missouri, explaining how one student decided to stop eating in protest of inaction and ineffective administrative responses to racial incidents on campus. 30 Missouri football players joined this one student in protest and University of Missouri’s president resigned soon after. This example is powerful because it shows other institutions that when you unite together, change can come. Harris- Perry continues to talk about how important education is to black families and how hard it is to send their children to a place that can be so full of hatred towards their race. She wrote, “Viewing higher education as a pathway to equity, African American families and communities have made enormous sacrifices to send black kids to college...
Read more