Of all the bits of Roots that might (even though this may not have been the intention) be construed as racist, 'the way we look and the way we talk' is not one of them because it is precisely this of which Knightley says: 'we learn to be ashamed before we walk'.

What he means (or what I take this to mean) is how mainstream education has taught a generation of English school children to disown and ridicule their own cultural inheritance. What's wrong with Roots is that it's just a rant which offers no solutions on how to overcome this peculiarly English trait. We haven't 'LOST more than we'll ever know off the rocky shores of England' because children can be, and are, being taught to value what's been hidden from them and, eventually, given the courage to add to it as well as to many other areas of cultural expression.