It's not true, as many privileged folks assume, that African Americans necessarily want to talk about race. Most of my AA friends through the years have just wanted to know that their white friends, bosses, colleagues, etc., are talking about it. They report being very tired of having to educate "us" before they can open up to "us" enough to be real friends, colleagues, etc. They have wanted, like so many other members of oppressed groups, for "us" to do our homework and not use what they wopuld prefer as friedn time to become teaching time. "Are you in this because you like ME-- the individual, unique me-- or because you see Black skin on a face friendly enough to ask your hard questions?"

I recently sought out a uni Phd for scholarly papers to help with a particular issue in which I am working; she had written extensively on what Black leaders face when they head mostly-white organizatons. This correspondence has been leading to a lovely, collegial internet friendship. We have not asked one another what our respective races are, which I think is part of the delight.

She recommended that I be able to define what I mean when I refer to racism in the settings in which I have long been part of the solution/change, because so many people assume that it mainly means violence or intentional economic discrimination; the deep damage racism has done to all sectors of US society is much broader than that. It often operates at a level where it's not easily accessed by the very people who have been conditioned in race-pattered ways.

Racism hides from us when we try to look inside. It was designed to work that way, and it doesn't mean that we don't care to change, or don't want to look inside. It doesn't mean that we lack the capacity to know ourselves. But it does mean that oppression is so nasty that it tunnels in, deep.

What follows is my latest email to her, in response to that invitation.

I find definitions stop conversation sometimes, especially when I'm looking to get deep into the heart of a person or an issue. Early this morning, Zora Neale Hurston nailed this one for me, as I listened to the audiobook of her short stories, Mules and Men. This passage provides material for what I think is the better way to take white folks along on a scary ride. I needed to transcribe this passage anyway, so here it is.

===

Hurston, regarding the difficulty of collecting folklore and her assignment to collect it, in the mid-1930's, among the Black communities of Florida:

"... Folk Lore is not as easy to collect as it sounds. The best source is where there are the least outside influences, and these people-- being, usually, underprivileged-- are the shyest. They are most reluctant, at times, to reveal that which the soul... lives by.

"And the Negro, in spite of his open-faced laughter, his seeming acquiescence, is particularly evasive. You see, we are a polite people, and do not say to our questioner, '[aw,] Get outta here!' We smile, and tell him or her something that satisfies the white person because-- knowing so little about us-- he doesn't know what he is missing.

The Indian resists curiosity by a stony silence. The Negro offers a feather-bed resistance. That is, we let the probe enter, but it never comes out. It gets smothered under a lot of laughter and pleasantries.

The theory behind our tactics: The white man is always trying to know into somebody else's business. 'All right! I'll set something outside the door of my mind for him to play with and handle. He can read my writing, but he sho' can't read my mind.

I'll put this play-toy in his hands, and he will seize it, and go away. Then I'll say my say, and sing my song.' "

===

I'm waiting to get the print copy to finalize punctuation, dialect, etc.

How to use it-- oh, zillions of ways, but letting white folk interact with this and explore how things may seem in present time, how this may feel to hear, examples they may wish to share, learnings they may be able to pass along to others just beginning the journey.... hopefully a process that lessens their "need" to learn from Black folk and their ability to actually LEARN and grow-- something I have often heard from African Americans as a deep desire for closeness without having to train someone they'd prefer to be a partner and/or friend with. And of course I'll have stories to share there, as a peer facilitator of that conversation, that step in the journey.

My feeling-- Zora Neale Hurston SAID it, we do not need to ASK people too much more than that! Thank you, Zora!


Wikipedia has quite a good section on Zora Neale Hurston and links to other good resources, some audio and some as HS lesson plans that older learners also can use.

~Susan