Obama's not post-racial, and he's not downplaying the role of race in our society. But he is redefining the majority, and that honors the civil rights leader.
Moreover, Obama's choice to "black identify" helps broaden the collective notion of blackness. On "60 Minutes," Obama articulated this when he explained that the realization that the black experience was not singular but multifaceted helped him resolve his identity. "The African American community, which I now very much feel a part of, is itself a hybrid community. It's African. It's European. It's Native American. So it's much more difficult to define what the essential African American experience is, at least more difficult than what popular culture would allow."
10 comments:
Writerfella here --
Which is Sen. Obama's spin of the fact that it is difficult for him to define what his essential African American experience has been. And though he professes never to have embraced the Muslim teachings both of his father and stepfather, that only complicates the confusion of perceptions of Obama by large segments of the American electorate. Perhaps this is one time when writerfella is happy that the race card Obama wears on his upraised sleeve is NOT a multi-race card...
All Best
Russ Bates
'writerfella'
"(Obama's white mother also claimed some Cherokee lineage.)"
No doubt her great-great-grandmother was a Cherokee princess...
Writerfella here --
And 'Barack Obama' is a long, long ago, far, far away cry from being a Cherokee name! In fact, what kind of name IS 'Barack Obama' anyway? Dare writerfella say... MUSLIM?
All Best
Russ Bates
'writerfella'
It must be Irish, by way of immigration from County Donegal to Alabama. "O'Bama"
Writerfella here --
Yes, writerfella remembers something similar in Baird Searles' review of the original BATTLESTAR GALACTICA in The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction: "Most of the women characters are unmemorable, but that Cassie O'Peia is a wonderful lively Irish lass!" Since Cassiopeia was from the human colony Caprica, when and where did she become Irish?
All Best
Russ Bates
'writerfella'
Obama's father was Muslim--hence his last name. But Barack's a Christian.
Writerfella here --
So Obama says. Adolf Hitler also was a Christian. Wherein therefore does such a fact figure positively into the equation?
All Best
Russ Bates
'writerfella'
I haven't said people should vote for Obama because he's a Christian. I haven't said they should vote for him, period. I simply informed you of the origin of his name.
Writerfella here --
And what is the origin of the name, 'Rob Schmidt?'
All Best
Russ Bates
'writerfella'
Presumably I had a German ancestor who was a "smith" of some kind centuries ago. My parents named me Robert after my father. It's probably a coincidence that "Robert" means "bright fame."
Post a Comment