Silent Racism Thoughts

After two chapters of ‘Silent Racism’ I could not agree more that silent racism is a harmful form of racism that is present in society. However, it is also a form that can be worked at to abolish, or at least lessen its occurrence. We are much closer to improving upon the presence of silent racism than more blatant forms. This is because silent racism is a way of thinking that is only present when we aren’t aware of it. Once awareness is increased, people can think about what they are actually doing when the think they are ‘not racist.’ I believe that the scale of degree of racism present does need to be altered to expand its contents. The two extremes of ‘racist’ or ‘not racist’ leaves opportunity for white people to believe they are ‘not racist’ and then do nothing to defend other races or to progress society’s ideas about racism. To me, someone who lets racist acts occur without acknowledgement or protest is racist as well. Although it may be silent racism, it is still an action permitting racist acts to take place. I would compare this to seeing a crime being committed, and then not reporting it because it doesn’t concern you and would get you involved. This is why there are several degrees of racism. Society has made people think, at one time or more, racist thoughts. Influential sources, such as the media, that create these stereotypes and racist feelings can also stop these actions and cause awareness.

Friday Jan 29

The two readings that I found interesting in their differences were Olaudah Equiano and Venture Smith narratives of their lives. Equiano narrative told more of his perspective from Africa and the middle passage that Smith did. In Equiano’s account I received more of the sense of different people and the way they were trying to survive. The people that took Equiano and his sister to try and sell them into slavery were not doing anything anyone else was not doing. The Africans had had slaves for many years before the White people came looking for a group of people that would become free labor. After Equiano is taken to Rhode Island and travels around with his master, he makes it seem like he likes his new life. He also writes like he feels a bit superior because his master gives him so much freedom.

Smith’s narrative was more about his being sold to different masters because of his ‘behavior problems’ and his fight for freedom. He writes a lot about how he tries to escape but then returns to his master because of a man stealing from them. Then he tries to do it the legal way and buy his freedom from his master. He works many odd jobs before he can finally buy his freedom from his master Smith. He later goes on to buy his children and wife with the money he gets from owning a farm. In both narratives there is struggle to achieve their goals and the people who support or hinder them from obtaining those goals.

Saidiya and Silent Racism

I’d have to say my favorite reading so far was the first chapter in Silent Racism. This is because it really connected the other readings and put them in the context of today. Silent Racism reminded me most of Saidiya Hartman and her chapter titled “Lose Your Mother.” The mentality of colorblindness and state of double-consciousness speak volumes in her situation of identity rejection, rebirth and rebuilding.
Saidiya’s emotions of a lost identity in contrast of her family’s willingness to forget the past could be perhaps due to colorblindness and the double consciousness that African Americans live with daily. The majority, or whites have taken on the role of forgetting the past of slavery and in a way rejected its transference today to silent racism on the once-enslaved population, the African Americans. I found it interesting how her own family chose to sort of side with the whites in their definition of racism, which is described on p. 3 of Silent Racism as only a two-dimensional framework: either you are racist, or you aren’t. Racism is only hateful, and also rare. Though they may have not believed this, Saidiya’s family let this mentality take over their life choices such as naming their daughter Valerie and chose to assimilate, which in Saidiya’s eyes meant forgetting their true heritage. In other words, the double-consciousness that blacks have to live with has perhaps manipulated the family’s thinking, how they view themselves and their place in society. Though her family chose to accept this sense of detachment and ambiguity of equality, Saidiya chose to reject it. Saidiya was more apt to side with the African American view of racism, in that racism permeates the institutions of society. It is not just hateful and rare, but can be passive and witnessed daily through our societies’ engrained institutions. Saidiya did not want to forget, for forgetting to her meant losing her identity. Though it was a tiresome road, she sought to explore her identity and heritage.

First Hand Experience

The reading from this week made me think of a paper I wrote last semester. In a methods class I wrote a race and ethnicity analysis on a SNL skit called, "The Blackness Scale." It was a skit that involved two actors, one white and one black, pretending to be Samuel L. Jackson and Al Sharpton. The two men used a scale to measure Obama's degree of blackness. As they moved a cut out of Obama's head up and down the chart, they depicted his amount of blackness when they referred to stereo types that would make a person be considered either more blacker or whiter.
With this being said and after our class discussion on Wednesday, I thought it would be a good idea to show this clip to a couple of my friends. The outcome was tons of laughter and everyone thinking it was okay to laugh because it wasn't my friends who were making the fun. When I absorbed the overall reaction of my friends, I felt I might have laughed as well if I had not been in class on Wednesday. Instead, I came to realize that my friends were unconsciously being racist.
Eventually I told my friends the purpose of me showing them the skit. When they determined that their reaction to the video wouldn't consider them racist or not, it helped me experience Trepagnier's theory on Silent Racism and understand that their are shades of grey when determining the degree of a racist person.

Silent Racism

I'm not sure how I feel about the Silent Racism reading this week. I do agree with Trepagnier that thinking of Racism as a black or white issue without any kind of grey area is not a viable way of looking at the issue. I also agree that for the most part all people are in some way racist or as it was pointed out in class... prone to stereo-typing.

while browsing my usual haunts on the Internet I found a video clip from Chris Matthews giving a report on Obama's State of the Union Address. In this Matthews states that during the address he forgot that Obama was black, he said that for a moment he forgot Obama was a black man standing in front of a room full of white men as president of the united states. Matthews was trying to point out that Obama transcends race but the way he said it reminded me of the Silent racism reading. I don't think we was purposely or even consciously trying to sound racist but just by how he said it made it sound like racism.

I think what my biggest problem with the reading is that I think trepagnier and I have a different definition for the term racism. I do thing that some of her points could actually be labeled stereo-typing and not racism

As I sat in class Wednesday morning, a question came to my head as we talked about the unfair treatment of African Americans during slavery. This question that lurked in my mind for that entire class was, would I be harmed as a slave if my master could hear my heart beat as the beat of the drum they took away from my people? As I read in the “Norton Anthology” for Wednesdays lecture the thought of a simple drum being taking from blacks made me see that slavery was truly just cruel. The beat of the drum in the time of slavery signified away of communication for all African Americans and when that was taken away due to the laws being passed blacks therefore had to adapt to a new form of communication. Which in their case was to use mischevious items that could be found all over the Plantation but, even that was a problem because if caught with these mischievous items they would be punished with either beatings or Lynching’s... I cannot believe how brutal a different race can be against another. Being black should not be any different from being white in any way shape or for m but, White Americans did not see that back then as I learned in lecture the thought of being inferior had made them power hungry for no reason at all. What was there to be inferior over? Blacks were seen as savage and untamed people so why did white people have such hatred over this race what made them so important. Was it really because they were racist or because they saw the blacks as having something inferior over them. In the accounts of “The Dead Books” you hear how these white men who were bringing slaves over had this lust for black women and that being said if blacks were so savage what was this lust over their women, there had to be something more to these black people then savageness. That’s where I wonder what were this cruel and immoral acts of slavery doing for white Americans besides giving free labor and hate, and if they could look at today’s society what would they say about the black race now????

Discrimination

After reading Jlucky's story, i realized that I have a story on he same lines. I have a friend who is African American and one night she was driving home late. She was driving a very nice car and was then pulled over. When she was pulled over, the cop came up to her and asked if this was her car. The officer thought that the car was stolen because it was an African American driving a nice car. The cop continued to ask her multiple times if this was her car and she told him that it was. He needed to see her license and registration to believe that it was in fact her car. After hearing this, I was very surprised because stuff like this should not happen. Cops or anyone should not discriminate against people of a different race. I also would like to talk about one of the readings that really stood out to me. The one that stuck out the most was the one about “The Dead Book.” Reading about all of the horrible things that happened on that boat is crazy. How could the captain or anyone physically beat and torture someone to death like that. It is awful to think that innocent people like her were being thrown over board after being killed while they were on the boat.

The accounts in “The Dead Book” bring to life the violence of a different time. Racism back then was explicit, intentional, and accepted. Another era of perpetuated racism was during the Civil Rights Movement. Having grown up in Memphis during this time, my dad has briefly provided me with glimpses into the realities and violence of racism in the 1960’s and 1970’s. Martin Luther King, Jr. was assassinated in Memphis, and my dad recalls the riots and violence that ensued. Bussing was implemented when he was in high school, and he has told me about the tension in his own school.

I think today when we hear the word “racism,” we associate it with those times. We think of the cruelty and inhumanity of slavery. We think of the division in America between whites and blacks during the sixties and beyond. I think that’s why when we ask ourselves if we, in fact, are racist, we are quick to reply with a definite no. The reality is, although most of us don’t participate in such racist acts as those that took place in times of widespread violence, we are not all above reproach. As Trepagnier points out, thoughts can be racist, even if they provoke no action.

The continuum of racism that Trepagnier proposes brings to the surface many realities of the varying degrees of racism within us, but it also allows for more comparisons and rationalizations. Just as we sometimes compare our level of racism to those of, for example, some white southerners in 1960, we can now compare ourselves to others on the continuum. I could say, for instance, that yes, perhaps I could take some racial stereotypes into account, but I’m not nearly as racist as some other people. It’s still a relative measurement, and takes the focus off the fact that each of us is racist to one degree or another.

The Dead Book

I thought Saidiya Hartman's "The Dead Book" displayed a powerful message. The overall recollection of the tragedy shocked and disturbed me, but one specific passage that the class hadn't discussed and actually intrigued me was the excerpt about William Wilberforce's strategy in accusing the captain found guilty. In the beginning of the story, when the author works to tie in the past events on the vessel with the trial, the text recalls, "He chose not to speak of Venus, the other dead girl. The pet name licensed debauchery and made it sound agreeable. Nor did he mention the nineteen men who died. Too many slaves would have had the opposite effect and diminished the significance of the tragedy" (148). I stopped after reading this and thought about it for a minute, and it really struck me as a blunt, very true statement. It was almost something that people think subconsciously, but don't actually say it out loud. When one person dies from brutality and torture, etc., it's something really big, because it becomes personal-- to witnesses of the event as well as people who hear of it afterward. I think it's because of the details. The details that witnesses describe makes it more personal. But when a mass destruction occurs, either from a natural disaster or war, a thousands deaths are not personal. They mean something to people, but they know not of the details of the tortures, murders... so it's just a number that represents something bad. I thought this passage was significant because the author points out the effects of situations like the murder on the ship, and Wilberforce goes about making the trial based on the girl, not the many other deaths. I have a feeing that when we talk more about slavery, the literature will be either personal or impersonal, having different effects.

Stereotyping and Racism

Color is the biggest divider of races, and plays a major role in many of the problems in contemporary America. I really liked what Marqui and Trevor where saying about stereotyping and how it is much more common than racism; however racism still occurs. Stereotyping based upon color difference has become such a part of our daily regimen that it is basically a part of our cultural DNA. Racism has been around for longer than it hasn’t, and because it is a thought process it is difficult to combat, particularly when these thoughts are passed down from one generation to the next. I know for me I live in south Florida, which is extremely culturally and racially diverse. Since I have been exposed to this diversity since I was born, I have learned to accept people of different backgrounds thinking them no different than myself. Like alcoholism , racism is hard to deny when you are surrounded by a culturally diverse area, but if you are never around it (alcohol), or in a place that is diverse, it is easy to overlook these obstacles and maintain that you are not racist or an alcoholic.
Although we talked about both stereotyping and racism in class, and about how they are very similar, there is a fine line between the two. Stereotyping is a thought process that happens immediately upon an encounter, meaning that as soon as a person sees color or cultural difference, they form a set of beliefs based purely on what they see or want to believe about them. And while it does not necessarily demean the person being stereotyped , it nonetheless judges a group of people upon their own interpretations and experiences with people of that descent. For example, baseball pitchers are typically stereotyped as not too bright, when in fact many of them are, like Greg Maddox. Although racism is also a thought process , and is just as demeaning, the racist person typically believes that race is generally the only factor that characterizes them, and if you don’t like it you don’t like them, which usually leads to racist action, which is why everyone needs to try and reverse racist actions. No matter what anybody does you cannot change someone else’s opinion, however you CAN change their actions, and maybe in getting them to act differently towards persons who are different than themselves, you might change how they think as well. Living in South Florida has surely made me more aware of this than ever.

Silent Racism

I found the reading we did from Silent Racism to be very interesting. I especially liked her "more racist" to "less racist" model to describe racism. I personally would never consider myself a racist person however I have occasionally had thoughts that were probably racist. I knew these thoughts were wrong, but they would come to me anyway. So using Trepagnier's model I would probably be somewhere be on the "less racist" things while still admitting that I am not perfect.
However, I do agree with what was being discussed at the end of class yesterday. In my opinion, some of the things that Trepagnier was calling racist could probably be described as stereotyping. I feel that these days stereotyping is a bigger problem than racism. Mostly because people are more willing to admit that racism is wrong. Even though I sort of disagree with how she classifies stuff, I do agree with the general theory behind what she is saying. I would also like to say that even though I agree with her theory I was not impressed with her research techniques. I do not think that you can use the results from discussion groups containing a grand total of 25 women as the base of a theory that encompasses the entire human population.

Stereotypes

Today in class we started talking about stereotypes in different communities and neighborhoods. This really hit home with me because I experienced this for six years in high school. I went to a high school located in a predominantly white, English-speaking, upper-class neighborhood; yet the school itself was populated predominantly by black kids. This caused many conflicts. Too often, as my black friends walked to school in the morning, they would get harassed by the white kids in the neighborhood (who did not attend our school because it was French Catholic). One day, a good friend of mine, Justin Ferdinant, missed first and second period. Alarmed by this, I started looking for him during our lunch period. I later found out that on his way to school that morning, he was attacked by a group of white kids and one of them held a paint-ball gun to his head. A nearby witness called the police and if you were Justin, you we’re probably thinking that this nightmare was finally going to end. I wish that was the case. When the police arrived, of all people, Justin was arrested. The police later explained that Justin appeared “suspicious” because he was a black kid, “roaming” the streets of a white, upper-class neighborhood. Horrible isn’t it?!?!?! So as I said, this really hit home for me and I think it further confirms this idea of “silent racism” that was discussed in class today. The police officer may not think himself as “racist”, however his behavior, actions and thoughts would suggest otherwise. So my question to you all is how do we ignore a stereotype?? How do we change how people are perceived in certain settings?

W.E.B. DuBois

This morning we referenced DuBois and his ideology about an African-American sense of "twoness" because of an effort to look at oneself from not only an internal perspective, but an external one as well. After reading that quote from "The Souls of Black Folk," I actually came into contact with a chapter from the book as required reading for another class. The chapter entitled "Of the Coming of John" describes a young man who is sent off to college from a small segregated town in Southern Georgia. All of the men in town seem to like John, but find that college will somehow "spoil him." After spending his time in college, he finally returns to his hometown and is disrespected because of his college education. This is evident in his plight to create an African-American School for the young, and he is denied by the white judge on the basis that African- American's should be subordinate now and forever in their Southern community. For me, the inability for others in John's community to become educated goes back to DuBois' point about "double consciousness," without the ability to gain education African-American's in John's and other communities will never be able to see the their own true consciousness, without putting themselves in the shoes of a white person.

Blog post, week 2

Since we didn’t get a chance to look over the ‘Nat Turner’ graphic novel piece by Kyle Baker in class, I thought it would merit a look on the blog. I found his style to be very noteworthy. The piece is visual in the simplest sense of the word; the varying shades and texture of his artistic images are the bulk of the story; sound effects are minimal. I read the novel for class earlier in the week, then went back before writing my post. During my second glance, I was surprised by how few words there were; my memory from the first read through had filled in a myriad of sounds and interactions that were only glances and faces on the page. The minimal pre-formed words and exchanges leave a great deal of room for personal extrapolation of the interactions on the page. The reader can insert exchanges for each glance and thoughts for every expression. The visual use of line and shading is also another device employed by Baker. I noticed that entrance of the gun wielding Europeans is a sharply lined, faceless entrance with a frame crowded by pounding hooves. This builds terror as much as any menacing words might. As much as the faces of the European captors are hidden, becoming all the more terrifying when kept from the light, the faces of the Africans they came to kidnap are vividly portrayed. The emotions shown are powerful and dynamic, at odds with their captors, whose only appearance as showing emotion is in dragging back the taken from attempts at suicide. Another frame that I found striking, was the sharks below the ship’s hull at the birth of the baby. The thin wooden planks are all that separated the belly of the ship and its human cargo from the black ocean and the creatures outside of it. This paralleled, for me, the mother’s womb and the child; she was all that protected the child from the ‘sharks’ that circled around it. I thought this piece was very different from what we had examined so far, and was fascinated by this interesting contribution to the literature

silent racism

After doing the reading for Wednesday's class and hearing the discussion we had, it makes me think about the different point of views towards racism. In the book, Trepagnier accuses people for being racist because of their thoughts images or their assumptions. I think that’s true in certain situations but not all. Back in the civil war days yes, racism was probably the biggest problem in the U.S. There were clearly racist policies and laws that were created to discriminate against the blacks and other minorities. However being that its 2010 I think the term "silent racism" is just another word for stereotyping. If people are judging others because their color, sex or gender then the ones doing the judging are being stereotypical. For example like when Taylor said the comment in class about him not being comfortable when he sees a Mexican walking the down the street from his house then that's being stereotypical. Taylor's not being racist by saying this comment he's just aware of the stereotypes of the Spanish and black minorities. This example is no different from a Middle Eastern person being harassed at the airports, or blacks being harassed by the police. I think the world is less based on racism and more on stereo types.

The Dead Book

'The Dead Book' was extremely hard to read. The thought that anybody has it within themselves to treat another human being like that is unimaginable to me. The captain completely dehumanized this girl as he beat her repeatedly and engaged in no sort of human-like interaction with her. What was also shocking is how everyone else on board "The Recovery", which the name itself is ironic, was able to stand there and watch this all take place. "The rest of the men were scattered about the ship doing their chores and didn't much notice the girl hanging from the rigging...and the men didn't give much attention to such things anyway" (140). Towards the end of the chapter, Saidiya Hartman quotes the London Assurance Company Policy, "that it was free from the death of slaves either natural, violent, or voluntary" (147). There seems to be a fuzzy line between what is actually considered "natural" and "unnatural" cause of death aboard the slave ships. "Everyone knew murder was part of work at sea", which helps finalize the idea that it is somewhat accepted and looked past when it occurs. To actually believe that the girl died of 'melancholy' is infuriating to read after presented with such graphic imagery of the girl hanging by her leg and arm while being whipped.

I found the reading in "Silent Racism" really interesting and made me think about things that I have never really considered before. The first thing that I found interesting was how we have created racism and have attached certain things to the word race. Since there are things attached to race we inevitably attached things to racism, and therefore as she says, can only fit into the two categories of "racist" and "not racist"(Trepagnier 3). I also agree that a lot of people are blind to racism because they think only certain things can be racist thus if they choose to be considered non-racist, they try to avoid or ignore them. She also talked about how just trying to ignore it didn't make someone completely not racist, which then made me think of white privilege and how a lot of whites do not even realize they are benefiting from it. The reading reminded me of a Tim Wise, an anti-racist writer, who came to talk to my high school about white privilege and what that means. I think it is interesting that because society has such a big influence on the way we think it causes us to instantly think certain things when we see people, and it doesn't necessarily have to be a blatantly racist or stereotypical thought but just on the mere fact that a thought of who that person is or could be, based on the way they look, shows that society has engraved racist thoughts into the way we think. All of this made me think of a reading I did in high school that helps explain the idea of white privilege and I think could go along with silent racism ( I attached a link to the reading if anyone is interested).

http://www.case.edu/president/aaction/UnpackingTheKnapsack.pdf

The Dead Book

I can confidently say that I was thoroughly shocked after reading Saidiya Hartman’s ‘The Dead Book.’ The cruelty and brutality that the captain had towards the slaves, in particular the girl the story is based on, is unfathomable to myself. How a human being can torture another human being without any feelings of regret or guilt is crazy. I would like to think that humans are genuinely ‘good-hearted’ but stories like this one seem to suggest otherwise. The actions of this captain, as well as other slave owners, certainly coincides with Thomas Hobbes’ ideas that humans are naturally evil, greedy and selfish. He also thought that life was short and brutal. For these slaves, this was very true.

This story seems to support the idea of ‘every man or woman for themselves.’ Nobody stopped the captain from his torturing ways because others were just happy it wasn’t them at that moment. ‘It was best to stay away from what didn’t concern you’ (p.140). There was fear too that any one to disobey would quickly have all eyes on them for the next beating.

Another line that was quick to catch my attention was ‘mostly the captain was a fair man.’ The captain’s actions seem to be the opposite of fair. Even if he felt he had a reason to punish the girl for being disobedient to his commands, there was no reason to go to the extremes that he did such as hanging her from each limb, and dropping her on the deck over and over again.

Dylan Cutler

Whats up everyone my name is Trevor Saunders im a african american male from Mount Vernon. Im not to passionate about history because i feel that as a society we sould live in the present. However, its also good to know basic information about my heritage and history. I think this class is going to help me fullfill my knowledge in african amreican history. Im a very outgoing person, im also an open minded so the way the class is conducted will help me understand whats going on. Im A brother of three i have two sisters and one brother. I had a pretty rough child hood growing up in the streets of Mount Vernon. My mom being a single mother struggled to take care of my siblings and I at the same time. I ended up living with my grandmother until i was in highschool, an then i was adopted by my uncle. After being adopted i had to change in alot of ways. I went from a predominently black school in Mount Vernon to a dominant white school in Dobbs Ferry Ny. This transition changed me as a person so much because i had to learn how to interact with people other then my peers. I learned that theres more in this world then what people see everyday. I also learned that its good to be a social person. Someone who has alot of different friends are more likely to have more connections. You never know when one of your going to need one of your friends to help you with a problem. Being in SLU is the best thing that happen to me. Living the college life is alot better then being on the streets and doing nothing. I am enjoying every minute of it.

An Op-Ed Piece from the Times

A friend of mine--Prof. Tsitsi Jaji of Penn--just alerted me to this op-ed piece in the New York Times. Prof. Jaji comments, "MLK sacrificed as much for economic justice as for a dream of racial reconciliation. A living wage IS a moral value. And ignoring the disproportionate numbers of black folk unable to find work is an insult to MLK's legacy."

Posting for Taylor

My name is Taylor Engle. I am a Pre-Vet and music major. Since I was a little kid I would spend my entire summer working in my grandparent’s farm. I love working with the animals, and especially the horses, even though it is a little girly. My goal is to become an equine vet, or be a vet at a zoo. I want to work with large exotic animals. Also I love to play music, whether it’s piano, guitar, or just jamming out on the drums; which is why I am also majoring in music. I don’t really have any plans with music. I’m just majoring in it because I love it. I have had pretty decent experiences in my previous English courses. I like to write; however I am not very fond of reading anything, unless it’s Harry Potter, or Animorphs. I took some English courses in High School, but have not taken any college English courses yet, so I am looking forward to this class. What I would like to take away from this course is to become a better writer, but to also learn a different perspective from an African American point of view. I would like to become a more open person because of this class.
To describe myself, I would first say that I am a white anglo-saxon American male, with some Germanic, and Irish descent. I am from Pompano Beach Florida, which is located in southeast ern Florida. The area where I live is very diverse with different types of people and cultures. Because my high school was made up of Jamaicans, Haitians, Puerto Ricans,, Cubans, African Americans, Brazilians, I am an insider when it comes to diverse groups. All of my friends surf, skimboard, wakeboard, deep sea fish, scuba dive, so I am an insider when it comes to those groups. I am an outsider here in the north country because south Florida is completely opposite to everything at St. Lawrence especially the cold and the snow. I am an outsider to the northeast area. Also there is not a very diverse ethnic makeup here at St. Lawrence, which makes me an outsider. In addition I went to a public high school, and many of the students here went to private high schools. I have never been around hockey, in fact I did not realize how big hockey was in this country until last year, so I am definitely an outsider to ice-skating, and hockey jocks, and anything to do with snow. Being an insider to such a diverse area of the country has helped me to be very open and accepting of different people and cultures. Since I am an outsider to the north country, and St. Lawrence University, I am going to try new things that I have never done before, like ice-skating, and sledding, and maybe learn to play hockey.

Kaitie Hewlett

Hi Everyone! My name is Kaitie Hewlett, I'm a senior, and a History major with an Asian Stuides minor. I love studying history because I subscribe to the cliche that history repeats itself. I believe that by taking a hard an analytical look at the past you gain insight into what is happening in the present.

I have taken many different english courses in my time here, and iI haven't really had a bad experience with any of them. I usually take an english course as my "fun" class so that i know I will enjoy at least one class per semester. My favorite english class that I have taken was the Englsih Renaissance Literature class with Dr. Danner ( I would recommend it to anyone).

I hope to gain a better understanding of African American History formt this course. I have taken the history courses with Dr. Smith but i think that by studying the literature of a certain era allows a new window to be opened on the subject. By Analyzing the material I hope to improve and expand on the knowledge that I allready have.

I don't really know what my heritage is, my family has been in America for many generations and its just not something we ever talked about. I will say that I am a proud native of the North Country. I live in Russell, its about 15 minutes away but if you blink you will miss it. I come from a lower-middle class home, my entore family has always been a part of the working class and we are rather stubborn and proud of that fact. Since coming to school at SLU it seems that I have been balancing on a tightrope between being and insider and an outsider in my home town. When I applied to SLU all of my friends gave me grief for wanting to go to school with the SLU snobs. When I came here it was like stepping onto an alien planet, I was surrounded by people very different from myself (which is what college is all about) and suddenly I was an insider who knew all about the surrounding community. I now find myself defending my friends and peers here at SLU to my friends at home and because of this I have become an outsider. Although I love the North Country and I will encourage anyone who is not from here to go out an explore it, I am not a true memeber of the North Country anymore.

stephen moore

Hey everyone. My name is Stephen Moore, and I am a senior English and Government major from South Burlington, Vermont. I guess I chose these two different majors because I’ve always enjoyed reading and writing. Math and science never really came that naturally to me, so it made sense for me to pick a major where I could just read books and write stories. I decided on the Government major a bit later, after I realized that I had taken a bunch of gov. classes and had enough to do a major there as well.

Being an English major though, I have had definitely had a lot of experiences with English courses. My favorite areas are fiction and drama, and these are probably where I have had the best experiences. I really enjoyed taking both the intro and advanced fiction classes because I was able to have a lot of fun in creating and telling my own stories. I think this is probably why I like taking writing classes. I really enjoy creating and telling stories. I’m actually really excited about this semester, because I am doing an independent study on absurdist drama where I am going to write my own absurdist play. I’m hoping that this will actually end up being my best experience with an English course because I pretty much made it up for my self. If there is one area that I’ve had trouble with it’s creative nonfiction writing. I seem to have a bit of trouble with this style and struggled a bit trying to figure it out.

In this class I’m really interested in reading literature from the 20th century. I’ve already had some exposure to early African American lit, although of course not all, but I would really like to see how it developed during the last century. I’d especially like to learn about African American drama. I’ve read A Raisin in the Sun, and Fences, but am not really familiar with other dramatic works.

I would describe my self as being a white, upper middle class liberal. I have a Jewish background, but was not raised to be very religious. Now I don't have any religious affiliations, and am pretty skeptical of organized religion. Growing up in Vermont has also given me a pretty liberal perspective. I generally believe that people should be free to live and do whatever way they want as long as they are not hurting anyone else. Although I like to think that Vermont is liberal and forward thinking, I also realize that I have not lived amongst a lot of diversity. Vermont is pretty homogeneous, and my high school and town were almost all white. This has definitely affected my perspectives, although I would like to think that I have grown up to be an accepting person. Being white in America, I also realize that I have lived my life as an insider, and have really had very little outsider experience. I don't think that I can really even imagine what it would be like as a true outsider in society, as I have always been a privileged member of society.

Chesney Randi

For those who don't know me, my name is Chesney, and I am excited to get to know all of you during the spring semester. I am an English Major, hence why I am taking this class. I had no expectations to major in English until I was enrolled in my FYS, Food for Thought. The class was led by Paul Graham another professor in the English department. He taught me many things like how important writing is and how many windows of opportunity their are by becoming and English major. Sometimes I regret becoming an English major because I am not as strong a writer as other students. I also find myself struggling when I am trying to find out a professor's writing style and what they expect the students to deliver right off the bat. so, with those being only minor issues, I have only had a bad experience with one English professor. At the end of taking that class and truly given it my all, I couldn't say it was very horrible because I did learn a lot.

In this class however, I expect to learn a lot. I want to be able to explore the feelings and conclusions that occur after the assigned readings during class time. I have been learning about Shakespeare and mainly English/British lit for three semesters now and I think it is time for a change. I picked this class because the topic of discussion covers topics that go beyond an average class taken within the English major. I have really never read a lot of African American Literature therefore, I am excited to expand on this particular experience.

Since I have never explored African American Literature, I believe it has to do with where I have grown up. I grew up in a small town known as Garden City, Long Island. It is not diverse at all and just about everyone is Irish or Itailian and Catholic as well. I was one of twelve kids in my grade to be brought up Protestant and that was about as diverse as it got for me until I went to St. Lawrence. The diversity that St. Lawrence offers is what made this school so appealing to me. Since I have been going to this school for three years, my social ladescape that surrounds me here has prepared me for other social situations that I might incounter in the future. Overall all, what I have learn thus far is that their are no identity makers that are important to me. As I begin to learn how to adapt to different social situations at St. Lawrence and else where, I learn that their is nothing that is physically significant that should seperate the human race. Now, that doesn't mean I don't have a problem talking about situations like segregation that have done so in the past, but I only hope to learn more from our past with an open mind and learn to better the social situations that we shall encounter in the future.

My name is Anna Meisenheimer and I am studying Psychology at St. Lawrence University. I enjoy it because I love working with people and I am interested in exploring what makes people “tick.” In addition, I feel that positive human interaction is very gratifying for me and humanity as a whole. With that said, my plans after graduation include obtaining a graduate’s degree in Clinical Psychology, so that I may help people on a daily basis (or so I hope).

My first English course that I took in college was during my first semester freshman year. Unfortunately I decided to major in other extracurricular activities besides academics, and my grades, especially the grade of this course took a toll. My second and final (until now) English course was actually my second semester freshman year. It was called “Creative Fiction Writing,” or something of the sort. During that semester I decided to focus more on academics, and it turned out I thoroughly enjoyed the class. Though it was writing intensive, it allowed me to draw on my imagination and even fond memories and tie it into a humorous, serious or off-the-wall story. To add, it surprisingly harnessed my writing skills for future courses that required analytical, fictional or scientific writing.

The liberal arts education of St. Lawrence University has allowed me to explore many areas of education that I would have shied away from if it wasn’t mandatory to fulfill distribution requirements. Gender and Society with Prof. Hornsby-Minor happened to be one of these courses. I have to say that it was one of the most meaningful courses that I have taken thus far. We learned about gender roles, sexuality and race on a macro and micro level, and our individual place in these socially constructed domains. This class actually drew me to Survey of African American Literature, and I hope that I may learn more about these contentious topics from perhaps a more historical perspective.

If I was to provide a census with my subject positionality, I would say that I am a white, female, upper-middle class American who is a full-time student living in Upstate New York. Though on paper this may provide the census with valuable statistics, I find this sort of information to be rather minimal in my own personal identity, and even superficial to humanity at large. If a friend or acquaintance was to ask me the same question, I would answer that I am a spirited 21 year old female that loves her family, friends, and the outdoors. I am unwavering in my ideals and truly believe that nature is the medicine for almost all of life’s ailments. Optimism is an important quality to me as well. I find that my family and greatest friends share these beliefs too and I am most drawn to those sorts of people, regardless of race, gender, sexuality or socioeconomic status. Basic human connection is organic and universal. I found this statement to hold true when I studied abroad in Europe and realized that I could still establish meaningful connections despite language barriers, history or place of origin. With that said, I feel like an insider when my ideals of family, friends and the outdoors coincide with those around me. I may be similar to others simply by one ideal or by all. Nonetheless, any sort of commonality gives me that basic human connection that I strive for. On the contrary, I feel a bit of an outsider when I have nothing in common with those around me. However, if I search hard enough, I often do find a commonality in something and can obtain a connection on those grounds.

Though this is how I identify myself, I feel that society at large has different standards that are based on the superficial, socially constructed criteria such as race, gender, sexuality and socioeconomic status. This saddens me that so many social issues/wrongdoings throughout history have been justified by these constructs, and whose consequences are long-lived in today’s society. Fortunately for me, because of my skin color I have not had to endure any of these hardships, and I think this is in part why my own personal identity has nothing to do with skin color or other societal constructs mentioned above. I look forward to this class to hopefully gain a better perceptive on what makes society “tick” in regards to these topics.

Jenna Hulton

Hey Guys & Gals

Hi there. I am Dylan Cutler, an easy-going athletic Greek girl from a big city on the west coast of Canada. Contrary to popular belief, I do not live in an igloo, I do not own a beaver as a pet, and I do not drink beer all day. These assumptions, although partly make me who I am (Canadian), are not everything about me, or where I come from. Home to me means ocean and beaches and forests and wood cabins and fishing and skiing (but I don't ski) and hiking and lastly, hockey. Oh, I do love the game of hockey. All sports are great, really. I am on the field hockey team here at SLU, and field hockey has been a part of my life for eight years now. Before field hockey, it was soccer. Before soccer it was volleyball. I also love to run long distances. As far as my Greek heritage, my entire mother’s side is from Greece. Although I am not religious, I do proudly partake in many Greek traditions that my mother has passed down to my sister and I. I hope to do the same for my children no matter where we are living. There are times where my Greek roots seem distant to me. For example, at a recent family reunion, there was Greek dancing which looked like a blur to me, and all sorts of very rich foods, which I didn’t seem to have much appeal for. I felt out of place in a way, but understandably so as I have lived in Canada all my life.

I am a sophomore and a Biology-Physics Major. I am enjoying this as I have found a perfect balance in the combination of my interest for the human body, and movement. My intention after SLU is to go to medical school and then into the field of sports medicine. My ultimate dream is to one day be the doctor of the Montreal Canadiens hockey team (Go Habs Go!). One day. Yup.

I have had good experiences so far in my English courses. Last semester I took Techniques of Poetry with Professor Hummer and I learned a lot about both poetry, and about myself. I discovered a new way that I enjoy expressing myself, as well as a new way of telling others how I feel. There was so much I learned that goes into poetry, which I never even had knew of or thought of before. Likewise, I am sure this class will enlighten me even more in a new field of literature I am quite unfamiliar with. I am hoping this class will show me not only how African-Americans were/are portrayed in literature, but also some true insights into what they went through in their struggles in the world. I do not know of any authors at the moment the specialize in this area, but I hope to be able to identify specific authors and their styles and techniques they like to use.

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I am a white female that lives in the North Country in a small town where everyone knows everyone else’s business. I do not like to say that I am white, or for that matter if I were African American or Native American I still would not want to say my race. I have never identified with being white and until my freshman year at college when I had to write a paper on my race and background did I ask my mom what our heritage is. I more identify with my small community and the farming people of that area. I am shaped in a lot of ways by the fact that I grew up on a dairy farm and have worked it all my life. There has been a farm in my family since the 1900’s or earlier and I know more about farming than where my ancestors came from, because that is what is important to me.

I feel like a person of the community or insider, when I can go to most places and now someone. That was one of the things my friends commented about when I took them to my home for a weekend. I knew many people and they knew me, but this has been the way it has always been for me in my community. I never thought about how connected I was to my community until I went to NYC.

One time that I felt like an outsider was when I went to NYC and stayed with two of my friends for a week. Everyone seemed like they were in a rush to get somewhere, meet someone, talk to someone and had no time to tell me if I was heading in the right direction. I felt out of place because I could not identify with many places in NYC, everyone was so close to each other, and had little space to move around and no one seemed to know each other. With both my experiences of being an insider and an outsider I have learned to appreciate the community I grew up in because for a while I struggled without it.

I am studying history because I want to find out about the past and in my high school some of the events in history I was interested in the teacher did not talk about so I started to take classes to find of the answers. I have also taken many classes about African history and have taken a class and internship on a farm in Gorom II, Senegal. I also felt very much apart of the community around me because of all my host family did to introduce us to their community.

One course that I learned a lot from was an intro to African literature and we talked a lot about the African community and how different people identify with that community. I am taking this course because I wanted to see how African Americans are seen in the literature as well as the literature they write themselves. I am taking a civil rights movement course this semester as well as last semester I took African American history to 1865. I wanted both the history as well as the literature that shows what the African American people were doing and going thru.

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I would describe myself as a Scandinavian-American biology nerd and track athlete. I find that that strongest feelings I have about my self described identity are related to my choice of athletics and study of science as activities that I associate with. Though there are many other traits that I can use to categorize myself, I find that I usually describe myself by the essence of my scholar athlete involvement. I have always worked to find a balance between these two areas of my life. In many places, these traits can seem incongruous- the extreme social sketches of each the scholar and the athletes paint different images. Pop culture may brand an athlete with certain social perceptions; as someone involved in the physical and not bound to examining the details of the world around them. Meanwhile, the most studious and successful student is perceived as absorbed in the microcosm of their field and work, atrophied and bound to a lab or desk. While I certainly do not see myself as either, and know few people who would fit these almost garishly simplistic sketches, I do realize that parts of me do not cross between these different worlds. For ease of getting through practice, I do not consider the flow of blood through my body as I feel my heart pump- I only see my feet move or hear the dull thud against my ribs. When studying, my body ceases to be a tool in my progress; the world becomes solely a miasma of images that are formed from layering page after page of text. In both worlds, I am an insider when I have centered myself to be so; but it would be just as simple to become an outsider in each as well, lapsing into the wrong plane of thought and becoming stranded from the reality of that situation. I identify still with my Scandinavian grandparents; my mother’s parents lived in Denmark for many years, spending their youth there and moving back to Germany in middle age for several years. However, by being American born and raised, and unable to do more than mimic the names and placed of the pieces of Danish culture passed through my family, I am forever separated form being recognized as more than of Danish descendance by my relatives in Denmark.

The juxtaposition of being an athlete and a student helps to motivate me to do more; the constant banter and switch between these parts of myself keeps fresh viewpoints on how to learn material, and allows me different perspectives on material. When I was in Techniques of Fiction, my only prior experience with English courses at St. Lawrence, these two view points were useful in blending and creating new characters for stories, that were less flat than had I needed to write them with only one lens of experience. I had a great experience in that class, and it helped me to find a love of writing that can often be worn thin by overuse in scholarly assignments. However, I do love what I study. I am I biology major, on the health career track. I settled on my major since it is situated at the confluence of everything I have enjoyed learning until now. The engineering classes at my hometown community college, the people skills from volunteering at schools, the level headedness from sports competition, all of it eventually finds an eddy to add to what I’ve learned in biology and form the basis of knowledge I would like to build my future on. I hope that in this class I can improve my analysis of literature; I have always been a voracious reader, and the chance to get a variety of new opinions on books is always interesting. No matter how many readings I could do of a book, I can only look at the text with one frame of experiences, my own. Class examination of readings offer new reference frames to examine the literature. Also, to look at the genra as a whole, the alternate experiences of people are important to consider. If I do end up being able to become a health care worker, I would interact on a regular basis with others who have an uncountable number of backgrounds. Since literature often puts the reader mentally into another person’s shoes, exposure to a genre of literature that describes the experiences of others can provide valuable insight.