Victoria Olayiwola Blog #4: Forget our Americanness, what about our Blackness? Pt1

 

 This is us.

                                           

 This is NOT us. Goes without saying really.

Imitation is the highest form of flattery.

“If you don’t look like me then there’s a problem.”-Dess

So I walked into Sadler one day and saw a male friend, so I went over to hello. Mind you, today was the day I decided I would show my hair which was in plaits. So I said hello, he was sitting amongst a group of mutual friends. Our mutual friend saw me first and said hello to me first. He noticed my hair and said oh you’re showing your hair. Then the friend I had actually gone over to say hello to me said saw my hair and was like Bu/Hon your hair is a mess, you need to go sort out your hair! Incredibly shocked I decided to  take it as a joke and pretend I wasn’t offended. Seriously? A mess? Really? Because none of the white people who saw it thought it was a mess. No sir. Even an Asian friend of mine alongside another white friend said it looks different. Funky. Nice, but different. 

I later learnt that it was the norm for girls in America, of African descent to prefer to look like “Barbie dolls dipped in chocolate” than accept their God-given natural hair. In London, England such notions of how a black women’s hair should look and whether ones hair is in a “mess” is non-existent. Is it the case that African-American girls are disproportionately influenced by advertisements of white girls flicking their hair and letting the wind blowing from side to side? Or is it because Beyoncé, Michelle Obama and other African-American female actors all of a sudden are blest with European looking hair? And so if the ordinary black African-American girl is not naturally “blest” with such hair, they devise ways to bless themselves with such things. Why?

Whatever the case may be , I am not ashamed of my hair. On the contrary I look at it sometimes and think WoW, we (black) really do have the best hair. If only it was longer so we could flick up and down and toss it from side to side like our non-black counterparts. So we can show its beauty. Because it really is beautiful. Straightening our hair or relaxing it or donning those odd horse-hair wigs and those tracks and so on and so forth only helps destroy its true beauty. If only our ideas on what true beauty weren’t so warped, so perverse, we would see it for ourselves.

Dess is right to say that most if not all African-American products are owned by African-Americans interested after the welfare of African-American women’s hair. If this is the case in America, I can confirm that it is even more the case in London where most, if not all, the Afro hair shops are owned Asians. One springs here and another there, all of them competing for loyal customers. As good shop owners they know the brands well and are of the greatest help. But do they know “our” hair? Do they even care? Rather do they stock up on what is selling fast, because they know it is best for black hair or because they can make a quick buck or two? Sadly, with great regret I think is the latter. For like any shop owner or company, they seek profit, regardless of what is happening to those who use it. 

This point brings me to the wonderful collage of black culture “The College Museum” by George C Wolfe.  Questions are raised about identity, aim and purpose. This questions are raised aptly in Exhibit 6, which brings up the question of hair. Note that the lady no longer had hair because she had been changing her hairstyle like the changing seasons of the year, now she was deciding whether she choose between an Afro wig from Taiwan or straight white woman looking hair wig. In the end she doesn’t choose a hairstyle, but choosing the straightened hair would have been a denouncement of true black people’s hair because true black people’s hair ISN’T straight. My theory is every time we as black people give in by bleaching ourselves and relaxing our hair in order to pursue to “imitation” we are in fact helping bolster and support the process of a lost identity. 

Blog #3 - Tatiana Bull

  For today's blog I wanted to talk about the first sketch in The Colored Museum called "Git on Board".     This whole sketch is basically  a satire on the stewerdess and all who would suppress the African American identity, thus bringing about the theme of the power of heritage.  I found it interesting how the stewardess discouraged any singing or unifying music-making of any kind.  She asked her guests to refrain from call and response sing and drumming, playing the drums would be sign of open rebellion, or in other words, a threat to white supremacy.  To emphasize her point, she asked the people on the plane to chant "no dums" until their chant sounded convincing.  From my understanding, the drums symbolize unity and preserved culture of African Americans. When she hears the beating of the drums, she attempts to ignore them and tries to brainwash the audience, as she has been brainwashed herself - she tries to forget the past that has shaped her life.  The rebellion the stewardess refers to here is of African Americans simply maintaing their unique heritage and being proud of the differences that they bring to society.

The stewardess is somehow separated from her race in the way that she does not share the slaves' fate at the end of their voyage.  She enthusiastically transports slaves to their final destination and she is condemned to a live a life with a smile plastered on her face, along with a fake personality for the rest of her life.  However, she is also in bondage, not physically like a slave would be, but she is emotionally bound to live her life of conformity and isolation.  By calling out "no drums" she is rejecting her culture and distancing herself from that possible unity.  When she starts to talk about African Americans who have maintained their identity and heritage and still contributed to American culture, it seemed as though the drums were getting louder.  I dont know, maybe that was just me.  Nevertheless, she STILL failed to acknowledge the drums and allow the power of these cultural influences to go through her.  

The line that stuck out to me the most was when the flight attended said "Please check the overhead before exiting as any baggage you do not claim, we trash."  She basically makes the point that baggage, the past, becomes trash if it is not maintained and valued.  The unique culture of African Americans will be lost forever if they dismiss who they are and from where they came in order to blend into society. The stewardess (and society) do not mind throwing away the baggage or the past.

Jillian Turner Blog # 3: We Laugh To Keep From Crying

Our exercise today, though entertaining brought up mixed emotions for me. On one hand, the actors and actresses played on stereotypes in the African American community that have comedic value, I couldn't help but think "this is so wrong." George C. Wolfe's The Colored Museum portrayed various layers of the African American culture and struggle.

In the opening scene, the juxtaposition of the Celebrity Slave Ship attendant, clad in all pink and a bright smile, described the violence and oppression of the transportation of slaves from Africa across the Atlantic. My initial reaction was nothing but shocked and appalled, but I soon came to the notion that we must laugh to keep from crying. I thought that her demeanor in the piece was almost more powerful because she did it with a smile. It symbolized how, over time, fake smiles have eclipsed the tears of oppression.

Later on in the film, scene with the man in the dumpster portrayed a similar eclipse of culture. He, throwing away his afro comb and dashiki, thought that throwing away his culture, past, and history, was the only way to be successful in a predominantly white world. I can't help but relate this to one of my favorite shows: The Fresh Prince of Bel-Air. In the show, Will Smith constantly highlights the differences between his family in Philly and his family in Bel-Air whom, in his mind, have subscribed to a similar dismissal of their heritage. The Banks family portrays a similar focus on money and success.

The film also discusses hair in the black community. In the scene, Wolfe contrasts black women who wear their hair naturally with those who chose to relax it to be straight. As discussed in class, hair is incredibly important for most African American women because it is a job in itself. However, wells takes an interesting approach. In the scenes, the actress refers to Loretta Divine as a Barbie Doll Dipped in Chocolate because she choses to relax her hair. This called upon tensions that African American women have with their peers who chose to seemingly "whiten" themselves. Many racial prejudices held are between women: light skinned versus dark skinned and even straight hair versus curly hair. This issue reminded me of scenes from the movie Beauty Shop. In the film, a white woman works in an Atlanta beauty shop with all African American women. Throughout the film, the women put distance between themselves and the white woman simply on the basis of race. 

These films, along with our text and discussions in class have had led me to the question: What is power and how is it gained? Throughout the history of African Americans, power was taken from them through violence. In more modern times, however, how is it defined?

Last Exhibit in "The Colored Museum"

We're probably gonna talk about this now....but was anyone else confused about the last exhibit? I really didn't get the meaning or importance of the fact that this woman laid an egg. I mean, I know she's did something special, after her mother told her she wasn't. But was was the entire scene supposed to represent?

Clarissa Blanco, Blog #2 "Where are you from?"

One of the most interesting aspects of Anna Deavere Smith's Twilight, to me, was that she TOTALLY mastered those accents! I know how hard it is to try to mimic the accent of another person from a country of which you are not. I mean, Ms. Park's (the asian woman whose husband got shot's) impersonation was just amazing. I'm  not very good at accents...to be quite honest, it's very hard for me to place myself in the position of another individual, then you're gonna ask me to mimic their accent? FORGET IT! But, Ms. Smith, she does a very good job at intricately mastering the accents of the different people she interviewed. Would it have been the same had she not done so? Had she ignored the fact that there was diversity in LA? Had she decided "this is too difficult for me; I'm not Asian, I'm not Spanish, I'm not Italian"? No. The fact that Ms. Smith paid attention to the details involved in the accents made this film a lot easier to empathize with.

Accents not only let people know what part of the world you are from, but possibly how far your roots go or  even your ties to your own country. Much like your name, if you have an accent it is inescapable unless you're in another country for so long that it seems to fade away. But have you realized that the longer you stay home the more permanent your accent is? Like Kunta Kente, from Roots, for example. He was pulled out of his "home" and forced into another, and another lifestyle. His name was what helped him remain "home", but once it changes he begins to lose a sense of identity. Does a person who loses their accent lose their identity too? I'd have to say yes.... My family is from Dominican Republic. I was born in America, and so was my mother, but my aunts and uncles- grandparents too- were all born in Santo Domingo. When they came to this country, they moved to a part in Manhattan called "Washington Heights". Wash. Heights, my friend, was little DR! Why do you think my family moved from DR to little DR? Because, they didn't want to lose their sense of being dominican. It's already hard to leave your home, but leaving it for somewhere foreign that barely speaks your language? Scaaarrryyyyyyy. Therefore, both my grandparents never really learned English. I can say that most of the bilinguals in my high school never really learned English. Why? Because they're afraid to leave what they know for what they dont; the "known" for the "unknown"; the old them for the possibilities of the new them. 

So, when you ask where I'm from, I'll tell you "from New York". But I come from a family that, from Santo Domingo, migrated to Washington Heights, and never really left home....Sometimes we must question ourselves. Are we ready to step out of our comfort zone? To practice our accents just enough so that we can relate to the Asian or Spanish community? Can we be the Anna Deavere Smith's of our generation?

Chris Phillibert "Do You Speak English?" (3)

I do indeed! Quite well, I think. I've spoken it my whole life and though I have incorporated various slang words, abbreviations and contortions of words on my expression of the language, I think I have a pretty firm grasp of the language at its core. I really enjoyed the second part of this question involving Anderson and his stance on language and literacy imagining a nation. It forced me to think back to the first question asking, "What is a nation?" which I liked a lot. Anderson believes that the idea of a nation is something that derives from man and that nations are formed by the people united by a common language or print literature. This question got me thinking about what other things in a person's daily life are constructed by people or the general community around them but we obey them as if they exist as rules outside of our own minds. In other words what other things seem as solid and unmovable as nations, but only exist as concepts we all agree upon in our minds. That got me to thinking about time and how as an international community everyone in the world across languages and cultures agrees that a second is the base for counting standard everyday time and that time should be measured in seconds, minutes, hours and the like. Ultimately I started wondering how people collectively came to agree upon that for time and how it might be harder or even easier to get people to agree unilaterally on an idea on an international scale nowadays. Currency, too, is another example of something, credit, debt, etc, that exists only in our collective minds but can have impact on tangible things like transactions and the like. I feel as if I'm digressing a lot here so I'll get back to point.

Anderson backs his idea of nations being formed around common literature and language by citing the example of European nations forming around their languages and different languages like English, Spanish, French, and others could be all formed from Latin and coexist in relatively close geographic areas. Anderson pushes the idea that there were just as many languages as there were nations and that shows that the building of nations is related to the formation of languages. Anderson also stresses that the ideas of nationalism and nationality are formed through what he refers to as "imagined political communities." Nations are deeply intertwined with these political communities and the expansion of nationalism is related to one's nationality, but is not quite the same.

Another thing I got to thinking about when considering this question is who controls what ideas are considered for adaptation or refusal in the public forum of a community? Whether that community is on an international scale as when it comes to time, a national scale as when it comes to currency, or a classroom scale when it comes to the name of a blog, there is a method of mediating which ideas are and are not brought up for discussion. The immediate answer that comes to mind for me is whatever presiding authority exists over the domain gets to decide what is discussed in that forum. The question from that becomes, what or whom is the authority when it comes to an international scale? Is there really any authority at all? I think when it comes to an international scale it depends on who you pay attention to. Whether you pay attention to international news or forum sites that get contributions from around the world, you will have ideas and concepts thrown at you on an international scale. I guess in reality, you're the only authority to what you consider in a public forum and collectively as a community with everyone making the decision to accept or refute something, a decision gets made. Sorry for the rambling!

My Roots--Sam Quinn #2

When I first read this question, I wasn't sure how to answer it. I mean, I could be straightforward and just say geographically where I came from, or I could get all figurative with it and share my past in a more wholesome sense. I guess I'll try to do a little bit of both?!

I was born in Fredericksburg, VA: a place that is famous for being home to so many major civil war battlefields, woohoo! My Mom was born in California, and my Dad was born in Hawaii! My mom's parents were (Sicilian) Italian, and my Dad's were German and Irish...so I'm just an odd European heritage kind of girl, but American fo'sho :)

But where am I from, in the sense of things that have shaped me is a different story. I am the middle child of 5 kids, and growing up we all spent all of our time together! It was great, we played a ton of monopoly/scrabble/risk, all played soccer, and spent our free time building forts outside and playing with beany babies! When we were younger, we came up with really strange games...one time my little sister was in one of those toy cars you pedal with by putting your feet on the ground, and we would roller blade around the basement and run into her. Another time we came up with a wressling game between my other sister and I called "Ding Ding Ding" (like the wressling bell, yaya?!) and yea we would wressle and my sister stood on a table and was the referee. Obviously I'm just very close with my family! And remain so, throughout being a teen and high school and now college! I think this part of my life helped shape me as far of my values and priorities: coming from a close, Catholic family definitely gave me grounded roots, even as I spread my wings. It has also taught me things in a different way, since I don't always agree with my religion or parents, I've learned from them to respect others, even if they are very different from you.

I guess I just wanted to give one example, or rather a little insight on "where I'm from" in both ways! Harkening back and reminiscing for a bit is grounding sometimes, because it reminds you of what is important to you, which is why I really liked this prompt!