Books I like which deal with the same sort of issues as this blog, listed in order of publication:
Thucydides: “The Peloponnesian War” (395 BC) – A history of the war between Athens and Sparta. It gave me a lens on the nature of power, morals, empire, human behaviour and ideology far better than anything I was taught at school or got from television. Thucydides’s writing and Hobbes’s translation of it into English are both models for me.
Langston Hughes: “The Ways of White Folks” (1934) – Fourteen short stories which taught me that racism comes down to power.
George Orwell: “1984” (1949) – Winston Smith lives in an England where the government controls the news and the history books. How ideas, knowledge and even language serve power, how we live in a world of lies, why truth and history matter.
Frantz Fanon: “Black Skin, White Masks” (1952) – the psychology of racism. One of the hardest books I have ever read but well worth it. Hollywood films now make more sense to me – in a bad way. This blog has a post on each chapter.
Lorraine Hansberry: “A Raisin in the Sun” (1957) – A black family wants to move to a white neighbourhood. Starts out slow but turns to pure gold.
James Baldwin: “The Fire Next Time” (1963) – Two pieces written for the New Yorker, the best thing ever written about White American racism.
Malcolm X & Alex Haley: “Autobiography of Malcolm X” (1965) – Should be required reading for every American.
Toni Morrison: “The Bluest Eye” (1970) – A black girl’s wish for blue eyes comes true. Maybe the best single book on internalized racism.
Cheikh Anta Diop: “The African Origin of Civilization: Myth or Reality” (1974) – Mostly about the African roots of Ancient Egypt. Great on how we are taught to see history through the eyes of racist white people. This blog has a post on each chapter.
June Jordan: “Civil Wars” (1981) – Essays. The first book I read written by someone who thinks like me, who says the things inside my head. I did not know that was even possible.
Derrick Bell: “And We Are Not Saved: The Elusive Quest For Racial Justice” (1987) – a law professor on the nature of American racism, law and the limits to what can be done. Excellent but depressing.
Jamaica Kincaid: “A Small Place” (1988) – about the effects of British rule on Antigua. The best book on imperialism after Thucydides but way shorter. Too angry for the New Yorker to print.
Edward S. Herman & Noam Chomsky: “Manufacturing Consent: The Political Economy of the Mass Media” (1988) – Outlines their propaganda model of how news in America is heavily filtered. Fact to Orwell’s fiction.
Danzy Senna: “Caucasia” (1998) – about a girl who can pass for white or black. How race is created by the rules of society.
Nell Irvin Painter: “Creating Black Americans: African-American History and Its Meanings, 1619 to the Present” (2006) – a good, solid overview of black American history. I have not read it all the way through yet but it seems good. I hope to do a post on each chapter.
See also:
- Books banned from Tucson classrooms
- Books on race on my Kindle
- The top ten Desert Island books – as voted on by readers of this blog. Three of them are listed above.
- The best American writers live north of 110th Street
Excellent list!
I’d add:
The Destruction of black Civilization
The Psychopathic Racial Personality
The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion
The United Independent Compensatory Code
The Isis Papers
Invisible Man
Black Like Me
The Talmud
An American Dilemma
Yurugu
All of these help me tremendously to over-stand this plantation we live in.
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Why was ‘Black SKin, White Mask’ such a hard read?
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Abagond I anxiously wait to see what you have to say about Django unchained. I suspect the white lens, and the assymytry of racism will come up, perhaps some elements of mighty whitey as well.
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@truthtobetold:
“The Protocols of the Learned Elders of Zion.”
For real????
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How about Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention? It’s in may ways superior to the autobiography.
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Abagond
” …. a law professor on the nature of American racism, law and the limits to what can be done. Excellent but depressing.”
~~~~~~~~
Do you find it “depressing” because of Prof Bell’s final conclusions regarding racism?
_______________________
TruthBeTold
When I read parts of the Protocols of the Learned Elders way back when, I saw that these agendas, processes, protocols or conspiracies were/are VERY REAL.
Whether the book is mirroring the agenda, or the book is the origin for the agenda, the reality is overwhelmingly strong to just summarily dismiss out of hand. I remain convinced that this book is founded in truth.
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This is a great set books to check out.
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This is a great list. I love the Bluest Eye. That is one of Toni Morrison’s books that I like and I have The Ways Of White Folk by Langston Hughes on my bookshelf. I want to reread the Baldwin novels and the Franz Fannon novel I want to read, He seems like an enigma. Again this is a great list.
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Abagond, I don’t know if you are interested in reading or doing a post the book, The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. In 1951 Henrietta Lacks died after a long battle with cervical cancer. She was an unwitting source of cells which are known as HeLa cells cultured by Otto Gey. Today her HeLa cells are still used in medical research. Her surviving family was never paid for this.It’s just my opinion that John Hopskins Medical School should have paid her family for using her cells. They are profiting from this poor black woman’s misfortune. It was just a thought.
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Awesomeness! Thank You.
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@truthbetold
Ah truthbetold yours is “the” list and abagond’s is great as well – still all those images of dead hanging black men surrounded by happy faced albinic/whites who are “never” brought to justice makes me not give f–k about anyone’s copyright or physical form possession – I will choose those among the lists That please me and are of interest.
I will attain or create a digital copy which I will overtly or covertly distribute everywhere – f–k money and violence…..
Yo mary burrell
“The Immortal Life of Henrietta Lacks by Rebecca Skloot. In 1951 Henrietta Lacks died after a long battle with cervical cancer. She was an unwitting source of cells which are known as HeLa cells cultured by Otto Gey.”
I’m quite sure Abagond did a post about this already – search his entire site – you’ll be Amazed.
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@ mary burrell
Excellent suggestion! I have not done a post on Henrietta Lacks or the Skloot book yet. I did mention HeLa in passing here:
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@ Truth
Thanks for your list!
People keep asking me about the Isis Papers, so I will have to read that and do a post.
“Black Like Me” is excellent but dated. Someone seriously needs to do one for the supposedly postracial Obama Era!
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You other bloggers and suggesting books and draining my bank account. 😦
In all seriousness, this is definitely an excellent list. I wish I had some additions to it like some of the other commenters (truthbetold in particular has a great list of her own), but alas, I sorely lack in such insight.
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@ Peanut
I think you would like that book.
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@ Max
I heard the Marable book was good but have yet to read it myself.
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@ Matari
Because he points out that there are serious limits to what the law can do. There is no cure in the law for racism. The push for civil rights is necessary but not sufficient. It did not help that I read it during the height of the Crack Era in New York.
On the other hand, he wrote (and I read) with the demographics of the 1980s in mind. He lived long enough to see the death of the white majority in view, so I wonder if that changed any of his thinking.
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@ The Cynic
The book came out of his doctoral thesis so it is aimed mainly at French psychiatrists, not a lay audience. Also his style of argument is very spaghetti-ey. Some chapters I had to read twice. Even now I cannot say I fully understand the book.
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@ Joaquín
I was not going to see “Django Unchained” but so many people have asked me about it that I am going to see it tomorrow (well, now today) Sunday. The post will go up Monday hopefully.
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Thank you for sharing this great list Abagond!
Nell Irvin Painter also wrote the History of White People which explains how the concept of a white race was invented in the U.S. in order to create an “us against them”.
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[…] "Books I like which deal with the same sort of issues as this blog, listed in order of publication:" […]
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[…] See on abagond.wordpress.com […]
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I’m looking for a book that stresses positives in American Diversity. Really racism and negative clashes between races have actually hurt regular white people more than helps them. Competing immigrant group at one time was a positive thing in america. People striving to out do their opponent (but knowing when to come together under a common cause). It is partly what made america strong. Now people have turned competition into animosity and anger in my opinion which helps no one.
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@bulanik:
It is weird that it is still around, but it shows you that the guys who presented the Auschwitz experience etc are still around. That it shows up in here just goes to show that racism is still very much alive and kicking in all its forms.
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Aba
You’ll love the Isis Papers. I read it twice and still learn something each time.
@ Sam
Yes….for real.
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Concerning the Protocols, may I suggest that before you even touch that you read “The Plot” by Will Eisner?
http://books.wwnorton.com/books/detail.aspx?ID=8033
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Bulanik
Read about King Leopold and his slashing of African women’s privates to use as a “trophy” for his bravery. He carried the dried breast fat of my ancestors he slaughtered on his horse saddle and then made handbags out of them.
The European will suffer an eternity of sorrow for his unique demonism. But then again, Dr. Ani explained to a tee why they lack huemanity.
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Bulanik
Thanks for the link. I’ll view the video in its entirety when I can, probably this week when time allows. As for experiments, Research Dr. Robert Gallo and the myth of AIDS.
Whites have an uncanny ability for repetition.
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@truthtobetold;
“Yes….for real.”
I hope you do understand that it is really not real. No more than, say, Dark Knight or American Pie 2. It is traditional eastern european racist antisemitic propaganda, that is all. Just like all that “science” which proved that africans have thicker skulls and smaller brains and could and should be therefore exploited at will.
You mentioned king Leopold and what he did in Kongo. Well, the guys who believed that the Protocols are real did the same for millions in Europe. They mutilated children alive in their experiments, tried to make brown eyes blues by injecting blue ink straight into to the eyes, without any pain relief naturally, and they made all kinds of surgigal experiments on humans, men and women, too. One example, they took some women and men and burned them and tested new methods of treating burn victims on these in the name of medical research.
And all that was inspired by books and litterature such as Protocols. All in the name of Racism.
@bulanik:
“There’s comfort and familiarity in myths. The Protocols’ myths, with their seemingly complex and well-thought out familiarity, are good enough if we want to believe and need something to explain why things are the way they are.”
Yes, there is that aspect. In a world which does not seem to make sense it is very comforting to find an explanation to it all. Patent solution is the follow up for the patent explanation, as if it where. That is exactly what the nazis had in mind when they came up with final solution, or what Mao had in mind with his Cultural revolution or Pol Pot with his Year One.
“I suppose racism is reassuring? Racist ‘explanations’ make the world and our lives so much simpler if they true.”
Absolutely right. THat is the reason why racist explanations bite so well and why seemingly intelligent people want to believe in them. They make “sense” because they simply offer an answer to ALL your questions. They tell you who is to blame, who is wrong, why it is so etc.
“Sam, correct me if I’m wrong, but wasn’t that what Goebbels (Nazi propagandist) called “The Big Lies”? The Big Lies are those deceptions that are so entrenched in the cultural memory they sound the truest. They make deep sense, and therefore convince and mesmerize easiest.
Therefore the racism of anti-Semtism – the Jew as evil incarnate – is so essentialized – that something like the Protocols must contain truth and credibility. It feeds uncertainty and hatred.”
Yes. Göbbels said once: Tell the audience a little lie, and no one believes it. But tell them a huge lie, and they all want to believe it.
Protocols, and many other stories like that, are essential for the racism. They enforce it and keep it going on, and at the same time give it a whiff of history, since anything serious has history. What is striking is how all of these have the same themes: unequality of men and the image of the enemy, either from with in or from outside, and “racial” biology plus mythical evil. There is something in this soup that speaks so well to all kinds of humanbeings.
For me personally it is always very weird that any one who is a target of racism finds comfort on racist fantasies or ideologies but perhaps it is the familiarity that resonates. I have no idea. Just guessing.
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@bulanik:
“As a book, The Protocols popular in the Middle East, and has been for decades: someone like the Baron Jacob Rothschild was a joke in Britain at one stage, but was perceived as a ‘demon’ in Saudi and on Egyptian telly.”
Adolf Hitlers Mein Kampf has been selling well in the islamic world as well for decades, along side the Protocols. And that is really weird indeed.
“The ironic thing is that The Protocols have probably been replaced by Islamophobia, and the idea of “Eurabia”. That’s the conspiracy theory that European and Arab powers aim to Islamize and Arabize Europe, and the Muslims slowly take over the world… Anders Behring Breivik believed in this theory, among others.”
Yes, and it is the same thing, just another target. 70 years ago it was the jews, now it is the muslims. The stories, reasons, racism, belief systems, fantasies, examples are almost the same as those 70 years ago.
Breivik and many white europeans believe that the muslims have a plan to take over the world. Just like those guy believed 70 years ago that jews were planning to take over the world. Just like the jews had all the banks, the muslims have all that oil money. And just like in the case of jews, the race is half of the story. Just like jews were the wrong race AND religion, so are muslims. They have a plan to take over, they have a foreign religion, and they are of another race. Usually a muslim is an arab, but always wrong race too. Just like the jews were 70 years ago.
A black african muslim, perhaps a somali, is a prime example of this. There in a nutshell is everything guys like Breivik are talking about. Another race, another religion, another culture and trying to take over and destroy us. Just like 70 years ago.
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@ Sam
Ok.
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Abagond, if you let retards like truthbetold comment on your blog(and thank them for it), it makes you look retarded.
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This list looked interesting to me, but then I noticed Protocols. If you are looking for truth, the author of Protocols plagiarized whole paragraphs from earlier writers. If you go to Wikipedia they show them side by side. It’s an absolute forgery and you should remove it. It has been called a warrant for genocide. By listing it are you implying it is genuine. The original document was in Russian, and then widely disseminated by Hitler. If Jews wanted to “take over the world” and write a manual on how to do it you’d think they’d have at least written it in Hebrew or Yiddish.
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@ Edwin Rowe
Actually Protocols was not on Agabond’s list
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LOL at The Protocols! Might as well list The Turner Diaries if you wanna go down Loony Street like that.
Over on Serious Avenue, I’d add/recommed Thandeka’s Learning to Be White.
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Turner Diaries
Every Wednesday night/Thursday morning Roy of hollywood
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Something%27s_Happening
on 90.7 kpfk http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/KPFK has a commentator named dave emory http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Dave_Emory
who regularly cites the “The Turner Diaries” amongst other works.
This is part of what blogs are for – public dialogue, a sort of informal peer review similar to the scientific methodology of seeking truth or validity via exposure and falsification.
Another part ,serious as life and i came be sometimes ,its just plain fun.
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@ Bulanik
Thanks for your list! “King Leopold’s Ghost” is on my to-read list too. Let me know if “In Praise of Black Women” is any good.
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@ Yan, Edwin Rowe
Letting someone comment hardly means I agree with everything they say. I let people say pretty much whatever they want so long as they are civil and on-topic.
I thanked Truthbetold because a) she took the time to make a list and b) it was interesting and c) I know at least some of the books on the list are good.
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Aba:
Also:
Brainwashed: Challenging the Myth of Black Inferiority
Killers of the Dream
Trojan Horse: Death of a Dark Nation
The New Jim Crow
Breaking Rank
Breaking Rank was certainly and eye opener for me.
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I’m reading George Orwell’s 1984 now. It’s a great read. I’ve always believed in the power of vocabulary and how words aren’t just words but ideas, but Orwell illustrates the point wonderfully. Eye opening book.
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Sorry Abagond,
I am off topic but I was wondering if you are planning to write a post on Django Unchained.
Thanks.
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@HD
Yes, I am.
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Bulanik
First: Breaking Rank is a book about Officer Norm Stamper. He “broke rank” and wrote about the ugly racism in the police force…including quotas, which ALL cops deny exist. For me, it showed the psychosis behind law enforcement when unstable men and women are given power to kill at will.
Second: Thank you for defending me. This New Year caught me on a Spiritual high. Everyone that I spoke to commented on my aura and ask me “What’s going on?”
My response was, “I feel different.”
When I prayed to the Most High that night, he gave me an insight to the so-called Supreme Being called the European. Since I do not wish to derail this thread, I’ll just say this:
Nothing that whites do and say can faze me anymore. Nothing. I expect this kind of behaviour from these “beings” who lack the most important element on earth…Carbon. Whites are going to whimper in pain for the Universe, now exhausted from centuries of molestation, will rise up and seek to weed out the unnatural elements on her Planet.
Pay the Caucasian no mind. I no longer do.
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The Bluest Eye is banned or challenged in most school districts. I don’t know why, because it is fairly mild compared to Shakespeare’s tragedies.
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Wow, my book list got bigger for 2013. Thanks you all! I just finished Medical Apartheid by Harriet Washington-definitely explains a lot as it relates to the health disparities among African-Americans. The book is such a powerful testament of what my ancestors had to endure!
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King Leopolds Ghost is a must for anyone who wants to know what is going on in Congo and central parts of Africa right now. Horrible horrible stuff indeed.
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It’s funny I just pulled out a very yellowed and dog eared copy of 1984 and Animal Farm that I read many many years ago. I think i will reread them. Also Brainwashed by Tom Burrell I just can’t stop reading I always find something i want to read again. And Black Pain by Terrie M. Williams is an excellent and informative read. Since mental health issues in the black community and Americans everywhere need to address.
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@Abagond
Is there something particualar about the Hobbes translation of Thucydides: “The Peloponnesian War” or will most translations be ok to get the point?
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@lifelearner; Thanks for this will put this in my amazon cart.
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I suggest the following :
Slavery by Another Name by Douglas Blackman
The Warmth of Other Suns by Isabel Wilkerson
Post Traumatic Slave Syndrome by Dr. Joy Degruy .
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I wish I could read at least one of the books in your list. One day, one day.
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[…] to researching his posts and the books he chooses to highlight. And speaking of books, go here for his latest recommendations in literature. If not for your reading pleasure, for your children; […]
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These 2 books about the Entertainment Industry look interesting:
The Circus Age: Culture and Society Under the American Big Top,
By Janet Davis.
A friend mentioned that this book traces the history of clown to blackface caricatures — the exaggerated eyes, curly hair, massive red mouth, big nose and big feet — all refer to the apparent features of the black people the clown imitates and lampoons. Its characterization relates to the black man — his maleness, as such — because the black man, like the clown, has no concept of reason, cries openly, and is happiest in dirt — that’s how the circus clown behaves. The lion tamer, in contrast, could only be played by a white person.
There is also another title:
Love and Theft: Blackface Minstrelsy and the American Working Class (Race and American Culture), by Eric Lott, goes further.
I haven’t read this one either, but from articles about the book, it seems that blackface and minstrelsy was THE Building Block of the US’s entertainment industry, and the research in this book proves it.
Blackface was behind vaudeville, cartoons, the circus and more. Of course even black men who entertained the audience had to wear blackface, Bert Williams and George Walker in stage make-up:http://upload.wikimedia.org/wikipedia/commons/thumb/d/d0/WilliamsWalkerJohnahMan.jpg/220px-WilliamsWalkerJohnahMan.jpg
A documentary about early entertainment, and some discussion of the theft and imitation that Eric Lott refers to:
(http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8kbnn3E7Gp8)
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Abagond, correction please — italics for book title only ^^.
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It is very difficult and time consuming to go back and correct old posts for someone else. Maybe better if you just rewrote it and ask him to delete the old one.
Hey, you’ve come back to be a prolific commenter again. What happened?
I wonder if Abagond did posts on the chapters of the last book in the list above like he promised.
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Jefe.
Very difficult and time-consuming, huh? I thought it was a matter of the blog administrator putting in this symbol: /i surrounded by chevrons. A doddle, surely! 🙂
Sometimes I do rewrite and ask for deletion of the wrong one, and sometimes I don’t. I don’t know which way is more effective.
What happened? — in the sense of why was I unusually un-prolific, you mean?
Did you miss me? 😀 😀
I believe I let on — a few times — how come I wasn’t here. A lot was happening: I had my work/businesses and an elderly relative with health issues (an ileostomy surgery, plus complications) to look out for and/or nurse. I still do. That started to get get heavy in late April; I recall saying so even then to Legion.
Also, I was tired. Then went traveling.
This week there’s a window for myself, as well as PC access.
After next week and up until mid-December, commitments will weigh in again.
Sometimes I come here to learn something.
Other times, I am curious, and read bits of threads if I have the energy to.
Today, I thought I would share some thoughts, as there are a lot subjects I could comment on, ideas I have, but I am ambivalent about that now.
I need my time and energy — everybody’s precious commodities — I suppose.
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I’ve heard it said that a language is only a language because numbers of people speak it, and a language only forms itself into a system because of INDIVIDUAL speakers’ language abilities. That’s how proper linguists approach things, apparently.
There’s a book I want to get my hands on by Nancy Niedzielski and Dennis Preston, called “Folk Linguistics”, which argues that in the US, language exists OUTSIDE of the actual speakers, because American English has a unique “language ideology”.
This is, then, the study of American English from an ethnolinguist and folklorist standpoint, because, according to the blurb “the authors approach folk linguistic belief as one of the most important aspects of ethnography and as a key to understanding a culture.”
So far, any enquiry of this kind has been labeled unscientific and useless.
(I don’t know by whom.)
http://www.jstor.org/discover/10.2307/1178686?uid=3738232&uid=2&uid=4&sid=21102715167251
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Another book that sounds worth finding: The Crest of the Peacock – Non-European Roots of Mathematics by George G. Joseph.
I am interested in this book not only because replies to the White Inventor Argument, but because it would help me understand the way cultures communicate and share WITH EACH OTHER.
The purpose of this book is how scientific and mathematical knowledge was transmitted to different continents — mainly from the East to the West.
Descriptions of the book says it is not technical or only for mathematicians.
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I read Langston Hughes “The Ways of White folks this past spring. A compilation of short stories, some made me laugh and some made me angry. The title alone was food for thought. It was a good read.
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Nell Irving Painter creating black American is enjoyed and informative, I the combination of the art and history together.
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@ Legion, did you finish this confessions book?
What I know of sociopathy (both women and men) is limited to stuff I’ve read about it in criminology. There was:
Carol Smart’s book “Law, Crime and Sexuality”, and,
Sue Hobb’s “Female Crime, Control and Conformity” (excellent) that I recall.
The sections on rape and rapists, and battery and batterers, were rather enlightening. I also want to get a copy of Claire Cohen’s book on male rape when it comes out next year as well, because it’s supposed to take a different approach to the subject. Therefore, the association I have in my mind are of reckless, emotionally disturbed but nevertheless charming and “successful” criminals or near-criminals.
Therefore, I don’t go for this glib use of the word to describe someone who would otherwise be described as insensitive, detached or irresponsible.
I’ve seen the word used on occasion in comments on this blog, say in regard to white racists. But I wonder who is doing the diagnoses? Are they psychiatrists?What kind of people use mental illness as a slur?
I *questioned Abagond’s use of “sociopath” in the first of his posts about Breaking Bad”. That, alongside descriptions like “evil” and “monster” for the leading character, Walter White. But on second thoughts, Abagond was being precise as he was describing a killer, a poisoner of children, a drug dealer, and armed robber — but a seemingly normal man. A fictional character that we, the viewers, were allowed to get to know intimately.
But I had to ask how come sociopathy among Americans is actually on the rise in the US, and not uncommon. Why is that?
It can’t be down to genes or neuro-biology, really, can it?
Doesn’t that suggest that this is something bred into a society…
Why is the descriptor used so glibly, why are there so many of these “monsters” walking around!
And this brings us to the sway of books again, this time the influence and brain-sucking power of “The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders (DSM)”, published by the American Psychiatric Association.
The description of this book on the Amazon site is as follows:
“..an authoritative volume that defines and classifies mental disorders in order to improve diagnoses, treatment, and research. This manual, which creates a common language for clinicians involved in the diagnosis of mental disorders, includes concise and specific criteria intended to facilitate an objective assessment of symptom presentations in a variety of clinical settings..”
Sure, there is no evidence to back up the existence of these disorders, so far as I can tell, but don’t let that stand in the way! 😀
Go right ahead and label!
One of the reviews of the book says that: “The British Psychological Society have described this document as shrinking the pool of people who may be considered normal in society ‘to the size of a puddle’.”
Glorious. Anyone doing this diagnosing must be one of that lucky few.
(*The comment with my question, I also give a book suggestion at the end: https://abagond.wordpress.com/2013/09/11/breaking-bad/#comment-191862)
I still believe approaches taken by say, F. Scott Fitzgerald, or Thomas Hardy, or Shakespeare are more sensible, and far more revealing about human nature than psychiatric labels.
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Legion, more ramble about that book you mentioned ^^ … more generally, I wonder what label we should a-fix to people who do bad things, or whether we should label them at all. Winston Churchill sent a lot of people to their deaths because of his decision-making during crises, but he is considered good and heroic, for example, unlike say a “dictator”, as we know it.
There are people who don’t get caught but commit all manner of deeds that are not only reprehensible, but are highly rewarded, and they are shielded from punishment, like say, arms dealers, or some bankers, for example…
What are they? What are they called?
It also makes me sometimes wonder about those that make it their habit to “peg” others with arrogant certainty.
What criteria should they — and we — use?
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No, Legion, I don’t think I’m interested (in the book), and the whole notion of the label is risible. What use is it anyway? The culture that creates it and calls for it is far more intriguing!:-D
I realize you’re busy (same here), but have asked Abagond to forward my email info to you.
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For about a decade, James Baldwin spent a lot of his time in Turkey. This was where he was able to write, or finish the following:
“Another Country” (1962)
“The Fire Next Time” (1963)
“No Name in the Street” (1972). These are my favourite works from him.
It seems Turkey was the place he could relax, and be himself, more than say France, or an American city, like New York. Turkey is a place between worlds, and although the Turks may have seen him and referred to him as an “Arap”, he was perfectly comfortable. Perhaps that gave James that extra bit of clarity he needed?
James Baldwin’s Turkish Decade: Erotics of Exile by Magdalena J. Zaborowska
This books seems to also contain so great photos.
(http://www.amazon.co.uk/James-Baldwins-Turkish-Decade-Erotics/dp/0822341670/ref=sr_1_3?ie=UTF8&qid=1383566717&sr=8-3&keywords=james+baldwin+turkey)
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I’ve only just found out that Cuba probably exceeded all the other New World countries for sugar production at one time and it was the Chinese coolies that were used in the Cuba’s cane fields to augment the labour of enslaved Africans.
The were treated no better than the slaves. Their abuse was so severe, even China’s imperial government sent investigators to find out why so many Chinese indentured workers were committing suicide!
In later years, the descendants of this workforce would establish El Barrio Chino” consisting of 44 square blocks, and probably the largest Chinese community in the Caribbean/Latin America. That community has dwindled greatly.
What I am curious about is how central the Asian coolies (both Indians and Chinese) have been not only to Cuba’s history, but the history of the Americas. I hope “Chinese Cubans” by Kathleen Lopez comes out in paperback soon:
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Clearing the Plains by James Daschuk
I haven’t read it myself, though I may. It sounds like the sort of real history many people (many poc, i suppose) want to be taught in schools. I listened to a radio interview given by the author on a few topics in the book.
It sounds like an excellent account of Canadian govt. policy toward First Nations peoples going back to at least circa 1870. I say ‘excellent’ because the book seems to provide (I’m going off of the interview) relate policies and policy effects from back then as institutional underpinnings for anti first nation racism in Canada today and social conditions or perceptions apropos of the Native population, by others. That, makes it densely relevant. Relatedly, it also provides relevant answers to the sometimes smug, sometimes uncomprehending, present day white inheritors of institutional and cultural structures ready made to benefit the “right” people, who can and do at times ask: “Why can’t these people get it together? It’s been a 140 years!”
A policy of controlled malnutrition by the govt. toward the Natives is examined. Apparently the govt. had treaty obligations to provide food to natives in the event of famines. The Liberal opposition party of the day gave Sir John A. MacDonald a tough time about govt. spending on food for Natives. It seems the government responded in part by saying, “Hey! We’re spending as little money on food for them as we can. In fact, we’re very carefully keeping these people at a level of malnutrition that will keep them just barely alive because, who wants the scandal of masses of dead Indians? Near dead Indians is not so scandalous though, the press and the public will not make a big deal about that.”
The Indians were inconveniently living on real estate the government and associated business wanted, to build a coast to coast railway. Later, food was withheld from Natives unless they agreed to relocate to reservations in no-wheres-ville. Kind of a win-win for the govt. If the Indians stayed, they die and the govt. gets the land. If the natives take the govt. terms, the govt. still gets the land and maybe the Natives will die in some other way. Nice work if you can get it, if you’re into that sort of thing.
Canadian Confederation takes place in 1867, and so, this book goes right to the beginnings of the brutal business of building the modern nation of Canada. A nation building process subsidized, in part, by the ethnic cleansing of Natives.
There is a formal definition for ethnic cleansing, that is important to review. It sounded, from the interview, that the author made sure to check his definitions, conventions, and so on, in order to make the appropriate claims, charges and proper context (or a proper context, as there could be other frameworks to present, I suppose) for this historical (and present day?) investigation.
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Kanye West said
Slaves to Fashion: Black Dandyism and the Styling of Black Diasporic Identity
By: Monica L. Miller
The book “…examines the pivotal role that style has played in the politics and aesthetics of African diasporic identity formation. The figure of the black dandy first emerged in eighteenth-century England as an attempt to control the representation of Africans by imposing upon domestic slaves luxurious uniforms intended to flaunt their masters’ wealth. These uniforms were soon manipulated by those who wore them, initiating a struggle between master and slave in which style emerged as a primary means of self-expression for blacks…
…Tracing the history of the black dandy forward to contemporary celebrity incarnations such as Andre 3000 and Sean Combs, {the book} explains how black people became arbiters of style and how they have historically used the dandy’s signature tools – clothing, gesture, and wit – to break down limiting identity markers and propose new, fluid ways of fashioning political and social possibility…
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