Posted on 12/17/2006 9:02:23 AM PST by shrinkermd
The possible presidential candidacy of the biracial senator has sparked an illuminating debate on race.
WE KNOW this: Barack Obama is a rising star. He's a powerful speaker and a gifted writer. He is the only African American serving in the U.S. Senate. But is he black?
That's what New York Daily News columnist Stanley Crouch asked last month, and his answer was decidedly "no." No, Crouch wasn't just employing the old "blacker than thou" canard. Nor was he concerned with the fact that Obama was raised by his white mother. Rather, he was treating blackness not just as a racial (shared biology) identity but as an ethnic (shared historical experience) one. And isn't that what the switch of terms from "black" to "African American" was all about?
Think back to the late 1980s, when the Rev. Jesse Jackson became the most prominent black to call for the adoption of the term African American. "Just as we were called colored, but were not that," he said, "and then Negro, but not that, to be called black is just as baseless…. Every ethnic group in this country has a reference to some land base, some historical cultural base. African Americans have hit that level of maturity." The problem, of course, is that most black Americans are descendants of slaves who had their African cultural heritage brutally stripped from them.
What Crouch is arguing is that what the majority of black Americans share is their ancestors' experience as human chattel, brought to these shores in the grips of chains. Slavery and segregation not only forged a rigid racial line between black and white but created a shared ethnic experience. For Crouch, the fact that Obama's father — whom Obama met only once — was a black Kenyan...
(Excerpt) Read more at latimes.com ...
This is a great article with great points. Among them:
"...The difference between now and then, of course, is the element of choice. Barack Obama does not remind Americans of the racial divide or of the chains that first created it. Instead, he points to an alternative history that Americans have never been able to achieve. "Symbolically, Obama's parentage is the founding couple that America never accepted," said Werner Sollors, who teaches African American literature at Harvard.
"Crouch is right: Obama does not remind us of this nation's original sin. But he does remind us of an opportunity that we as a nation are continually missing.
Last paragraph may be over the top depending on one's perspective; however, it is reached by reason not emotion. But living White Americans are not responsible for what others did 150 plus years ago; again, guilting White people has not and will not solve the problem. It even isn't race that makes for the Black underclass, it is the same values and behaviors that makes the White underclass of the UK its mirror image.
Are either of his parents from Africa?
If not, then he is an American.
That was easy.
if a white man born in South Africa becomes a U.S. citizen,does that make him an African-American?
for affimative action purposes?
Ask Teresa Kerry. She called herself African American during the 2004 campaign because of where she's originally from.
'.....if a white man born in South Africa becomes a U.S. citizen,does that make him an African-American?....",p>
He'd be a white Afican-American; unlike the black guy. i'm so confused.
He's a "Big-Eared American"
Probably not since according to the Socialist left, a white person born in this country is not considered to be a Native American. It's a DemocRAT labeling thing.
what do pelosi, kennedy, obama, clinton a, clinton b, gore etc. have in common?
there all the same skin color: radical left wing socialist liberals.
From Wikipedia: "Barack Obama was born in Honolulu, Hawaii, to Barack Hussein Obama Sr. of Nyangoma-Kogelo, Siaya District, Kenya, and Ann Dunham of Wichita, Kansas."
Yes, the "Big Ears" resulted in Maureen Dowd being chastised by Barack. Apparently, she caved or Pinch had her cave since not one peep since. She is quite capable of sliming any Republican including POTUS but she can't even comment on a RAT with big ears.
Another annoying politics-to-fashion speak analogy. Curtains, makeover, etc - blech!
Last line..... "Obama's father — whom Obama met only once — was a black Kenyan..."
As I mentioned before I have thought about this topic off and on for some time the following definitions have seemed to arise from the way the terms are used...
Negro - a race. A person like Obama with parents of different races is biracial. He/she is a Negro based on his/her genes.
African-American - A person whose social and cultural values and beliefs are based on the unique (but apparently still developing) amalgam of post-slavery African culture and values and the non-African American culture. Defined by how they live (diet, religion, dress, etc.). He/she is an African-American based on how they live.
Black - A political movement/vision started in the 1960's as a way of focusing voting power in order to achieve political/economic gain. Black-Power was a revolutionary concept that forced the American political leaders to address the needs of both Negroes and African-Americans. It appears to have devolved into a political spoils system with racist over tones similar, ironically, to the segregation system in the Southern states that it helped to end.
A better question...is Obama the new Muslim?
Obama spent "two years in a Muslim school, then two more in a Catholic school" in Jakarta. At age 10 he was sent back to Hawaii to live with his maternal grandparents so that he could attend the highly-regarded non-sectarian private Punahou School; he entered Punahou in fifth grade and went through high school, graduating in 1979.
The guy can't even say "Axt'd", so how he be black?
Simply having dark skin or African racial characteristics does not make one an African-American IMHO.
lol
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