White Fragility: Why It's So Hard for White People to Talk about Racism

Back when I was a college professor of English, we were undertaking curriculum review, seeking to revise our course offerings in order to affirm more “multicultural” and “ethnic” literature.  Some of us revised our syllabi to include more non-white writers and voices.  I think our efforts were noteworthy, but there is little doubt the Western, European, white literary tradition remained fully intact and fully dominant in our curriculum. Perhaps, this cannot entirely be avoided in an “English” department, which focuses on reading/writing the English language and literature written in English, not to mention the dearth of non-white writers and voices in English given their history of oppression in a white-dominant culture.

At best the changes we made led to more conversations among faculty and students regarding race relations, colonization, white supremacy, and systemic, historically-based racism reflected in our English language and literature.  At worst these changes merely cosmeticized and therefore reinforced what remained an essentially white supremacist curriculum.

I remember an occasion when I was discussing our Ethnic Literature course with an indigenous faculty member. He pointed out to me that the effect of relegating non-white literature to a separate, “ethnic” category implied that white literature did not have ethnicity, that white literature was the norm, whereas non-white literature was some kind of aberration. That was a moment of revelation I have never forgotten. 

Of course, I had routinely checked the box for white or Caucasian when asked for my race on an informational form, but somehow it had not quite sunk in that my whiteness is just as much a race or ethnicity as all the other categories.  Furthermore, multiculturalism includes whiteness as a separate culture distinct from non-white cultures.  I was more likely to think of white culture regionally—Southern, Southwestern, Irish, German, etc.

Such is the power of white supremacy.  As whites we are socially conditioned to think of ourselves as the norm, and the entitled norm at that, and to think of non-whites as deviations from that norm.  In other words, whites are more color-blind when it comes to themselves than when it comes to non-whites.

This book by Robin DiAngelo (2018) not only analyzes white supremacy as a system of both conscious and unconscious patterns of racism, it also documents and demonstrates in example after example how white people resist acknowledging their participation in this system, much less accepting it and taking responsibility for changing both themselves and the larger system.

Until white people, including, and perhaps especially, white liberals, move beyond this resistance and open themselves to learning how to be authentic allies of those fighting for their liberation from oppression, we will continue to be part of the problem, benefiting from and reinforcing the system of oppression, instead of part of the solution.  Good intentions won’t cut it.  Genuine humility, consciousness-raising, and transformation are called for.

This book can be the beginning of a long journey during which white people learn how they can contribute to the work of dismantling white supremacy and achieving racial equity.

Leave No Trace

The motto of the Boundary Waters Canoe Area (BWCA) is “Leave no trace.”  A permit is required to camp and canoe there and guidelines are provided for minimizing the human impact on this wilderness area in northern Minnesota close to the Canadian border.  Outdoor enthusiasts, as well as environmentalists, are fiercely protective of this natural preserve, “the largest remaining area of uncut forest in the eastern portion of the United States” (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Boundary_Waters_Canoe_Area_Wilderness).

Most recently “Renewed proposals for copper and nickel mining in northern Minnesota has…been a source of tension. Mines would be situated south and west of the BWCAW upstream of the wilderness and within its watershed, leading to concerns among conservation groups that surface runoff could cause damage to the area. In December 2016 the federal government proposed banning mining for 20 years while the subject was studied. The new administration cancelled the study in September 2018, clearing the way for mining leases in the national forest.^”   

Mindy Mejia’s recent novel, Leave No Trace, does not directly address the land use disputes of the BWCA, but it does make an understated plea for the preservation of wilderness areas.  The wilderness theme has a long history in American literature, dating back to William Bradford’s Of Plimoth Plantation: “What could they see but a hideous and desolate wilderness, full of wild beasts and wild men?” These early colonial narratives morphed into the nineteenth century frontier novels by James Fenimore Cooper and Catharine Maria Sedgwick, who borrowed from earlier American “captivity narratives” (https://yourbrainonbooks.blogspot.com/2010/02/narrative-of-captivity-and-restoration.html). 

Not only does Mejia’s novel harken back to the wilderness theme, with its contrast between nature and civilization, but also to the captivity narrative, in which European settlers recount their experiences being captured by Indians. In Leave No Trace, however, civilization is the enemy, nature is the source of restoration, and the systems of law enforcement and mental health treatment are the captors, who prevent the narrator, Maya Stark, Assistant Speech Therapist at the Congdon mental health facility in Duluth, MN (those in the know will find the name of this facility hilarious), and her patient, Lucas, from tracking down Lucas’ father, Josiah, who has disappeared deep in the BWCA. 

Which brings us to the theme of disappearance, not by captivity, but by choice.  Josiah and Lucas Blackthorn had escaped into the BWCA wilderness ten years earlier, after Josiah had been arrested for obstruction of justice in Ely, MN, a gateway to the BWCA. Mejia underscores this theme by drawing parallels among the fictional Josiah and historical instances of voluntary disappearance, such as that of Agafia Lykov ( https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Agafia_Lykova) and Ho Van Thanh (https://www.npr.org/sections/thetwo-way/2013/08/09/210477419/father-and-son-coaxed-from-jungle-40-years-after-vietnam-war).  In addition, Maya’s father, operator of a salvage tugboat on Lake Superior, has received a grant to search for the lost “ghost ship,” the SS Bannockburn, a Canadian freighter, that (involuntarily) disappeared on Lake Superior in 1902 (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/SS_Bannockburn).  In another parallel, one of the orderlies at Congdon refers to Lucas as “Tarzan.”

Other forms of “disappearance” occur in the novel.  Lucas’ mother had disappeared from his life when she died suddenly of an aneurysm; Maya’s mother had abandoned her and her father when Maya was a child.  These parallels, as well as a budding romantic attraction, bond Lucas and Maya, as together they scheme to escape the mental facility to go in search of Josiah.

 

Having lived in the BWCA with his father for ten years, Lucas, now nineteen-years-old, had suddenly reappeared, caught breaking and entering into a camping outfitter store in Ely. Violent and uncommunicative he is committed to Congdon. Though he is violent toward her at first, Lucas eventually connects with Maya and she with him.  Maya learns that Josiah is sick; Lucas had left to get help but is arrested and confined at Congdon before he could get back to his father.  Finding Josiah and getting him help is Lucas’ mission; with Maya’s help he is able to succeed, though, in the end, Josiah finds another way to disappear.

Maya’s journey into Lucas’ past takes her on a journey into her own past.  It turns out they share, not only the loss of their mothers, a history of law-breaking, and of mental health treatment, but also a history that neither of them knows about. 

The tangle of coincidences in their pasts is barely believable, but despite an unlikely plot, the themes of disappearance, of being lost and found (or in the case of the Bannockburn, not found), of captivity and restoration, of recovery and redemption resonate powerfully. 

And the BWCA wilderness is not the only one in the novel where people can disappear; there is the wilderness of personal history, of social alienation, of mental instability, in which one can get lost, but from which one can also find truth, human connection, and mental health. 

Maya’s mother had been a geologist, and the rocks of the BWCA become part of the setting and the story. Agates, a type of volcanic rock, become a dominant symbol in the novel.  Maya’s mother had taught her: “The Earth took violence and decay and made agates…Agates can only form when something in you is destroyed, when the hollows of grief or depression can never find the light, and the sediment that accumulates inside them is dense. Their power changes you.”

However “hideous and desolate,” however “full of wild beasts and wild men,” however violent, however capable of destruction, the wilderness has the power to create beauty, strength, and preservation.  As Henry David Thoreau wrote, “In Wildness is the preservation of the World…From the forest and wilderness come the tonics and barks which brace mankind.” And such is the underlying message of Leave No Trace.  There is healing value in exploring both the wilderness without and the wilderness within.

And such is the value of preserving the wildness of the BWCA and other wilderness areas.

In the end Maya and Lucas seem to make peace with civilization and find some semblance of balance between it and the wilderness.  The fate of our planet may depend on the ability of all of us to find such balance.

   

Mislaid

A friend recommended this book because it takes place in my home state of Virginia, but, as I’ve discovered previously, just because I’m familiar with the setting doesn’t necessarily make it a great read. (See https://yourbrainonbooks.blogspot.com/2016/09/commonwealth.html)

Published in 2015, Mislaid by Nell Zink, who grew up in rural Virginia, may be one of the most bizarre novels I’ve ever read. The plot itself is bizarre enough, as a lesbian student at a women’s college marries the resident gay male poet and bears two children by him.  She finally leaves him, taking their daughter with her, and hides out in rural Virginia changing their names and passing themselves off as black, not for the same reason as Rachel Dolezal (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Rachel_Dolezal), but because she doesn’t want her husband to find her.  This unfolds in just the first three chapters, and so it continues with one bizarre episode after another.

Set during the 1960’s, serious issues, such as gender, sexuality, race, class, power and privilege, are addressed, but they are somewhat overshadowed by the bizarre plot and outlandish humor.  There are laugh-out-loud lines on almost every page, which makes for great entertainment but distracts from the social commentary. 

Here’s a small sample of some of those LOL lines:

“Around age fourteen, it got more complicated. She informed her best friend, Debbie, that she intended to join the army out of high school. She knew Debbie from Girl Scout camp. Debbie was from Richmond, a large and diverse city. ‘You’re a thespian,’ Peggy heard her say. ‘Get away from me.’ Debbie picked up her blanket and moved to the other side of the room…Betrayal. Debbie never spoke to her again. Peggy told her mother.

            ‘A thespian,” her mother said, bemused. ‘Well, darling, everybody gets crushes.’ Her mother was from the generation that thought a girl’s first love is always a tomboyish older girl…Her mother suspected her of having a girlfriend, already and sent off for brochures to Radcliffe. She didn’t believe in coeducation, but her daughter’s plight called for desperate measures.”

“To look at him, Temple was about as black as a person could get, as though the school were hoping to pack as much blackness as possible into each ‘token black’ seat in each of his successive integrated classrooms.  Initially he was chosen his mannerly comportment and tidy clothes and resented only for making it impossible for his classmates to win at Eraser Walk.  The eraser nestled in his hair like an egg in a nest.  He could have hopped to the blackboard on one foot.  The class voted never to play Eraser Walk again. One by one, his superior achievements were acknowledged with surrender. He called it, raising the white flag’.”

“The ghost-like, flaxen-haired black child was almost a matter of civic pride. They hoped she would stay in the county and marry a light-skinned, blue-eyed man to found one of those conversation-piece dynasties.”

“He was the democratically elected head prosecutor of the city of Charlottesville.  Since victims outnumber criminals, he favored victims. He knew there is no such thing as a victimless crime. Whatever casual drug users might say. A person whose harmless actions are criminalized becomes a victim of the law. That paradox helped him out every day by showing him the unreality of his job.”

“Still, she insisted on living with Temple, explaining to Lee that with him around she could always be assured of finding leftover pizza in the refrigerator. She would never have to cook. Lee admitted it was a strong argument.”

Humor can sometimes mask offensive stereotypes, and such is the case with this novel, despite its ostensibly liberal treatment of social issues.  I grew up in Virginia during the 1960’s and never experienced anything approximating the world of this novel, though the depiction of class rang true.  So, read it if you will, but don’t take it as a realistic representation of Virginia or the South in general.

The Golden Crucifix: A Matthew Cordwainer Medieval Mystery

I can’t compete with my writer friends’ achievements, but I can support them by reading and promoting their books. 

This 2018 medieval mystery was written by my graduate school classmate at the University of Denver Joyce Tally Lionarons. Retired as a medieval professor and scholar at Ursinus College in Pennsylvania, she now applies her talents to the detective genre.  It’s clear from reading this book that she has not only done extensive research in medieval literature and language, but has also done her homework when it comes to the geography; the social, political, religious, and law enforcement structure; even the medical practices of thirteenth century York, where The Golden Crucifix is set.  In addition, she brings to life a tangible sense of the street life at the time; the reader is immersed in the sights, smells, sounds, and the very tastes of the time and place.

Most literary scholars date the origin of the detective genre to Edgar Allan Poe’s “Murders in the Rue Morgue” (1841), but, of course, some find earlier examples of stories with similar characteristics. (See https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Detective_fiction)

The eighteenth century is sometimes referred to as the Enlightenment period in Western history because of the rise of science and rationality as sources of knowledge, as opposed to folk traditions, superstition, religion, and anecdotal evidence.  However, in the second half of that century the Gothic genre of literature, or tale of terror, rose in popularity.  Poe, of course, is probably best known for his horror stories. 

So, why the post-Enlightenment popularity of both Gothic and detective fiction?  One theory is that it relates to the debate over human nature.  Are we rational creatures for the most part, in a world subject to natural law, able to exercise reasonable control over ourselves and our environment, as Enlightenment thinkers would have it, or are we largely irrational creatures in a world governed by mysterious, supernatural forces beyond our control?

The Gothic plot usually begins with a protagonist in ordinary reality who encounters some kind of irrational phenomenon or experience that results in either death or madness or escape.  Even if the protagonist escapes the irrational forces, however, they are not defeated and are just lying in wait for their next victim.

Keep in mind that the irrational forces can also be within the psyche of the protagonist him or herself, whether in the form of madness, uncontrollable impulses, or deliberate malice. This genre could be said to provide an outlet for our human fears of the unknown (including ourselves) or a reinforcement of those fears, or both.  Thus the term “tale of terror”.

The detective story plot also usually begins with some kind of rational order that is disrupted by a crime, usually a murder, often violent.  In this case, however, the detective comes to the rescue by applying close observation, physical evidence, witness testimony, logical analysis, and other investigative (similar to scientific) techniques of arriving at truth, solving the mystery, and restoring order.  In this genre rationality triumphs, thus reassuring its readers that our rational nature can overcome the irrational forces in the world.

In the medieval world the rational and the irrational were understood in terms of a supernatural conflict between God’s ideal of a virtuous and orderly world, on the one hand, and Satan’s mission to destroy that world.  Disorder and death come about because of evil represented by Satan and because of human sin. Redemption and salvation from evil come from adherence to the teachings of the Bible, the Church, and religious authorities, not from secular rationality.

The Golden Crucifix takes place in a world of filth in York, where the river Ouse is “a damp reek made up of decaying fish and the accumulated waste of the city.”  The opening scenes introduce us to a world of lust and greed, in which traffickers in stolen goods are juxtaposed in the next scene with the wealth of the Church on display in a Twelfth Night procession. The treasures of the secular, in this case, criminal wealthy and those of the Church are surrounded by the filth of the streets, where prostitutes, pick-pockets, panhandlers and scrabbling poor freely range in a daily struggle for survival.

Such is the ordinary reality of that world, but there is some semblance of law enforcement, and when a prostitute is found murdered and the Golden Crucifix, a valuable article in the Church treasury goes missing, the local Coroner Matthew Cordwainer takes responsibility for solving both crimes along with other local authorities.  Cordwainer is sixtyish, troubled by an arthritic hip, aided by a walking stick, and helped both at home and through the streets by a young manservant.  He shows respect to both secular and religious leaders and gives lip service, at least, to religious observances.  However, despite their sinful ways, he values the humanity of the prostitutes and is determined to bring the murderer to justice. 

Later another prostitute, and then a local “madam” are found murdered. The Prioress of the nunnery is stalked and attacked, though she survives.  Cordwainer navigates the world of the victims, the streets, the criminal traffickers, law enforcement, and the Church as he unravels the knots that tie the thefts, the murders, and the attack on the Prioress all together.  He relies not only on observations, interrogations, and rational analysis, as in the typical detective story, but also on his knowledge and experience as long-time resident and Coroner in the city. As one comes to expect in detective stories, there are multiple suspects with means, motive and opportunity and it is Cordwainer’s dogged, persistent, methodical investigation that eventually untangles the knots and restores order, such as it is.

Full justice is another story as the Church has one jurisdiction, secular authorities another, and the methods of both interrogation and punishment in secular law enforcement fall far short of humane treatment.   

The medieval mystery plays focused on Biblical stories and religious miracles, the mysteries of God’s world.  While this supernatural world view provides the backdrop to The Golden Crucifix, the novel unfolds in an all too natural and mortal world, leaving us, as in the conventional detective story, with a reassuring sense of rationality overcoming crime. It also suggests, however, that in a world of human weakness, hostility, aggression, and lust for both power and pleasure, social disorder will endure. Thus, we are additionally left, as in the Gothic tale of terror, with a sense that malignant forces still lie in wait, though they may be more human than supernatural.  

That is not to say there are no model citizens, and Cordwainer is one, but he seems to forever be hobbling through town with his bad hip trying to stay upright as he traverses the mud, the ice, animal droppings, and human filth that fill the streets.     

Joyce Lionarons has published two additional Matthew Cordwainer medieval mysteries:  Blood Libel and The White Rose.  Enjoy!

Evangelicalism and the Decline of American Politics

This 2017 study by Jan G. Linn offers a history of evangelicalism in American politics since Jerry Falwell founded the Moral Majority in 1979 and a theory of why the influence of evangelicalism has been so destructive to our political process. 

It could be fairly stated that Jerry Falwell is the man who put Lynchburg, Virginia, where Jan and I were both born, on the national map.  Jan grew up in Falwell’s neighborhood.  At one point I lived in the same neighborhood as Falwell’s Thomas Road Baptist Church.  So, as Jan says in the prologue to his book, “This is Personal.”

Jan Linn graduated from E. C. Glass High School in Lynchburg in 1963, the year before I did.  I knew who he was because he was a well-known football player for the E. C. Glass Hilltoppers (Lynchburg is known as the “City of Seven Hills” or the “Hill City”).  I did not know him personally, but in my junior year I sat diagonally behind him in Mr. Racer’s Economics class.  Mr. Racer was a Republican who often railed against President John F. Kennedy in class.  Jan would raise his hand and argue with Mr. Racer. I can’t remember now the substance of those arguments, but I was struck that he would speak up and challenge the teacher.  Though I never personally said anything, as the daughter of a staunch Democratic father, I secretly admired and sympathized with Jan, even though I didn’t necessarily understand the issues being debated. 

As Jan recounts in the book, he was raised as an evangelical himself, and he went on to become a Disciples of Christ minister.  I also was raised as an evangelical (though I went to a different church) and went on to become a college English professor and a Unitarian Universalist.  Somehow Jan and I both ended up in Minnesota.  He founded a ministry near the Twin Cities and I taught at St. Cloud State University (about an hour or so away from Minneapolis) for almost 30 years.  It wasn’t until we were both retired that a fellow E. C. Glass classmate put us in touch with each other.  Since then we’ve met a couple of times with our spouses and enjoyed some good conversations about growing up in Lynchburg, religion, politics, and, of course, Jerry Falwell.

This is the second of his books I’ve read.  It is well-researched and documented, well-argued, and well-written with clarity, sharp intellect, and passion.  See his publication record here: https://www.thriftbooks.com/a/jan-g-linn/583872/ Jan also regularly comments on religion and politics in his blog: https://linnposts.com/

Evangelicalism and the Decline of American Politics, not only provides a history of the evangelical movement that Jerry Falwell started, but also an overview of different definitions of evangelicalism, an analysis of our current political dysfunction, and a theory of how evangelicalism, or what Jan calls “partisan evangelicalism,” has contributed to that dysfunction. 

In short, conservative evangelicals hold fast to a rigid Bible-based, authoritarian world-view, based on divine command, which cannot be questioned or compromised without falling into iniquity.  The Bible is their supreme source of knowledge; any other source of knowledge, such as science or rational thought, is flawed by human imperfection.  Whenever any other source of knowledge, no matter how fact-based, empirically supported, or logical, contradicts the Bible, it is dismissed as misguided.  There simply is no room for compromise or critical thinking.  Bible-based beliefs are absolute.  When this kind of absolutism finds its way into politics, then all hope of conclusions and solutions democratically arrived at by a diverse populace of different religions, philosophies, and world-views is completely lost.  For partisan, conservative evangelicals, a deal with a non-evangelical is a deal with the devil.  Thus, we have obstructionism, stalemate, and a break-down of democratic civic processes of decision-making and problem-solving. 

Ironically, this kind of narrow, rigid evangelicalism is not shared by the majority of Americans.  There are liberal Christian evangelicals such as the followers of Jim Wallis of Sojourners magazine, non-evangelical Christians, believers in other religions, believers in no religion, all of whom are American citizens with voting rights.  However, the conservative evangelicals, who don’t necessarily believe in separation of church and state and who place the Bible above the Constitution, have strategically taken over some of our political institutions, both locally, statewide, and nationally.  The Republican party can hardly make a move without approval from its evangelical base. 

Jan calls for a return of evangelicalism to the tradition of Christian scholarship, the message of the Bible (as opposed to literal absolutism), the Christian contemplative tradition, spiritual humility, and the words of Jesus Christ to love our neighbors and even our enemies.

As one sees today the twisted ways in which evangelical voters defend the likes of Donald Trump, there seems little room for hope that such a return can happen.  Perhaps the evangelical mind-set will have to be out-numbered and out-voted by the reasonable Moderate Majority as opposed to the absolutist Moral Majority.

Meanwhile, it is gratifying to know that Lynchburg, Virginia, produced an intelligent, sensible, humane Christian, who believes in the Constitution and separation of church and state as well as the Bible and the Christian message.