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November 11, 2018 at 6:04 pm #2407BIANCA PEREZParticipant
The picture I’ve attached below is a thread tweeted by Donald Trump shortly after Hurricane Maria devastated Puerto Rico. The tweet demonstrates the callous and indifference that welcomed the suffering of Boricuas in the aftermath of Hurricane Maria. Trump’s complaint that “they” are not doing anything for themselves just perpetuates the characterization of Boricua folk as non-American and “other”. Like Trump, many Americans have a difficult time understanding that Puerto Ricans are also American (for better or worse). His call for “community efforts” is also appalling, because of course neighbors have been helping neighbors, and of course local businesses and organizations have been helping the community with relief efforts, but this rhetoric puts the onus on the individual victims instead of shining light on the systemic problems that have landed us at this spot.
Source: @realDonaldTrump on Twitter 9/30/17
…Such poor leadership ability by the Mayor of San Juan, and others in Puerto Rico, who are not able to get their workers to help. They….
— Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) September 30, 2017
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November 4, 2018 at 6:25 pm #2248BIANCA PEREZParticipant
This week, we spoke at length about segregation in schools and the harmful way it impacts black and brown students. This reminded of the research done on the psychological impact of school segregation during the Brown v. Board of Education era. I have attached a photo of a young boy taking the “doll test”. This experiment was conducted by Dr. Kenneth Clark, also pictured in the photo. Dr. Clark essentially had young black children ascribe characteristics to white and black plastic dolls, and ultimately choose which one they preferred. The children described the white dolls more positively and a majority of them preferred the white doll to the black. Dr. Clark’s research bolstered the fact that segregation bred “self-hatred” and “inferiority” in black children. The psychological damage caused by segregation should be integral to the discourse on the impacts of these structures, alongside the impacts on physical health, SES, and so on.
Source: Taken by Gordon Parks in 1947
Library of Congress Brown v. Board Exhibition
https://www.loc.gov/exhibits/brown/brown-brown.html
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November 4, 2018 at 5:49 pm #2238BIANCA PEREZParticipant
WARNING: Racist anti-Japanese caricature of a man
For this week’s discussion of Japanese concentration camps, I wanted to post something that communicates the highly racialized climate that characterized Japanese incarceration. After hearing Judge Posner speak about national security on the podcast, I was affronted by the neutrality with which he attempted to approach Japanese incarceration. The way that he depicted the situation was irresponsible and, honestly, gross. He spoke of the necessary abandonment of “niceties” in wartime as if Japanese incarceration was simply “mean” (literally wtf). To not speak of the ways in which race and racism were central to demonizing Japanese Americans is to misrepresent the situation entirely. To this point, I wanted to highlight the racist tropes and caricatures that were used by the American government and public to vilify Japanese Americans and justify their incarceration. The U.S. government espoused tons of propoganda art that utilized racist caricatures of Japanese folk in hopes to mobilize the American public and American soldiers to rally around fighting and hating “the enemy”. I attached a poster of a swimming pool advertisement that was meant motivate Americans to exercise in order to better “fight” the Japanese, represented here by an overtly racist drawing. Images such as these worked to dehumanize and other-ize Japanese Americans, so that their incarceration was not seen for the evil that it was.
Source: Library of Congress via Getty Images
From Huffington Post article, “These Anti-Japanese Signs From World War II Are A Warning Against Bigotry Today” by Kimberly Yam dated 12/7/17.
https://www.huffingtonpost.com/entry/pearl-harbor-japanese-americans_us_5a283fb8e4b02d3bfc37b9f6
- This reply was modified 5 years, 4 months ago by BIANCA PEREZ.
- This reply was modified 5 years, 4 months ago by BIANCA PEREZ.
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October 28, 2018 at 9:45 pm #2099BIANCA PEREZParticipant
This week’s discussion of reparations reminded me of the Black Panther Party’s Platform, a document that I read a few years back. In the document, the Black Panthers demand the 40 acres and mule that was promised to each newly freed black person post-Civil War. I’ve attached an image of a man in a field, accompanied by two mules, with a headline that reads “40 acres + Mule”. Apparently, the phrase “40 acres and a mule” comes from Union General William T Sherman’s Special Field Order No.15, issued on January 16, 1865. This was essentially a form of reparations for the people that were enslaved and forced to work on land they did not own for no wage. Of course, the promise was never fulfilled, and the land in the South that would have been redistributed to the black folks was returned to the pre-war white owners. So, the discussion of reparations has been on the table since the conclusion of the Civil War and was seriously considered by the same generation that literally enslaved other humans. It has been 150 years since the promise was first made, and, sadly, the idea of reparations still seems so radical to many of us.
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October 28, 2018 at 8:49 pm #2089BIANCA PEREZParticipant
This week, James Baldwin’s letter to his nephew, My Dungeon Shook, reminded me of a video that I saw on the internet a while back. The video is about black parents giving their children “the talk” about what being black in America entails. Throughout the video, different parents tell their children what it means to be black: that they must take their ID with them in case a cop decides to stop them on the street; that they need to be careful during a traffic stop if they want to come out of it alive; that black is beautiful; that black is smart; that black is talented; no matter what anyone says. The parents are trying to imbue upon their children that blackness is something to be celebrated, while also alerting them to the violent realities that they will face because they are black. I have attached a screenshot from the video; in it, the parent and child are discussing the possibility of the child being pulled over. The child tells the parent not to worry because they are a good driver–they do not realize that their parent is trying to discuss the criminalization and brutalization of black bodies by the police force. This parallels well with James Baldwin’s letter to his nephew, as he too was trying to warn this young black child of the racial violence he will encounter in the U.S. It is depressing that “the talk” is as necessary now as it was when Baldwin was speaking to his nephew.
Source: “The Talk – My Black is Beautiful x P&G” by youtube account My Black is Beautiful
Published April 17, 2018
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October 21, 2018 at 6:57 pm #1907BIANCA PEREZParticipant
For this week’s topic of segregation, I’ve attached an image of UC Berkeley students protesting the apartheid regime in South Africa. These students, as well as students from other schools across the nation, were demanding their universities to divest from South Africa. The article from which I pulled the image notes that “the UC regents invested more in South Africa than any other university,” in the amount of about 6.4 billion dollars. University students, outraged at the state perpetrated segregation of Black and White South Africans, demonstrated for weeks on end. They occupied spaces on the Berkeley campus, boycotted class, and eventually got UC Regents to divest from South Africa, which was not an insignificant factor in the ending of apartheid in South Africa. The conditions to which Black South Africans were relegated to were heinous and in very obvious ways paralleled Jim Crow era segregation in the United States. The case of U.S. university students mobilizing against South African Apartheid reminds me of the student activism that we saw in the Civil Rights Movement, with organizations such as SNCC, who orchestrated and executed many demonstrations against Jim Crow policies.
Source: https://www.universityofcalifornia.edu/news/how-students-helped-end-apartheid
Article by: One Bold Idea, May 2, 2018
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October 20, 2018 at 3:45 pm #1801BIANCA PEREZParticipant
The image I’ve attached below is an illustration done by the Washington Post. It depicts Dr. King and others marching, while holding signs that say phrases such as “Black Lives Matter” and “We Can’t Breathe”. This image is essentially meant to showcase that Dr. King would stand in solidarity with the Black Lives Matter movement if he were alive today. I see this illustration as a rebuttal to the criticism that the BLM movement has received as “violent” and “inappropriate”. As we discussed in class, many that purport to respect Dr. King ask modern day activists, “Why can’t you protest like MLK did?” What they do not realize is that they are protesting like MLK did. This misconception comes from an intentional watering down of Dr. King’s radicality. Many of us have a distorted view of how MLK was received during his time. This week we learned that MLK had a disapproval rating of 75% prior to his assassination. Those people who are antagonistic towards BLM activists and insist that BLM take up the tactics of Dr. King do not realize that Dr. King faced many antagonizers just like them.
Source: https://www.washingtonpost.com/posteverything/wp/2015/10/01/dont-criticize-black-lives-matter-for-provoking-violence-the-civil-rights-movement-did-too/?noredirect=on&utm_term=.cb35f5ce14c3
Article by Simone Sebastian, October 1, 2015.
(Washington Post photo illustration / UPI Photo)
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October 13, 2018 at 5:17 pm #1615BIANCA PEREZParticipant
The image attached below is a picture of a sign that was posted in an early voting precinct in Bismarck, North Dakota. The sign alludes to the fact that North Dakotans will soon be required to have a North Dakota I.D. that has a street address in order to vote in the general election and all elections moving forward (these I.D.s were not required in this election, the primary). This announcement comes from the Supreme Court’s recent decision to uphold North Dakota’s voter I.D. law. This decision is going to disproportionately affect indigenous communities. Formerly, indigenous residents were able to use forms of “tribal identification”, which do not list addresses. Furthermore, indigenous folk disproportionately make up the homeless population, and often use P.O. Boxes as a mailing address–however, in accordance with North Dakota’s law, P.O. Boxes will not be accepted as a legitimate form of address. This final decision comes to indigenous communities only a few weeks before Election Day. The law, no matter its intention, will keep many indigenous residents from casting ballots. This is particularly relevant to our week’s discussion because the right to vote is recognized as one of the foremost in civil rights, and is topical as elections are right around the corner. This image is one representation of the “rollback” of rights we’ve experienced since the passage of 60s era policy, with regressive decisions such as Shelby v. Holder (2013) and the introduction of voter I.D. laws. This can also be put in conversation with Alexander’s discussion of mass incarceration as, among other things, a tool for Black disenfranchisement. Just as felony disenfranchisement laws affect overrepresented populations in prisons (read: Black and Brown folk), North Dakota’s voter I.D. law affects those who are overrepresented in the homeless population and those who do not subscribe to our preoccupation with personal, private property (read: indigenous folk).
Reference: Article by Camila Domonoske at NPR
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October 13, 2018 at 3:36 pm #1595BIANCA PEREZParticipant
The image I’ve attached is John Gast’s infamous 1872 painting entitled American Progress. The painting, set in what is now the United States, depicts an angelic white woman leading White settler colonizers “westward” across the landscape, chasing indigenous folk away, presumably eventually out of frame. The White folk bring with them electrical poles, steam locomotives, wagons, and their “modern” style of dress. The painting clearly harkens on the notion of manifest destiny and acts as 19th century propaganda for European westward expansion. Put into context of our studies, Gast’s piece relates to both Wolfe’s and Lipsitz’ discussions of the differing ways in which people think about space. In the painting, White people bring “good” things: they bring light, innovation, modernity, and, in effect, virtue. The fact that White people are able to introduce virtue into this space rests on the premise that the land was devoid of “good” before. The indigenous folk were not doing what they should have been doing with the land–they were being unproductive. This parallels both Wolfe’s discussion of non-indigenous versus indigenous imaginings of space and Lipsitz’ discussion of White versus Black American imaginings of space. In all three contexts, White folk decide that because non-White folk are occupying space in a way that does not fit their understanding of “productive”, they are definitively doing something wrong (something that white people can fix, if you’d just let them). Gast’s piece, and more pointedly later analysis of it, illustrate well different populations’ discourse surrounding land, space, and what they are intended for.
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