First I wanted to say
that my brain had a longwinded fart… until today when I realized I completely
forgot about the blog for Wednesday. Guess I filed away blogging in my brain’s
Sunday storage space. Sorry about that—I'm making a blog now (since we didn’t
technically have to for this week) in attempt to make up for my little
oopsy.
I really
wanted to blog about the little Arac paragraph that I brought up during class.
I'm not quite sure what I understand of it and I had trouble verbalizing the
mixed feelings it gave me during class. I'm afraid this close reading has
broken a brain circuit, so my writing/understanding might be a tad circular—bear
with me.
(Page 31 second paragraph)
“The fact
that nigger is widely used in the
text of Huckleberry Finn has had the
effect of encouraging authors, scholars, teachers, and other persons of
goodwill to feel that they are doing the right thing when they name Jim in the
language of a racism that is less important to locate in the psyche of
individuals—as Myrdal did in An American
Dilemma—than in the structures of our nation, what since the days of Black
Power has been called “institutionalized racism. “ Over forty years ago, Lionel
Trilling praised Huckleberry Finn for
being a “subversive book,” and Hechinger echoed him in his Times article, but it seems to me that Huckleberry Finn is currently being read and publicly used in
support of complacency. “
I was able
to break down the first long convoluted sentence. I have come to the conclusion
that the “authors, scholars, teachers, and other persons of goodwill,”(basically
everyone) are the ones who now believe that racism is not an individual act.
They believe that the blame has been lifted and relocated to a
structural/institutional issue. However, Arac argues different. Unlike Trilling
and Hechinger who both believe Huckleberry
Finn is “’subversive’” or “undermining the principals of”(Dictionary.com)
the word nigger. In other words:
Trilling, Hechinger, the authors, teachers, scholars, and Myrdral believe that
Huck saying nigger does not make him
racist. However, society has instituted the word and therefore they are to
blame…not Huck. Instead, Arac determines that Huckleberry Fin is, “in support of complacency,” or, “a feeling of
satisfaction, esp extreme self-satisfaction”(dictionary.com). So, Arac
basically believes that it is the individual who is to blame in the name of
racism.
This means
that since Arac disagrees with how Trilling and Hechinger, and how other
authors, scholars, and teachers interpreted the book—which is paralleled to
Myrdal’s criticism—Arac then is arguing against institutionalized racism. The
framework of the first sentence of the paragraph then becomes just that much
more curious. He cites Myrdal as the founder of structural racism in his book An American Dilemma and then follows up
with a citation of “Black Power” labeling Myrdal’s theory as “institutionalized
racism.” (omg) I have to ask then: is Arac, the emotional low blower, throwing
a jab at the black power movement? Is he saying that Black Power is trying to
blame the institution in order to take hold of it some how? Because Arac argues
that the institution here is not at fault, but the individual. Why then does Arac cite two different people for
something he disagrees with? One: Myrdal, whom is from Sweden (http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/An_American_Dilemma)
and then secondly the Black Power movement, who he says in reference to
Myrdal’s theory, “what since the days of Black Power has been called
“institutionalized racism”. It is understood that throughout Arac’s book, his
in-text citations are emotionally charged. Only one of many examples is how he
described one scholar he disagreed with, “so the authoritative scholar’s
pedagogical guidance required students to perpetuate this wounding error”(27).
Not to mention Arac decided to omit the second part of Myrdal’s book title, An American Dilemma: The Negro Problem and Modern Democracy. Why did Arac include both
references and then neglect to do it in completeness? It seems to me that Arac
has an agenda—and in the face of passive aggression, trying to accuse Myrdal,
the Black Power movement, and maybe the individual of “goodwill”(31) for having
their own agenda.
I found it particularly
interesting that in order to make this point he began by saying, “The fact that
nigger is widely used in the text of Huckleberry Finn has had the effect of…”
Here, Arac places blame ON the book for making people, “feel like they are
doing the right thing…” in reference to their relief of personally driven
racism. He is arguing that the book makes it seem as if the word nigger has become embedded in society
and that using it is not racist because it has been instituted in, and, thus, a
normal part of society. He disagrees, as I said earlier, and blames the
individual for attempting to find release from his or her own racist
tendencies. But this is not a book that the common individual decides to pick
up and then comes to such conclusions all alone, is it? Arac even says in his
preface, “This book [his book] details and analyzes the emergence of
hypercanonization [of Huck. Finn.] in
the academy,”(vii) and “early-teenage children are being made to study and
admire a text in which the character, hero, and narrator, Huck, uses the term nigger hundreds of times,”(viii). He
makes the point that this book is being institutionalized. Forced upon young
America—teaching them to only idolize the main character and ignore the
possibilities of racism within his dialogue. One preface and 31 pages later,
Arac completely combats his own argument, saying it is the book that penetrates
the minds of its readers and plants the idea that racism lies on an alternate
level than individually. Even though 31 pages and a preface ago he states, “I
do not argue that Huckleberry finn is
racist or un-American,”(vii).
This
passage alone made me take a new perspective on everything that Arac says. I
don’t know if I like him too much. In fact, I don’t. He gives me bad vibes and
at times like this, seems ill-willed and sneaky…….. #justsayin
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