Dr. Watkins, I was deeply moved by your commentary on Black scholars. I have felt the sting of racism, resentment, and hatred from blacks and Whites alike – due largely to the fact that I am a black intellectual who refuses to hide or diminish my intellect to comfort others' sense of personal inadequacy. Although I have several earned degrees of distinction ( B.S., MBA, ED.S. & Ph.D.) I continued to experience professional assault and aggression from individuals experiencing cognitive dissonance over my achievements and accomplishments. I've had white colleagues probe me on how I held certain information because " I couldn't be that smart." I've had Black colleagues refuse to help me with a project because " if I'm so smart I could figure it out myself." I even had a Black supervisor present my work as his own, terminate me for no apparent reason, then espouse to all of my former colleagues that he could not tolerate my incompetence even if I was black. ( They fired him three months later)
So it finally dawned on me that I was little more than a sophisticated sharecropper – farming my talents, skills and itellect to build the fortues of masters who fundamentally resented the fact that I knew more about their business than themselves. I worked alongside Uncle Tom's who would cut my throat to gain the approval of their white peers – blind to the realization that they were little more well paid than pawns and puppets that masked the master's true intentions.
I eventually escaped the plantation and have been following the North Star to professional and financial autonomy. I am still trudging through the trails – often in the dar – in search of a new land where I have all the tenets of true freedom. But, by God, I am never going back. I will never forget the sheer exuberance I felt throwing my shackles at the feet of my master and declaring my independence from anyone else who sought to diminish or denigrate my talents to further their own goals while subjugating mine. Congratulations on your success in escaping the plantation! From one free man to the next – I am right behind ya!!
Can Black scholars here confirm if there is any truth in this?Forgive me if I'm wrong or being unduly provocative but I wonder if I'm wrong in to observing that members of this group show little or no interest in discussing questions about the politics of Western academia in relation to race, and particularly as affecting Black people.I dont remember any comments from this group on the odd drama of the relatively elderly Skip Gates, a man using a walking stick, being handcuffed for 'threatening the peace' in connection with challenging a policeman to produce his ID as the man insisted Gates demonstrate he owned the house he had just walked into, and Harvard's declaration that 'It was not Gates finest hour nor that of the policeman' , while the US President was compelled to apologise after dismissing the behaviour of the policeman as ridiculous, with Gates choosing to not discuss the issue further while one view argued he could have used it as a platform to highlight the harmful racial profiling faced by African-Americans.That incident really, really pained me.I am interested in knowing if this call to create an enabling space for Black scholars has any value to it.toyin--On Tue, Jan 15, 2013 at 1:37 PM, Ikhide <xokigbo@yahoo.com> wrote:--"For the majority of black scholars who are spit out by the system, there is almost no reward. After the academic honeymoon is over, scores of black scholars are kicked to the curb, like the prostitute with messy hair, smudged makeup and a rip in her stockings the morning after a late-night date. They buy into the scheme lock, stock and barrel, only to find that the platform was designed to empower the blonde-haired, blue-eyed man down the hall. Some expect to change the way things are done on their campuses, but you can't move into someone else's house and expect them to let you shift around the furniture. The best you can do as a black scholar is to do a very good job of imitating the white ones – but when you are trying to be someone else, you will never be perceived as anything better than a faulty version of the original.I argue that it's time to break the chains and get black scholars off the academic plantation. It is perfectly fine for scholars to teach at white universities and do research in journals controlled by white males. But it is also OK for us to re-engage our communities, earn multiple sources of income and find other relevant platforms through which we can share our expertise with our communities. Our value is undeniable, even if academia rejects us, and we cannot allow self-righteous judgments by culturally-incompetent colleagues to undermine our self-esteem."- Dr. Boyce WatkinsRead on... It gets better...- IkhideStalk my blog at http://www.xokigbo.com/Follow me on Twitter: @ikhideJoin me on Facebook: www.facebook.com/ikhide
You received this message because you are subscribed to the "USA-Africa Dialogue Series" moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin.
For current archives, visit http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue
For previous archives, visit http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html
To post to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com
To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue-
unsubscribe@googlegroups.com
CompcrosComparative Cognitive Processes and Systems"Exploring Every Corner of the Cosmos in Search of Knowledge"
Compcros
You received this message because you are subscribed to the "USA-Africa Dialogue Series" moderated by Toyin Falola, University of Texas at Austin.
For current archives, visit http://groups.google.com/group/USAAfricaDialogue
For previous archives, visit http://www.utexas.edu/conferences/africa/ads/index.html
To post to this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue@googlegroups.com
To unsubscribe from this group, send an email to USAAfricaDialogue-
unsubscribe@googlegroups.com
No comments:
Post a Comment