I'm still in the middle of the book, but I think what they are saying is that, we've come to believe race is real, because of what they call racecraft, makes it seem real, that its a conjure game without a conjurer, a bunch of interviews with them, the Fields sisters, are on Jacobin if you want to check it out. They go a bit further than…
I'm still in the middle of the book, but I think what they are saying is that, we've come to believe race is real, because of what they call racecraft, makes it seem real, that its a conjure game without a conjurer, a bunch of interviews with them, the Fields sisters, are on Jacobin if you want to check it out. They go a bit further than saying race is a "social construct" If I'm understanding what they are saying correctly, a would be racist looks at someone's skin and other attributes, makes a decision about one's ancestry (which it and of itself has a bunch of associations) and then practice a double standard based on that, and that many of us are doing this, reproducing this, kinda all the time, so much so that we are living in a collective conjure (hence the use of the metaphor of witchcraft) They tease out differences between bigotry and attitutdes and racism (which they see as acts/practices) They seem to disagree that internal sense of identity either as white or something else or as a racist has all to do with the practice of racism and they give a bunch of examples. I'm not an expert on what they call Racecraft, but its a pretty compelling argument when you are inside of it. They talk a LOT about political economy as well...to think through inequality as they are marxists. Its a framework that helps understand how people come in and out of being the victims of racism, depending on time, location etc. My southern Italian ancestors are good case study, at one point they were perceived as not white, something other and experienced racism, then that shifted over time between the 1920s and 1960s, it still happens to some of us, depending on how we appear. Jews are another example...
Yeah it's true. There are all kinds of subtle ways we enforce the belief in race through our words and stereotypes. And I mean, statistically there are differences between various ancestries. It's the ascribing of meaning to those differences where we run into trouble.
As for an internal sense of identity, I really hate that concept as applied to race or gender or anything else. I can't make any sense of it, and indeed think it's a prime example of "racecraft" (or gender stereotyping). There's no such thing as "feeling black" unless you limit blackness to a box of certain allowed things and go from there. It's crazy to me that some black people so eagerly embrace this idea.
Looking forward to hearing the cases they make for this.
Yeah, the marxists (like the Fields and Adolph Reed) are big on their analytical categories and the historical and capitalist why of race, they call it ascriptive identity category, like you mentioned. I think their work is the key to undoing a lot of this antiracism mess, as they show why its so popular, it serves neoliberalism
it should also be noted, MLK was moving in this direction, in 68, talking about redistributive economics as the way to deal with inequality amongst blacks. So, we come back around to Kingian politics and takes as ultimately being more radical really, than nationalist takes.
I'm still in the middle of the book, but I think what they are saying is that, we've come to believe race is real, because of what they call racecraft, makes it seem real, that its a conjure game without a conjurer, a bunch of interviews with them, the Fields sisters, are on Jacobin if you want to check it out. They go a bit further than saying race is a "social construct" If I'm understanding what they are saying correctly, a would be racist looks at someone's skin and other attributes, makes a decision about one's ancestry (which it and of itself has a bunch of associations) and then practice a double standard based on that, and that many of us are doing this, reproducing this, kinda all the time, so much so that we are living in a collective conjure (hence the use of the metaphor of witchcraft) They tease out differences between bigotry and attitutdes and racism (which they see as acts/practices) They seem to disagree that internal sense of identity either as white or something else or as a racist has all to do with the practice of racism and they give a bunch of examples. I'm not an expert on what they call Racecraft, but its a pretty compelling argument when you are inside of it. They talk a LOT about political economy as well...to think through inequality as they are marxists. Its a framework that helps understand how people come in and out of being the victims of racism, depending on time, location etc. My southern Italian ancestors are good case study, at one point they were perceived as not white, something other and experienced racism, then that shifted over time between the 1920s and 1960s, it still happens to some of us, depending on how we appear. Jews are another example...
Yeah it's true. There are all kinds of subtle ways we enforce the belief in race through our words and stereotypes. And I mean, statistically there are differences between various ancestries. It's the ascribing of meaning to those differences where we run into trouble.
As for an internal sense of identity, I really hate that concept as applied to race or gender or anything else. I can't make any sense of it, and indeed think it's a prime example of "racecraft" (or gender stereotyping). There's no such thing as "feeling black" unless you limit blackness to a box of certain allowed things and go from there. It's crazy to me that some black people so eagerly embrace this idea.
Looking forward to hearing the cases they make for this.
Yeah, the marxists (like the Fields and Adolph Reed) are big on their analytical categories and the historical and capitalist why of race, they call it ascriptive identity category, like you mentioned. I think their work is the key to undoing a lot of this antiracism mess, as they show why its so popular, it serves neoliberalism
it should also be noted, MLK was moving in this direction, in 68, talking about redistributive economics as the way to deal with inequality amongst blacks. So, we come back around to Kingian politics and takes as ultimately being more radical really, than nationalist takes.
You're always offering fascinating bits of further research! Thanks for this and for the video link. I'll definitely have a look.