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Real Black: Adventures in Racial Sincerity
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From Publishers Weekly
To more effectively delve into the "relationship between race and sincerity" and its implications for the academic and popular debates on who or what is "authentically" black, Duke University cultural anthropologist Jackson regularly assumes the guise of his alter ego, the "ethnographic superhero Anthroman," a cross between "Harry Potter and Huckleberry Finn." Billed as "part conspiracy theory, part rant, part novelistic storytelling, part autoethnography," Jackson's book provides discerning readers with a provocative analysis of contemporary black subcultures: middle class blacks in a gentrifying Harlem who are split between a social justice-minded old guard and a neo-capitalistic new guard, conspiracy theorists, Black Hebrew Israelites of Worldwide Truthful Understanding and hip hop artists as exemplified by Mos Def. The strongest sections are his field interviews with residents of Harlem and Brooklyn, who furnish perceptive and unpretentious observations of their experience. Some of the interactions are thought-provoking: A conversation with a young man convinced that a fruit drink sterilizes black men gives the author pause; he returns the drink for bottled water. Others are more disturbing, such as the arrest of an individual who blares NWA during a neighborhood incident. The author's powers of observation are indisputable; however, his theoretical interpretations, which can be so jargonized that readers may get repetitive stress injuries after reaching for the dictionary so many times, are best savored by specialists.Copyright © Reed Business Information, a division of Reed Elsevier Inc. All rights reserved.
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From the Inside Flap
New York’s urban neighborhoods are full of young would-be emcees who aspire to “keep it real” and restaurants like Sylvia’s famous soul food eatery that offer a taste of “authentic” black culture. In these and other venues, authenticity is considered the best way to distinguish the real from the phony, the genuine from the fake. But in Real Black, John L. Jackson Jr. proposes a new model for thinking about these issues—racial sincerity.Jackson argues that authenticity caricatures identity as something imposed on people, imprisoning them within stereotypes—turning them into racial objects and inanimate things, instead of living, breathing human beings. Contending that such assumptions deny people agency—not to mention humanity—in their search for identity, Jackson counterposes sincerity, an internal and more productive analytical model for thinking about race.Moving in and around Harlem and Brooklyn, Jackson offers a kaleidoscope of subjects and stories that directly and indirectly address how race is negotiated in today’s world—including tales of name-changing hip-hop emcees, book-vending numerologists, urban conspiracy theorists, corrupt police officers, mixed-race neo-Nazis, and high-school gospel choirs forbidden to catch the Holy Ghost. Enlisting “Anthroman,” his cape-crusading critical alter ego, Jackson records and retells these interconnected sagas in virtuosic detail and, in the process, shows us how race is defined and debated, imposed and confounded every single day.
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Product details
Paperback: 306 pages
Publisher: University of Chicago Press; New edition edition (November 15, 2005)
Language: English
ISBN-10: 0226390020
ISBN-13: 978-0226390024
Product Dimensions:
6 x 0.8 x 9 inches
Shipping Weight: 1.2 pounds (View shipping rates and policies)
Average Customer Review:
3.0 out of 5 stars
4 customer reviews
Amazon Best Sellers Rank:
#458,668 in Books (See Top 100 in Books)
While television scripts instruct the actors where to be and what to say, real life scripts teach us how to determine who belongs to a certain group and who does not. These latter, everyday scripts are stringent stereotypical outlines of expected physical and personal attributes, based on race, gender and other immediately identifiable characteristics. They allow us to judge the legitimacy of one another's actions and group memberships without any information other than what is visible. These scripts are easy to use and govern what we think of as authentic, but are they the best way to differentiate between what is real and fake? John L. Jackson Jr. tackles that question in reference to racial scripts in his book Real Black: Adventures in Racial Sincerity and answers in the negative. This book introduces his concept of racial sincerity, which contrasts and challenges the scripts that lead to monolithic notions of racial authenticity. Through searching ethnographic studies of race and identity carried out in Harlem and Brooklyn, Jackson presents the reader with stories that defy the scripts they use every day, opening minds to a new perception of race. Jackson received his Ph.D. in Anthropology from Columbia University and is currently a professor at the University of Pennsylvania. He is very familiar with New York City, having done research there for his previous book, Harlem World: Doing Race and Class in Contemporary Black America. This focus on the familiar does not limit the scope of his work though. His argument for sincerity's adaptability over authenticity's strict definitions is easily applicable to other situations in a country that so frequently uses "these scripts as easy shorthand for serious causal analysis," (13) so all readers will find this book relevant. By far, the stories told by Real Black are the book's strengths. Examples include black Jewish conspiracy theorists who reject all other religions and races, a teenager who uses race to justify not enlisting post-9/11 and a middle class Harlem restaurant surrounded by scenes of urban blight. Jackson's carefully selected and decidedly meaningful profiles--of people, groups and situations that simply do not fit within authenticity's boundaries--are highly interesting and make strong, easily understandable arguments for sincerity. This is crucial because in some sections of the book, the intellectual depth of the material and Jackson's diction prove difficult to access for those without a background in anthropology.For example, the average reader may not be able to follow the contention that race is about "authenticating others who concomitantly escape solitary confinement within the pre-scripted categories that others impose." (17) However, when Jackson profiles Leo Felton, who was born to a black father and a white mother but chose to act as "a white, neo-Nazi skinhead who attacked black people because of their race," (19) we can better understand his point. Because Felton is biracial and hates minorities, the authentic scripts surrounding him collide, leaving the real to reside with his sincerely hateful racism. Through this story, the reader can see race differently, as "what you feel in your gut, what you sense in your soul" (20) instead of your family's heritage, and begin to allow for identity beyond racial scripts.Another of Real Black's compelling profiles is of a high school gospel choir member who appears to "catch the Holy Spirit" during performances, although his principal forbids such an act. Since we do not know what actually happened to that student, should we believe his shaking is religiously inspired or instead consider his actions an elaborate show? Jackson admits here that "sincerity highlights a willful subject who can always, of course, be faking it," (85-86) but this leads to a question that might bother many readers: how can sincerity be preferred if it can always be faked? Jackson answers that despite this possibility of fraud, sincerity prevails because it rejects the scripts that forcefully and autocratically analyze others "from the outside, [as if] they cannot simply speak for themselves." (15) It is this freedom that sincerity gives; this newfound sense of individual control that places it ahead of authenticity's outdated rigidity and makes this book worth reading. Beyond the intriguing stories, focusing on the author adds another dimension to the book. As mentioned before, Jackson's writing is exceedingly intellectual, thorough and eloquent. On the other hand, Jackson the researcher speaks much differently with his interviewees. His comment to a Brooklyn focus group that "Blood musta had some serious problems, kid," (102) is conspicuously different from his narrative style. This poses another question to the reader: which is Jackson's real voice? Whether included intentionally or not, this insight into the author's world gives a deeper understanding of another aspect of sincerity: its plurality. Both voices are in fact real, as Jackson writes sincerely as an academic and converses sincerely as an ethnographer. This additional layer presents the reader with even more to consider and further develops this book's depth. In the end, Jackson uses the authenticity afforded him by his Ph.D. in Anthropology to sincerely try to modify overarching notions of scripted racial identity. The best analogy for this effort comes from his outstanding chapter on Hip-Hop identity, which focuses on rap artist Mos Def. He centers on Mos Def because the rapper's "hip-hop credibility (partly as a function of his articulated Brooklyn childhood and masterful lyricism) is beyond reproach." (189) In other words, he fits the authentic scripts assigned to hip hop stars. However, Mos Def takes this solidified authenticity and uses it to push the boundaries of these scripts. He sings, sincerely, in some songs and infuses rock music, again sincerely, in others. Through these efforts, "Mos Def opens up space for the black, male, hip-hop body to sing itself anew, to destroy the categories of expressive difference that make an authentic male rapper different from an authentic male singer" (188) or rock star. In effect, Jackson does the same with this book, creating a space for racial identity to be real without fitting into the traditional, authentic definitions of race.
My frequent 8 year-old verbal skirmishes with my parents often ended with my reluctant capitulation. Each altercation was unfailingly followed by one parent that incessantly prodded me to apologize to the other. While I was surely not penitent, I still spewed the defeated words of "I'm sorry" through clenched teeth in order to ensure the restoration of peace and sanity in the household. Was it an authentic apology? Surely. Was it a sincere apology? Far from it. John Jackson extrapolates upon these often complicated notions of authenticity and sincerity and extends them into the discourse of contemporary American race relations. Though Jackson's SAT-word infused jargon may be underappreciated by non-academics in the field, he nonetheless establishes eloquent and critical arguments about the notion of racial sincerity that can be appreciated by both scholars and non-scholars alike. Jackson presents a fresh look of the concept of black authenticity through the new viewing "lens" of sincerity. He maneuvers beyond the traditional theories of racial authentication by use of several so-called real characters that he encounters throughout his ethnographic adventures in New York. Jackson's selection and subsequent juxtaposition of opposing characters, beliefs, and identities is done elegantly, and serves to further support this idea of racial sincerity. The author presents this view of sincerity as an affront to the commonly accepted belief of authenticity as the defining factor in the validation of one's racial identity. Leo Felton, a black white supremacist, serves as one of Jackson's most prominent examples. Felton is a neo-Nazi skinhead who was arrested in Boston for trying to pass off counterfeit bills at a local convenience store, but was in fact discovered to be planning a much more sinister plot to blow-up Jewish monuments throughout the city [19]. Further investigation revealed the shocking truth; this Aryan racist was in fact of mixed-race black ancestry. How could this happen? Felton's answer was simple. He wasn't living a lie, but rather living a more significant racial truth. He may have been materially black, but spiritually and soulfully white [19]. Jackson challenges the reader to consider this new twist on an age-old dilemma. What is real racial identity? Could it be more than simply a predetermined set of genetic coding in our DNA? Or even beyond the amount of melanin in our skin? Tyrone, a talented young black man with a magnificent singing voice, unconsciously emerges at the center of controversy at a local New York high school's gospel concert. One's sincerity, as an internalized and opaque concept, cannot be validated as truth or duplicity to the outside world without the presence of a certain performance. In Tyrone's case, the storm of debate revolved around the sincerity of his vocal performances. His unforgettable vocal prowess was interrupted mid-concert by the spiritual infusion of the Holy Spirit. Tyrone's so-called "nervous" body and the jutting, gesticulating, dancing, shouting, shaking, twitching, convulsing, and wailings of "Sweet Jesus!" that followed his capitulation to the Holy Ghost was called into question by the school's principal. This young man's performance was soon met by an affront of administrative action; Tyrone's sincerity was deemed false. The principal regarded Tyrone's performance unsuitable in the context of a high school gospel performance, and in turn established firm boundaries between appropriate and inappropriate behavior. Jackson explores how this "confinement" of sincerity's expression can be extrapolated into the realm of racial sincerities. He poses the challenge of understanding racial social "scripts" under this new definition of sincerity and leads one to wonder if our own sincerities are becoming trapped within the confines of our predetermined racial "scripts." Jackson leads us to question this notion of a racial "script" as one that challenges the sincerity of any racial performance. Is sincerity, as an inherently private and opaque experience, merely a following the racial "script" or truly acting on its own convictions? Furthermore, what is more important? An external validation of a person's racial identity (whether through performance or blood lineage), or the internal true self that one subscribes to? To complicate things even further, how do we evaluate those who are truly sincere about one aspect of their prescribed social "script" but not another? Should they be declared real or not? Jackson himself can serve as proof of the difficulties of this notion of sincerity. He addresses his own insecurities with ethnography by commenting on the phenomenon of "ethnographobia," a fear of ethnographic partiality and the wavering impossibility of never capturing the elusive real in print. By incorporating the help of Anthroman, a "cross between Harry Potter and Huckleberry Finn, less Superman than Blankman," [25] he was able to envision a means to "step outside" himself and become "fearless about social research by visualizing myself protected from harm by my own superhuman powers of observation and analysis." [25] Nonetheless, Jackson's retreat to the powers of Anthroman leads the reader to wonder about his real voice. The interposition of anthropological terminology alongside his ebonics infused speech leaves one to ponder his sincerity as an anthropologist. Jackson's Duke University degree and accomplished academic record validates and authenticates him as a real scholar of anthropology, but his momentary "slips" into the very world which he studies evokes some doubt about his sincerity. Which is Jackson's real voice? As the controversial and ambiguously authentic rapper Eminem would say, will the real John Jackson please stand up? While Jackson develops a powerful argument by posing sincerity as a challenge to authenticity, several questions remain unanswered. Sincerity is posed as an acceptance of "mutual impermeability" and the reading of "the other darkly" [86]. Although Jackson condemns the privileging of authenticity as more real than sincerity, he essentially fails to establish its applicability outside the theoretical academic realm. As a colorless, tasteless, invisible concept, sincerity finds no validation in the real world. We live in a society that is driven by its preoccupation with the authentic, the real. Authenticity is what people crave, as evidenced through the portrait of African Ancestry Incorporated, a New York company that specializes in offering tangible proof (via DNA testing and complete with a certificate) of African Ancestry to Black Americans throughout the country. Measures such as these are what predicate truth to the masses. Without this ability to express these ideals as interpersonal and wordly, sincerity becomes lost in the convoluted world of academic imagination and loses much of the ability to transform contemporary American race relations. The question of sincerity's multiplicity also poses a challenge to Jackson's arguments. Multiple layers of racial sincerity can, in fact, coexist. What does sincerity mean to a person who feels sincerity towards one aspect of their racial identity but not another? For example, how would Jackson's argument have been altered had the white supremacist Leo Felton sincerely believed in the importance of his black genealogy? Is it impossible for an Aryan racist black man to be simultaneously proud of his African blood lineage? While unlikely, it is certainly possible. A narrow and bipolar narrative on authenticity overlooks these exceptions to the rule. In any case, Jackson still succeeds in stressing the importance "seeing" beyond the transparent and into the realm of the opaque that resides within each and every one of us. He introduces a fresh and undeniably real way of exploring the issue of racial identity into a field that is often overrun with disagreement, and offers some hope as to its power as a mediating force in American society. He serves to remind us of the external forces that confine us in our pursuit to form our own racial identities, while simultaneously empowering us to create our own destinies through the vehicle of sincerity. "Sincerity's organizing principle maintains that the erstwhile racial object always knows more about itself, its insides, than the external authenticator." [227] Jackson's Real Black is a worthwhile read for any enthusiastic of racial studies. Just don't forget to use a dictionary, and remember, "Hate the game, not the playa."
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