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7 Street roots June 6, 2014 Myth buster: Exposing the mythical origins of racism One a u th o r’s perspective on how some Am ericans, in cluding Thom as Jefferson, created the concept o f race BY JIM DOUGLAS to own slaves, and they had no reason dr need to justify slavery based on any notion T acqueline Jones teaches at the of race or racial inferiority. They simply I University of Texas and has been needed slave labor to maintain their I awarded a MacArthur “genius” “luxurious way of life.” iellowship and other prizes. She’s an Jones explains that Africans experienced intellectual heavyweight, who specializes in “extreme political vulnerability” to African-American history, particularly as it enslavement because they had no nation- relates to labor. I suspect that historians will states to protect them and little ability to conclude that her book is very important resist their capture and bondage. The Being married to an academic historian, I difference in power between Europeans and should have known what to expect Like Africans created what, perhaps on the academic histories in general, “A Dreadful surface, appeared to be a relationship based Deceit” is based on exhaustive research and on race. To Jones, however, it was “local contains a myriad of specific facts, political economies and labor demands marshalled by the author to prove her shaped by military imperatives 4 not racial hypothesis. For a reader nqt trained as a | prejudices — [that] account for the origins of historian — even one interested in gaining a slavery in the colonies” and the eventual greater understanding of the history of race * predominance of African descendants in the in the U.S.— this makes for a challenging slave population. read. It can be hard for many-of ,us to Antonio was an “Angolan” in Maryland extract the key points from the tremendous who resisted how he was treated. In 1658, | amount of detail concerning numerous he had been a slaVe for about six months people’s lives and events. But Jones when his Dutch owner, one of the most ... ultimately supports her thesis well. powerful men in the colony, beat him and Conquering the harmful divisions in our left him to die. Perhaps surprisingly, society based on race is critical to genuine Antonio’s owner was later prosecuted social progress in 21st-century America. But (although not convicted). The key to Jones’ to accomplish this requires an analysis is th a t in telling the story, none of understanding of where these divisions the participants in the trial referred to any originated. racial characteristics or appeared to hold “A Dreadful Deceit” uses the life stories any prejudice based on race. of six people to illustrate the history of race Up until the time of the revolution, in the U.S. The author’s purpose is to “neither ethnicity nor skin color correlated contend with America’s own “creation precisely with a specific legal status.” myth” that “the nation was conceived in Southern planters and others “stereotyped ‘racial’ differences” and that, over time, Africans according to their tribal origins but “these self-evident differences have suffused refrained from attaching any racial our national character and shaped our characteristics to Africans and their national destiny.” descendants.” Slaveholders did not talk in Jones sees race as a myth. She writes term s of race or use it as a reason to justify “raee itself is a fiction, one that has no basis slavery. Both pro- and anti-British camps in biology or any long-standing, consistent offered slaves freedom in return for fighting usage in human culture.” Instead, racial with them. divisions have been the result of “complex After the Revolutionary War, Thomas ; historical processes” that have little to do Jefferson, “architect of the nation’s with biology and everything to do with conception of liberty and a slaveholder power relations and the needs of the himself,” and other thinkers'and political political elite atth e time. It is a provocative leaders set out to develop the principles hypothesis for those who may believe that upon which the republic would be founded. racism goes back to the arrival of the first It was only then that a theory of social slaves from Africa. difference, positing “black intellectual Even though enslaved Africans were in inferiority,” was necessary to “rationalize English North Anierica as early as 1619, black exclusion from the body politic of the until the American Revolution slavery new nation.” It was in this context, Jones existed without any stated basis in race. Only the powerful and well-to-do could afford . theorizes, that Jefferson and others CONTRIBUTING WRITER ■ i - ; • »v» ¡ 4 í 5 - IB í IÍB íh SÓ és IS z írfixfi ’»ss : A Dreadful Deceit: The Myth of Race from the Colonial Era to Obama’s America by Jacqueline Jones developed theories for the first time that black people were inferior, “less intelligent and imaginative” than white people. In one sense it was simple: for political reasons related to potential political power in the . Southern colonies, it was important that slaves not be given the same rights as free people, especially the right to vote» Thus, the myth of racial inferiority was born said Jones. In addition to Antonio, Jones uses five other examples, stretching from Boston King, a black fugitive in revolutionary South Carolina^ to Marxist Simon Owens, who battled both the auto industry and the United Auto Workers to address the specific needs of black workers. The different examples over time show that the myth of racial differences is flexible, varies by time and place and can include contradictory ideas. In the early 1900s many Southern whites believed that black people were lazy and not capable of learning, yet also believed black people should do the hard work in the fields and passed legislation to prevent them from going to school, which implied their desire to become educated. The precise origins of American racism or whether race is a myth, can suggest the strategy for change. An epilogue brings her analysis to the current day. She cites numerous examples proving that a “post-racial society” didn’t follow Obama’s election: There are disparate rates of poverty, educational attainment and incarceration; the Great Recession had a disproportionate impact on rates of foreclosure and loss of accumulated wealth; and government cutbacks and resulting layoffs have had a lopsided impact on people of color. And, much like the way legislative A meal, a smile, a hug, a listening ear It All of these fill our plates, and our hearts at Sisters Of The Road. Be a part of our Full Plate Project! Everyone deserves a Full Plate. full plate PROJECT- Y o ur donations in June & July are m atch ed I: I $25 becom es $50 133 NW 6th Ave. Portland. Oregon 97209 503-222-5694 www.sistersoftheroad.or actions were used to hinder black people’s right to vote after both the revolutionary and civil wars, the onslaught of voter ID laws seeks to have the same effect today. Jones concludes that even though mythologies of racial difference have largely disappeared from public discourse, “centuries of violent discrimination against people of African descent” have “deeply scarred and twisted fundamental structures of American life.” Her analysis seems to describe the current situation very well. Reprinted from Real Change Newspaper, Street Roots sister paper in Seattle, Wash.
