The man who originally did the study about “acting white” (I’m really bad about remembering theorists names), “acting white” was actully a small part of his study, thats just the part people caught on to.

*M* is referring to John Ogbu. Also, this research was published last year so it’s interesting that The Economist is just now picking it up.

It would be hard to imagine a more crippling cultural norm.
mmm hmm

so sad but so true…

Not true where I grew up but since there’s a study on it must be true everywhere.

Black people just want to be dumb (everywhere but where I grew up that is..Seattle)

I grew up in the burbs with upper middle class black folk, the Jack & Jill set. This was true there too. It seemed that for the black kids, genuine blackness was basically being/acting dumb or “hood.” Can you summer in Maine and be “hood”? Forget that. Can “summer” be a verb in your household if you’re “hood”?

Definitely my experience when schooling in Maryland and Jersey. However, from previous readings and discussions, I always understood this as not being that significant an issue.

Oogie, it’s not only significant, the message it sends is subversive and ugly. A year ago I was on a bus here in San Francisco, and a boy was teasing a girl for paying more attention to her book than to him. When she’d had enough, she asked him if he read, and he replied, TO A GIRL HE WAS TRYING TO IMPRESS: “Hell nah, I don’t read! I keep it real!” I wanted to kill, bury and pour salt over him to make sure no more like him sprung up. These kids aren’t even trying to help themselves anymore. I’m sorry, but didn’t Black Folks once upon a time risk death just to learn how to read? How the hell do we prevent yet another generation from going down from this? My I reiterate that the above incident took place in 2007 San Francisco, CA?

Sad. Also true where I grew up. Fortunately, I had no problem “acting white” if it meant getting good grades.

A friend of mine used to say, “If you really want to hide something from black people, put it in a book.” I didn’t believe him. I could be wrong.

“Hell nah, I don’t read! I keep it real!”

*headdesk*

Color me appalled, y’all.

Devil’s advocate here, so don’t completely decimate me, but what is the incentive to be studious?

I mean, like susan said, if “keeping it real” means that you don’t read, that you don’t go on a search for more knowledge, how do you change that mindset?

If we can’t come up with a way, does it mean that we should give up on the current (and previous) generation and focus on the future?

I’m asking this as a serious question for anyone who has better/different insight than me

I have two boys and a new baby girl. One son goes to a private Christian School and the other goes to a predominately white public school ( could not get him into the Christian school this year but should be in next year). I say this because I want my kids to thrive and not be a statistic. I know about black peer pressure. Its all about keeping it real when you admire these rappers and some sports figures. I grew up in the time when Hip-Hop first came into fruition. It was all about lyrics and how to outhink the other. you needed an education for that. I just don’t understand where we lost our focus on achieving intellectual prosperity and settled on moronic underachievement. Its just sad. It breaks my heart when i read articles such as this.

So, I’m copying and pasting this response which was made by Michael J. Dumas, Ph.D. to an article written by Harold J. Logan which was posted on The Root (www.theroot.com) early last month. The article was titled “The American Embrace of Ignorance, and Why Blacks Need to Let Go.” I think Dr. Dumas offers some interesting insight into the approach often taken by people who are so quick to dismiss so many black youths as “anti-intellectual” or otherwise hostile to formal education.

John McWhorter, whom is referenced below, is the author of Losing the Race. Logan describes the work as a portrayal of “an African-American community turning its back on the most effective tool available to end centuries of under-privilege.” Susan Jacoby, whom is also referenced, is the author of The Age of American Unreason. The book deals more with many Americans frequent flirtation with anti-intellectualism and addresses it a problem faced by the bulk of the population, not just select groups.

“Posted By:
afrographia at 04/08/2008 7:57:33 PM
Comment:
As a professor of education who studies Black education (and who grew up po’ and on welfare), I am always worried when we begin to make generalizations about Black young people based on our own personal experiences with them. Ironically, this too is anti-intellectual. Let me explain, using one of McWhorter’s main complaints: that Black youth see education as “acting white.” This may ring true to many readers, based on their interactions with Black youth in urban schools, and through representations in the media. However, if you actually read the research (and McWhorter, although an academic, is simply a commentator on this issue), or deeply engage with young people in your communities, you will discover a more complex picture: In short, young people are generally excited to learn from those who earn their respect, regardless of color, and are quite eager to engage arts and ideas when they believe that doing so will empower them, and give them a better understanding of themselves and their world. Education is only “acting white” when it valorizes others while denigrating Black experience; when it is seen as something that benefits individual Black folks at the expense of others; when it is imposed, poorly delivered, with no rationale given other than it is simply something one has to do.

Related to this, the author of this essay errs in comparing Jacoby’s excellent book to McWhorter’s diatribe. Logan, the businessman, suggests that the relative lack of Black achievement on standardized tests and grades attests to their lack of intellectualism. However, Jacoby’s point is that even though people may perform well enough to be successful, the problem is that they are not interested in engaging the world, they are not curious, they do not think deeply. The majority of the schools attended by Black children do not teach, nor encourage intellectual rigor. This has been the case since the beginning of integration, when scores of Black educators–who emphasized both performance and intellectual rigor– lost their jobs. Simply achieving higher test scores is not synonymous with intellectualism. More importantly, it is foolish to simply tell Black kids to “do better in schools” (as they currently exist), without challenging the cultural, political and economic forces which make many urban schools so bankrupt materially and intellectually. And it is about the whitest thing we can do.

Michael J. Dumas, Ph.D.”

@susan: Just to be clear, I meant not significant as in this is not a primary reason as to why blacks are not performing in schools as well as white students, for example. I do not discount the findings since this was also my experience: I went through hell in High School because I liked learning (The nerve!). But after I widened my scope I realized there are other areas that should first be focused on to solve the disparity problem regarding academic performance.

No prob Lauren! It hurts to see that some people are seemingly so eager to jump on the bashing young, “blissfully ignorant” black kids bandwagon. The last time I checked “nerdy” kids or “geeks” are often socially ostracized by kids of other ethnicities as well. Sometimes it seems like we forget that these kids are just as complex as any other individual and they are developing these complexities in the midst of a system that often undervalues and ignores them.

It’s not just our peers that do this. I don’t speak to many members of my family now. All of my sisters had kids before the age of 20 and only one graduated high school. I got my master’s at 23. Guess who’s the black sheep of the family? I used to think I was the only one or that I had done something to deserve this treatment. Unfortunately, I have way too many friends who have experienced this and it is SO painful. This phenomenon is so sad and it is destroying our commnunity. It’s that serious, y’all.

Sadly Sarah, I feel the same when I see these kids on the train after getting out of school. They are rude, unruly, and absolutely devoid of humanity. Alot of the ostracizing went on during my youth in Hartford, CT and continues to this day. No where are a good deal of these people? Either in prison, six feet under, or stuck with a shitty job having to support the half dozen children their baby’s mothers shitted out. It’s because the school system is institutionalizing the lack of education for our youth. That’s why their schools are subpar. It also convinced me that black people WANT to be stupid. Slick Rick couldn’t have said it better back in ‘87 “It’s cool to look bummy, and be a dumb dummy, and disrespect your mummy”. Black people want to cultivate that victimhood they continue to perpetuate. Black media doesn’t help either. They only contribute to it. Everybody wants to be in a video or on a basketball court instead of in a classroom.