By Eisa Nefertari Ulen
In Dark Days, Bright Nights: From Black Power to Barack Obama, historian Peniel E. Joseph examines President Barack Obama’s ascent to the White House, an almost unbelievable achievement that is still startling in its historic significance.
Even as late as the last few months leading up to the primary elections, few experts would have guessed that the first black president was on his way to Pennsylvania Avenue – not journalists, not public policy wonks, not sociologists, and not even most historians. As Spelman College Professor of History Jelani Cobb asked his colleagues soon after the general election, “Not one of us predicted this. How’d we miss this?” Joseph explores what they missed, and why, from a point of view that many might find controversial.
A professor of history at Tufts University, author, editor, and recipient of several prestigious fellowships, Joseph asserts that The Age of Obama is a direct result of the very militancy our 44th president has so carefully distanced himself from. Organized in 4 chapters, Dark Days, Bright Nights traces a legacy of black male leadership linking three men: Malcolm X, Stokely Carmichael, and the third, a man abandoned by his father, raised by a single mother, and sent to live with his grandparents. A half-brother to siblings not only on his father’s side, but to a sister on his mother’s side, too. A man whose personal narrative is strikingly similar to the experiences of countless disenfranchised black men who were meant to be among the primary beneficiaries of Black Power Activism, a man whose name the world knows: Barack Hussein Obama.
Joseph does not linger on Obama’s personal narrative; instead, he highlights aspects of the President’s widely-known biography as a way to re-imagine BlackPower.
In the first chapter, an essay titled “Re-imagining the Black Power Movement,” Joseph identifies this largely misunderstood and understudied era as the precursor to multiculturalism and diversity – a requisite for mainstream acceptance of a mixed-race son of an immigrant Kenyan and European-descended Kansan with an Asian sister, two black daughters, and a white grandma called Toot.
Joseph also examines Black Power not as a misguided assault on American institutions, but, rather as an international force fueled by sharecroppers and students, trade unionists and tenant right’s activists, along with “intellectuals, poets, artists, and politicians,” all of whom were inspired by icons Carmichael and Malcolm X, men whose work “helped to expand the boundaries of American democracy.”
Situating Black Power at the center of our participatory democracy identifies The Movement as essential to the success of America’s foundational ideal, Lincoln’s promise of “government of the people, by the people, for the people.” Just as Frederick Douglass’ “famous maxim that power ‘conceded nothing without a demand’” produced an activism that pressured Abraham Lincoln to deal with the institution of slavery, Carmichael, X, and a more militant Martin Luther King than most care to recall demanded the 20th century freedoms that enabled Obama’s 21st century victory.
Joseph writes that the more radical aspects of icons such as Douglass and King have become just as obfuscated as the qualities Carmichael and X possessed that mainstream middle Americans of all colors would applaud. The problem of reducing Black Power to nothing more than radical militancy is more than just a problem of bad public relations, Joseph asserts, it’s wrong, a deceit that too many Americans believe is truth, a lie that has lingered for nearly half a century.
According to Joseph, Carmichael, who coined the term, “defined Black Power as black unity in the service of elected political power…Black Power called for – indeed mandated – a new political ethos that would seek the eradication of poverty, violence, war, and despair. In this, Carmichael shared King’s concern over humankind’s very fate.” The media failed to highlight “the Carmichael who believed in democracy’s powers to heal the South’s racial wounds [and] remained permanently scarred by the little-cited murder of his friend Jonathan Daniels, a white organizer gunned down in Lowndes County in 1965.”
In the chapter “Stokely Carmichael and America in the 1960s,” Joseph compensates for mediocre media coverage as well as historical inaccuracies that too often derive from prejudice and fear. Joseph’s elegant and substantive penetration of Carmichael’s family life, his dedication to democratic ideals, his skilled work as a local organizer, the international component of his activism, and his decision to change his name to Kwame Toure make whole the man too often reduced to half-truths.
In the chapter “MalcolmX, Harlem, and American Democracy,” Joseph also moves beyond two-dimensional poster-sized images of the man who came to be known as El Hajj Malik El Shabazz. Joseph emphasizes the reasons for Malcolm’s effectiveness, particularly his work as a community organizer. He also reveals Malcolm’s fascinating relationships with writers from John Henrik Clarke to James Baldwin, Lorraine Hansberry to Maya Angelou, and Albert Cleage to Rosa Guy.
Joseph also documents the important international influence of Malcolm X on events like the Afro-Asian Conference in Indonesia, and the New York visit of Cuban leader Fidel Castro, which, Joseph asserts, “positioned Harlem at the center of Cold War intrigue.”
Few schoolchildren in this country grasp the impact Malcolm had on international politics, but Dark Days, Bright Nights provides a perspective on the Cold War connection between the liberation of Africa and the liberation of African Americans that is far more accurate than textbook accounts of this pivotal moment in world history. Joseph helps restore “the contours of [Malcolm’s] domestic and global activism.”
Here at home, “Malcolm’s political, cultural, and intellectual leadership transformed postwar America. As an activist, intellectual, organizer, and icon, he sought to re-imagine the very meaning of American democracy.” This force of Malcolm’s imagination has powered African-American leadership through the decades. Dark Days, Bright Nights traces Black Power activism through the 1960s, 1970s, and 1980s to lay a pathway to the inauguration of the first black President on January 20, 2009.
Komozi Woodard, Professor of History at Sarah Lawrence College, calls Joseph, “one of the young lions in the field of Black Power Studies who have the firm understanding of American history required to map the contours of the Black Power politics that links Amiri Baraka’s organizing of the Gary Convention and Jesse Jackson’s leadership of the Rainbow Coalition to the rise of the mass political movement that propelled Barack Obama into the White House. Thus, Peniel Joseph outlines the complicated way that the independent thrusts of Black Power led African Americans into interracial coalitions in the Democratic Party. This is American history at its best!”
Because too few know or fully understand the Black Power Era, it is also American history that all Americans need. About Malcolm X, Joseph bemoans the sad reality that, “There is still no definitive biography of this important historic figure, and scholars too often rely on his speeches as a means to explain his impact rather than actively seeking to reconstruct the breadth and depth of his political activism.” Perhaps this at least partly answers Jelani Cobb’s question about why no one in the Ivory Tower saw Barack Obama coming.
“It has been a source of mild frustration that so few academics have even dwelled on this question,” Cobb says, “preferring to launch into assessments of what Obama ‘means’ or how his election ‘fits’ into history. But those assessments can’t hold much weight given the fact that somewhere, somehow we should have seen this coming. Or at least seen changes that suggest that it was possible. We were caught looking the other way and I don’t think many of us have been humble enough to admit it.”
With this book, Joseph makes a strong cased for the connection between the Black Power Movement and two of its icons and Obama as a modern-day icon. Viewed in this context and through 20/20 hindsight, Joseph shows us that perhaps Obama’s rise isn’t quite so startling or unexpected after all.
Eisa Nefertari Ulen is the proud daughter of Black Power Era activists and author of the novel CrystelleMourning. She lives with her husband and son in Brooklyn.
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If “Wish” is considered “street lit” I can only conclude that “street lit” means “black” because obviously there aren’t any *other* kinds of blacks…
(That was sarcastic, anybody else reading this comment, in case you couldn’t see that!!!)
Hey, Jill. Well, it’s a bit more narrow b/c Wish *is* about a low-income family living in the city; there *is* discussion of crime, and the protagonist *is* searching for a way out…when I wrote my master’s thesis I focused on “urban narratives”–and that included PUSH and Ann Petry’s The Street..but I read Coldest Winter Ever and decided it didn’t belong…I don’t think books *about* the city or set within the city can all be lumped together. It’s not just the subject matter or any common themes, it’s also the quality of the writing and a certain self-conscious effort to engage with the existing literary tradition. But that does smack of elitism as well, and I see a difference between what should be available in a public library and what should be taught in a college classroom…Vanessa and I wrote some VERY long emails as we tried to articulate our different positions!
Wow, what a great interview! Lots of interesting insights. Thank you both!
Sometimes my Libra nature shows too much and it becomes way to difficult for me to make my point.
It is difficult for me to be totally non-bias in conversations about urban lit because it just doesn’t appeal to me. That having been said, I do know there is research out there validating various aspects of street/urban/hiphop fiction. I hear over and over that students are able to find themselves in these books, and isn’t that we all want: to find ourselves in books? If we don’t find ourselves, why keep reading? Isn’t that why we want more books for and by POC?
I think school libraries are tricky situations. As a school librarian, I have to answer to parents and stakeholders regarding what is in my collection. True, 96% of all YA fiction could probably be challenged, but I think books with gratuitous sex, profanity and drug use, that does not move the story along, makes a book difficult to defend in a challenge. I have seen discussions about street lit that argue that ‘Push’ is not of this genre. Is it? Don’t know! I do know that not all African American literature is not street lit and not all street lit is African American!
At the same time, I find it quite interesting that Salinger, Twain, Rowling and Morrison are continually challenged (asked to be removed from the media center) but adult urban lit never is.
Some students ask me for ‘drama’ but too many request ‘murder’, ‘sex’ or ‘lots of cussing’. Perhaps they’re looking for stories they can relate to, but I remember reading as a teen and the fascination with grown up books.
I applaud Vanessa’s efforts to define an legitimize this genre. Something I had to learn to hope to be successful as a librarian is that it’s not about my personal taste!
I learned something today! Thanks for posting this interview.
edi asks good questions…this is a complex discussion. as a school library volunteer, i do see students clamoring for books that would be considered ‘street lit’. i know that for many of our students, it’s an exciting trip into a world with a lot more ‘drama’ than their own, for some it’s very familiar, and for others, who knows? they just like it. my approach is to respect the choices they make, sometimes ask questions about them, and make suggestions of my own that broaden their reading experiences. thanks for posting this!
First AWAM is not street lit as most street lit readers would define the genre. Glad you declined.
While I don’t read street lit personally, I did take time to read some and to ask readers why they enjoy it. As a volunteer librarian, I do put it on our shelves and I don’t condone censorship. I start with where my readers are. I don’t tell my readers they shouldn’t read it. I wait for an opportunity to ask if they like to something they haven’t read. I don’t want to persuade them to stop reading street lit as much as I want them to become open to other books.
I will say that what I have read of the lit my girls like, it wasn’t written well and that has nothing to do with the settings or language but the writing style.
While Push and Coldest Winter Ever fall into urban lit, I don’t see it as street. I don’t lump these with books that to me read like something cranked out with as much substance and thought as tabloid fiction.
I think we too narrowly define these books. It’s like saying all rap is the same and I’ve learned that isn’t the case at all.
There are a lot of genres that don’t appeal to me so for me, rejecting street lit isn’t a resistance to reality I don’t want to read about it is the style and delivery that don’t appeal. Regardless of my preference, I believe in being informed to what appeals to readers so in our library, you’ll Clark to Morrison.
Just want to follow up with Edi and Susan’s comments. I think the difference between titles like PUSH and the ones that tend to fall into the Street Lit category is the author’s analysis (and, perhaps, intent). In PUSH (and AWAM) there is a clear analysis of the socio-economic factors that play into a main character’s experiences. And that analysis shows up on the page. It shows up in the way the character navigates her journey through choices and decisions. To me, the white version of Street Lit seems to be shows like Gossip Girl, and perhaps books along the same lines. Often, it’s indulgence to the extreme, with extreme consequences; a world that is more of a “mirror” than a window or a door. While there’s certainly room for both, I think there is something to be said about windows and doors that offer a new vision; and authors who are actively engaged, through their creative work, in actually shaping a world that operates on a different set of values and beliefs.
When I put this in the context of what my girls consume, vis-a-vis media and cultural products, it becomes a bit clearer. It’s not about fear–for me, anyway. While I don’t mind if my kids watch The Bratz and Cinderella and all the other mass market “mirrors” out there, what I want to keep putting in their way is food for the soul. Nourishment that will help them to *re-envision* their worlds, to see new possibilities, new avenues they might otherwise never look for; books and films that critique their environment and offer alternatives. That’s what WISH did for me and, I’m guessing, does/will do for the young people who read it. If a book does that, I’m more willing to fight for its inclusion on library shelves. There are tons of books that get banned for ridiculous reasons. If they contain profanity, sex, whatever, but those elements are used to critique commonly-held values of control, domination, consumerism, misogyny, racism, homophobia, etc. and THEN offer up new ways of being, I’ll fight for those books *and* buy them for all the young people I know.
Sorry for the long comment, Z
.
Don’t apologize, Neesha! This is the conversation Vanessa really wants people to have (I think). It’s interesting to consider whether street lit functions as a mirror, window, or sliding door, to borrow Rudine Sims Bishop’s metaphor. Like Gbemi said, not all street lit readers see themselves in the books; there’s a LOT of voyeurism going on, I think, precisely b/c the world being described is NOT the world that’s familiar to most–even IF you’re working class and living in the city. If that world IS your world, then street lit is the mirror you need and deserve to find in books. The sliding door bit is a little trickier, and here’s where a lot of the fear comes in: if hustling isn’t your reality, and yet you find it exciting and alluring, you just *might* try to slide open that door and find a place for yourself in that world. That fear is not entirely irrational, I don’t think, though I agree that street lit can potentially function as a cautionary tale. Some of you already know that I have a hard time with the “if they read this, they just might read that” theory. To me it’s kind of like saying porn and feminist cinema belong in the same category b/c ultimately, they’re all films about women. So if someone’s watching a lot of porn, eventually they just might lean toward feminist cinema. They won’t unless they’re given the critical tools to DISCRIMINATE between the different kinds of films and ways of telling a story. I agree with Neesha–authorial intent is crucial.
Ah–hadn’t considered the voyeurism angle. True. When I was a teen, there were shows I watched and books I read that glamorized self-destructive behaviours and thought patterns. I accepted those without questioning them, and dreamt of living such “exciting” experiences. I know, without a doubt, that young people now do the same with the shows they watch and the stories they read. I guess that’s where it’s important to me that young people, in particular, are offered an array of choices and representations of themselves and their surroundings. And, quite frankly, I’m going to do my darndest to provide my girls with more representations of powerful women making decisions based on self-love, self-respect, non-consumerism, etc. They’ll get enough of the other stuff every day, in every other venue.
I really disagree with the interviewee’s answers about the value [sic] of street lit, even for non readers.
When you look at legal and religious precepts, these form bridges for people to go from who they *are* to who they can *be.* Law and religion represent the ideal to which to aspire; and they INspire because of that; because they are not what IS, they are what CAN BE. I don’t see why any literature should be otherwise.
As Gramsci noted, there are two aspects to domination: physical power, but also a system of beliefs that permeates consciousness and causes the dominated person or group to accept the conditions of oppression as inevitable. I see street lit as contributing to the perpetuation and even promulgation of this system of beliefs.
I believe that street lit (and street culture generally) reinforces the notion of separation which in this society unfortunately corresponds with powerlessness and stereotyping which leads to further powerlessness. To the extent that what constitutes race is culturally determined, this does not have to be inevitable. Stories create and/or reinforce consensus and shared understandings; why shouldn’t they reinforce an elevated understanding of life that will valorize something better than the sexualization of young girls, and the lack of dignity and respect in young people for themselves and for each other generally?
I understand the point you’re trying to make, but sometimes you don’t see the picture if no one paints it.
“Stories create and/or reinforce consensus and shared understandings; why shouldn’t they reinforce an elevated understanding of life that will valorize something better than the sexualization of young girls, and the lack of dignity and respect in young people for themselves and for each other generally?”
I love this.
Wow, what an awesome interview and a really good conversation. Thanks so much for turning this experience into a teachable moment for us, Zetta!
I have very little positive things to say about street lit, but Vanessa made me think more critically about what this literature could be saying about our particular moment in time. I’m grateful for this. I also like the point Neesha makes about valuing the books that strive not just to present a painful reality, but to give the reader the tools to critique it, as Wright does in Native Son.
At the same time, every generation has its pulp fiction and this is no exception. 50 years ago there were Senate hearings on whether or not comics were turning American children into delinquents. Today, few people care about that. Go back even further and you find black parents fretting over little girls who listened to the sexually explicit lyrics of Bessie Smith after school.
One thing that I would like to see acknowledged here, however, is the role that marketing (publishers and bookstores) play in promoting this particular genre non-stop. Doesn’t there come a point where shelves no longer reflect reader demands, but shape them by providing access to such a narrow selection. Why do I have to hunt for Percival Everett’s latest and “special order” Carleen’s book and there are 30 freakin’ copies of Zane stacked on the floor? I know this is an old argument, but that’s my frustration.
Hey, Claudia–we’re actually discussing Erasure at this week’s librarian book club meeting! Too bad you can’t join us…
I also keep thinking of the blues, and even the way folktales and jokes/signifyin’/playin’ the dozens weren’t included under the umbrella of AfAm Literature until quite recently. I think the backlash against street lit might also have something to do with the way hip hop culture has dominated US popular culture for the past decade…a lot of black folks feel rappers don’t speak to their reality, yet the image of the thug/ho dominates TV and film–and now literature as well…so I agree: a lot of us just want balance.
Jill–I absolutely believe the purpose of art is not only to show what’s real, but what’s possible…
This interview has made take a tiny step back. However, my feelings towards “street” lit remain in tact. As mentioned in a few comments, it’s the writing style that’s often more the problem for me than the content. Most books that fall into this subgenre seem to have been written by the very high schoolers flocking to read them. Also, the content does often seem to romanticize street life. Perhaps my feelings lie in the fact that those stories are not representative of my life. There’s no appeal in them for me, not even as a voyeur.
As for those types of books being some sort of gateway for teens to canonical literature, I can’t see that working in an unguided situation. Even most of the adults I know that read “street” lit never grow beyond it in their reading.
“unguided”–I agree, Terri. What incentive would a street lit fan have for picking up a book that didn’t have graphic sex or violence, and perhaps utilized sophisticated literary devices? My worry is that those who read street lit–if they’re satisfied with the genre–will then have an *expectation* that THAT is what literature ought to be/do…
thanks for the fascinating interview, but what I really want to say is that the cover of Wish is utterly lovely!
thanks, Charlotte!
[...] that’s very popular with many urban library patrons (you can read my interview with Vanessa here). The group had read A Wish After Midnight, and it was interesting to hear their [...]
Claudia, you’re so right in pointing out every generation has its pulp fiction. Thanks for throwing in a brief historical popular culture perspective as you offered your opinion to this discussion. Great points! Like Claudia, Vanessa and et all, I respect the right for anyone to read whatever they can get their hands on. So while I attempt to respect that as a librarian behind the desk I have to admit that I did practice ordering preferences when I ordered titles for teens in my library collection in Atlanta. (Truth be told we all do). The few urban/street lit titles that were coming out some years ago that I initially read weren’t nearly edited enough to convey the story well—and in my humble opinion, even Sistah Souljah’s Coldest Winter could have stood a few more pages of editing. But I ordered a few anyway just in case they were asked for by my Afr Am adult readers who didn’t visit the library as frequently as my ‘die-hard ‘ Afr Am readers who visited once or twice a month. Economically however, when purchasing money became tight my spending was geared to those who frequented the library more, were checking out books, coming in and handing me suggestions for their next bookclub pick. When Afr Amer teens came in requesting Zane, we had it because that was what adult bookclubs were reading. Zane for Afr Am teens then was the new Judy Blume–even more so than the then burgeoning Gossip Girl series. Yet even when they came in I have to admit I sure was trying to get them to read titles not on their reading list other than the standard Walter Dean Myers or Mildred Taylor. I pushed Martha Southgate, Tayari Jones, Sharon M. Draper and even Sapphire’s Precious with minimal success. However I seemed to have greater success among teens, both boys & girls, to pick up titles when I had an opportunity to read the text in an afterschool setting. The teens with whom I had the honor of visiting would want to read the book on their own after we or they would take turns reading passages. Now by no means should I the adult expect to participate in the leisure reading experience of a teen reader, I wouldn’t want to. It’s up to the teen to invite others to discuss and share their reading experience with others teens and any adult. However once I have been given permission to share my review and we’re excited about the book or theme, the challenge for me as a practicing young adult/children librarian who enjoys creating activities around literature is how creative can one be in programming around urban lit. Do I ask a pimp and a ho to come in to discuss their careers for a Career Day program? Should I plan a trip so that we can take the kids to a crack house or the aftermath of drive-by? Heck, can I see at least a few SAT vocabulary words thrown in there if there is supposed to be some message espoused in this novel just for the hell of it?
While many of my librarian colleagues have an opportunity to provide fun activities with some of the blockbuster YA titles—Harry Potter immediately comes to mind but more recently the Percy Jackson Olympian series, how imaginative or fantastical can I be with urban lit’s subject matter? Can’t a teen just be a teen and not go through a drive-by to discover that drugs can be bad for you? Does a good book make if it has a moral to the story amidst the background of violence? If publishers wanted to be promote authentic voices, why don’t they invest in bringing in a pimp for a YA booksigning and see how well THAT will go over in Barnes & Noble. I can guarantee you that adults would probably leave their kids at home, if not, themselves for the Q&A. Oh yeah that cash cow would immediately be sacrificed and then slaughtered if these books were met with anger by a wider audience.
Hi there. I just started blogging. You can find me on wordpress. Title of my blog is “A color that’s only paint” It’s from a story out of my book. Your blog was automatically generated. I thought that was pretty funny because the title of my book is “Over the Edge: Stories from the Street Life.” But I digress. Thanks for blogging about this. My story is definitely from the streets. I won’t go into it here but it is definitely not glamorized. There seems to be this incredible cultural blindness about the lives of many, many people in the USA — and other countries as well. “Street Lit” seems to be a convenient categorization of any material that doesn’t ascribe to a middle class, spit polished, life of well tended neuroses, I guess. People see only what they want to and dump everything else in the “other” category. A good story, written well, leads the reader to discover their own truths–even more when the reader can readily relate to the protagonist. Look at Dickens. Serialized in the newspapers. The original “Street Lit.” Keep Blogging. I’ll keep reading.
Books are like doors, opening us up to other peoples insights and experiences. My issues with street lit, is that those doors usually reflect a sensationalized vision of urban despair, leaving its readers none the wiser for having taken the journey. Especially if the writers of those books are motivated by dollar signs, yet don’t have the common sense to hit spell check. Though that should be left to the reader to figure out for themselves. Censorship is clearly dangerous, given the level of elitism in the publishing & art world