Writing Sample 2: Excerpt from an Academic Essay
Country Clubs Whiteness and the Black Body:
How The Black Notebooks and Citizen explore Contemporary Segregation
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 ended racial segregation in public places like schools, busses, and water fountains, but it did not disallow discrimination in all private spaces. Some white communities took note of this asterisk and used it to keep people of color out of certain interior environments, like their country clubs. Within the safe havens of these clubs, privileged white people could have brunch, swim, and play golf and tennis, without ever having to watch what they said, or share a locker room towel-down next to a black body. These modern, sporty variations on pre-1960’s segregation have not gone unnoticed by a pair of contemporary female black authors, Toi Derricotte and Claudia Rankine, both of whose work explores the interior spaces of country club culture as physical manifestations of institutional racism. Through the juxtaposition of a black family against a white-only country club in The Black Notebooks, and the black body of Serena Williams against the whiteness of professional tennis in Citizen, Derricotte and Rankine expose pockets of segregation, and the secret white America they protect....
...Keeping black bodies out of these spaces allows for the whites in these insulated spaces to forget the past, and to tell the racist jokes they want to tell, uninhibited by the discomforts of “political correctness,” and the same “dignity” and “courageousness” expected of black athletes in white spaces. It allows for hypocritical behavior. As Rankine said in an interview with NPR, “There are two worlds out there; two America's out there. If you're a white person, there's one way of being a citizen in our country; and if you're a brown or a black body, there's another way of being a citizen and that way is very close to death”(NPR).
Through their work, Toi Derricotte and Claudia Rankine explore the interior spaces of country club culture as “a way of talking about invisible racism” (Schwartz), and show what whiteness is still willing to do to protect all it has gained. Both writers are engaged in active resistance to the dominant power structure. Both books are working to mine societal caves where, despite The Civil Rights Act, and the claims of some that we live in a post-racial society, segregation still exists, where white people wearing white shorts and short-sleeved white tee-shirts sip iced tea and tell racist jokes, unencumbered by ever being woke.
Works Cited
Berlant, Lauren. “In 'Citizen,' Poet Strips Bare The Realities Of Everyday Racism.”
Bombmagazine.org. n.d. 6 June 2016.
Delgado, Richard and Jean Stefancic. Critical White Studies: Looking Behind the Mirror. Temple University Press. Philadelphia. 1996. Print.
Derricotte, Toi. The Black Notebooks: an interior journey. W. W. Norton & Company. New York. 1997. Print.
Demott, Benjamin. Passing: a Black Poet Chronicles Life in a White World. New York
Times Book Review. Nov 2, 1997. Print.
Hoover, Elizabeth. “We Are Not Post-racial: An Interview with Toi Derricotte.” Sampsoniaway.org. June 18 2010.
Koppel, Nathan. “Private Clubs that Aren’t Private under the Law: Courts Might Deem Groups Public if They Have Broad Admissions Policies but Discriminate Based on Gender or Race.” The Wall Street Journal. 25 June 2009. Print.
NPR.org. Heard on Weekend Edition. Saturday, January 3, 2015. 7:58 AM ET.
Rankine, Claudia. Citizen: An American Lyric. Graywolf Press. 2014. Print.
Schwartz, Alexandra. “On Being Seen: An Interview with Claudia Rankine from Ferguson.” The New Yorker. 22 Aug 2014. Print.
How The Black Notebooks and Citizen explore Contemporary Segregation
The Civil Rights Act of 1964 ended racial segregation in public places like schools, busses, and water fountains, but it did not disallow discrimination in all private spaces. Some white communities took note of this asterisk and used it to keep people of color out of certain interior environments, like their country clubs. Within the safe havens of these clubs, privileged white people could have brunch, swim, and play golf and tennis, without ever having to watch what they said, or share a locker room towel-down next to a black body. These modern, sporty variations on pre-1960’s segregation have not gone unnoticed by a pair of contemporary female black authors, Toi Derricotte and Claudia Rankine, both of whose work explores the interior spaces of country club culture as physical manifestations of institutional racism. Through the juxtaposition of a black family against a white-only country club in The Black Notebooks, and the black body of Serena Williams against the whiteness of professional tennis in Citizen, Derricotte and Rankine expose pockets of segregation, and the secret white America they protect....
...Keeping black bodies out of these spaces allows for the whites in these insulated spaces to forget the past, and to tell the racist jokes they want to tell, uninhibited by the discomforts of “political correctness,” and the same “dignity” and “courageousness” expected of black athletes in white spaces. It allows for hypocritical behavior. As Rankine said in an interview with NPR, “There are two worlds out there; two America's out there. If you're a white person, there's one way of being a citizen in our country; and if you're a brown or a black body, there's another way of being a citizen and that way is very close to death”(NPR).
Through their work, Toi Derricotte and Claudia Rankine explore the interior spaces of country club culture as “a way of talking about invisible racism” (Schwartz), and show what whiteness is still willing to do to protect all it has gained. Both writers are engaged in active resistance to the dominant power structure. Both books are working to mine societal caves where, despite The Civil Rights Act, and the claims of some that we live in a post-racial society, segregation still exists, where white people wearing white shorts and short-sleeved white tee-shirts sip iced tea and tell racist jokes, unencumbered by ever being woke.
Works Cited
Berlant, Lauren. “In 'Citizen,' Poet Strips Bare The Realities Of Everyday Racism.”
Bombmagazine.org. n.d. 6 June 2016.
Delgado, Richard and Jean Stefancic. Critical White Studies: Looking Behind the Mirror. Temple University Press. Philadelphia. 1996. Print.
Derricotte, Toi. The Black Notebooks: an interior journey. W. W. Norton & Company. New York. 1997. Print.
Demott, Benjamin. Passing: a Black Poet Chronicles Life in a White World. New York
Times Book Review. Nov 2, 1997. Print.
Hoover, Elizabeth. “We Are Not Post-racial: An Interview with Toi Derricotte.” Sampsoniaway.org. June 18 2010.
Koppel, Nathan. “Private Clubs that Aren’t Private under the Law: Courts Might Deem Groups Public if They Have Broad Admissions Policies but Discriminate Based on Gender or Race.” The Wall Street Journal. 25 June 2009. Print.
NPR.org. Heard on Weekend Edition. Saturday, January 3, 2015. 7:58 AM ET.
Rankine, Claudia. Citizen: An American Lyric. Graywolf Press. 2014. Print.
Schwartz, Alexandra. “On Being Seen: An Interview with Claudia Rankine from Ferguson.” The New Yorker. 22 Aug 2014. Print.
