America's New Role: Bully

Up until now, America had played a familiar role: Con-artist. They were able to sway nations to agree to various things that clearly had American interests. Of course, no one realized it at the time, but reflecting on the past one can clearly see that America was always looking out for "numero uno." At least America had good intentions along with their advancement in the world. The League of Nations would have been beautiful for all, especially America. This was a nice concept, for it saw America has the unifying bond between all countries. Then came the Cold War. The end of this war signaled the shift from this role to the next. America had superior military ability, which was made evident with their success against the Soviet Union. This paved the way for America to carry out their plan of "world domination"-by this I mean they wanted all countries to follow their ideals of freedom, democracy, and capitalism. Andrew Bacevich brilliantly phrases it,"In the century just begun, any nation refusing to adhere to that model-embodied by the United States-was doomed to fail." Of course, "warrior president" George W. Bush found it America's job to assure the world that others were carrying out this mission-the mission to model themselves after the US. Robert Kagan made a very interesting remark, "America did not change on September 11. It only became more itself." This is true. This did not bring the US to cry for peace in the streets, but rather it brought the US to send soldiers in various over-seas places to fight we're not sure who and we're not sure for what. America is now a police force. They patrol the oceans with a navy far greater-in size, stature, etc-than the Royal Navy. Our military grows by the year. With so many problems within our own country, how can America possibly afford to do this? I understand the importance of a standing army, but already being such a great power, why can't America scale down? Not even scale down, just remain at the position they are in now. We do not have to be a defensive military or an offensive one. We can have a balanced medium. Over 100 countries occupy American military forces. This is an absurd number. If the military can scale down and America can resist the temptation to dominate the globe, our domestic relationships will improve-by that I mean citizen relationships with the president, the government, and even other citizens.

Future Readings

If you liked Oscar Zeta Acosta's Autobiography of a Brown Buffalo, you might like the sequel The Revolt of the Cockroach People.

If you liked Bob Dylan's Chronicles and enjoyed Todd Haynes' movie I'm Not There, you might like Greil Marcus' book The Old, Weird America.

If you liked James Weldon Johnson's novel Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man, you might like his actual autobiography Along This Way.

In the off-chance you liked Gertrude Stein's Autobiography of Alice B. Toklas, you might like her first and easiest-to-read novel Three Lives.

If you liked Zitkala-Sa's American Indian Stories, you will probably enjoy Sherman Alexie's collection of short fiction The Lone Ranger and Tonto Fistfight in Heaven. (Alexie's work has appeared The New Yorker, and he has appeared on The Colbert Report.)

If you liked Marjane Satrapi's graphic novel Persepolis, you will find Art Spiegelman's Maus worthwhile. You might also want to read Zimbabwean novelist Tsitsi Dangaremba's Nervous Conditions, which is not a graphic novel, but Dangarembga deals with issues similar to that of Satrapi.

Whether or not you liked Ben Franklin's Autobiogrpahy, you should read Piri Thomas' 1967 autobiography Down These Means Streets.

If you liked Harriet Wilson's Our Nig, then you should read everything by Toni Morrison.

If you liked James Seaver's Narrative in the Life of Ms. Mary Jemison, then you'd find Howard Zinn's A People's History of the United States pretty interesting.

A few more novels that I like, which you may or may not:
Gunter Grass, The Tin Drum.
John Okada, No-No Boy.
Arundathi Roy, The God of Small Things.

Lastly, Joan Didion's allusively-titled essay collection The White Album, and Oliver Sacks' clinical tales The Man who Mistook His Wife for a Hat are good reads.

Enjoy!

Virginia's Paper (by Wanda)

Virginia’s paper is about Bob Dylan’s Chronicles and Simmel’s essay, “The Stranger.” She argues that Dylan purposefully distances himself from the reader, who reads the book in order to get a closer perspective on his life, and decides to rather remain a stranger, like the one described in Simmel’s essay. Thus, Virginia’s essay analyzes Dylan’s style of writing that plays around with the persona and identity, and how it portrays Dylan as the “Stranger.” The thesis explains three aspects of Dylan’s writing that puts distance between him and the reader: labeling himself as the Outsider, admitting a part of his life that most people have no idea of, and depicting himself as a free vagabond, or a frontiersman. The antithesis is that sometimes Dylan tries to actively reach out for the reader and minimize the distance. Yet, the thesis and antithesis synthesizes into Virginia’s conclusion that Dylan’s promotion of both distance and connection he remains a mystical and mythical figure, undermining our hopes to know him better.

I would like some more explanation about the antithesis and how it reaffirms Dylan’s status as a stranger, in relation to Simmel’s essay. Does the sense of connection and closeness act as a camouflage, to trick the reader into knowing him well? Or is it another veil, another actual step Dylan takes back from the readers?

Wanda's Paper

Wanda’s paper addresses the dual identities present in Johnson’s Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man and uses Du Bois essay “Of Our Spiritual Strivings” to deepen the argument. Her thesis states being black in America extends to “white” people as well. Her argument is developed by referring to the changes that Johnson (the narrator) goes through throughout the book. She addresses how Johnson, who originally identifies as a white person, learns to look down on blacks while in his original situation. Once he finds out he is bi-racial, he begins to feel confused about his identity and begins to withdraw himself from white society, isolating himself with his music. At this point, he is at an in-between stage. Wanda then introduces the idea that even though he begins to identify more with his black heritage, he does not completely abandon his white identity. However, the way he relates to white culture changes. In his relationship, he seems more like a secondary citizen. For instance, in the way he strives to date white women yet doesn’t think himself fully worthy or the way he works for a white man as an entertainer. After this, he continues to “flip-flop” between cultures, mixing aspects of both, yet never belonging to either. This sense of uncertain, incomplete belonging is similar to what is outlined in Du Bois.

I think Wanda does a good job of explaining, with numerous examples, they ways that a “double consciousness” exists. However it is not really clarify why it exists. Why can’t a person simply identify as a mixture? One way to answer this is to look at the role of society more closely. It might be interesting to look at travel; how does his identification and understanding of his race vary depending on his location?In the south, he considers himself to be black, in the North he relates more closely with white. Together this indicates race is a product of surrounding.

Vu's Paper

Vu's underlying topic surrounds itself around the scarring of Frado's life, and the inability of the characters in the story to subsequently act upon Frado's pain and be "moral" human beings. To add onto this point Vu explains that W.E.B Dubois' idea of the double-consciousness directly correlates with Frado's situation as a free-slave in a Northern home where she is forced to act as a servant. Vu proposes the fact that the "double-existance" that Frado holds is the underlying theme in "Our Nig". Even though Frado is a free-citizen she still has to face the cultural hatred that the Bellmont family throws at her. Frado comes to the point where she disowns her very being because of the hatred she has to put up with on a daily basis. Frado loses her identity as a black girl even though she is technically able to be whomever she desires without feeling persecuted (she is free). One of Vu's point signals that even the characters who seem to at least try to act based upon their sense of morality seem to succomb to the cruelty and prejudice that the Bellmont family imposes on her.
The characters in the story that try to help Frado seem to attempt to uphold the standards and ideologies of the North. Whenever Mr. Bellmont treats Frado as an equal or even attempts to do so, it seems that someone else in the family brings her down.
Vu's final point focuses on the fact that the internal struggle amongst the characters seems to manifest itself physically through death and illness. Ultimatley one of the only people in the story that seem to fulfill their promises to Frado passes away, James.

Casey's paper

Casey's paper focuses on the role of music and performance in The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man. She uses a number of ideas from Du Bois to help understand the narrator's actions and feelings. The narrator's struggle with being both black and white indicates the existence of a double conscious. Casey argues that the narrator attributes two aspects of his life- his music and his school- to the races he is trying to choose between. She uses two examples to illustrate Du Bois' idea of seeing oneself as others do. These include his experiences with his father and a duet with a girl.

I think it would be good to expand the idea of how he attributes his music and his school to being both black and white. I wonder if you could analyze the scene where the narrator sees his father with another family at the opera. Would this situation relate to your argument about musical performances? I would also explore the connection between race and performance to a greater level.

Dan's paper

In his paper Dan traces the ex-colored's man path to estrangement from society. He starts by looking at the difficulties the narrator faces with deciding which race he belong to. Using Simmel's arguments, Dan very convincingly proves that the ex-colored man is a stranger to both races. The next step in the alienation process is the narrator's journey to Europe where his estrangement becomes not just racial but national as well. He sees himself as an observer of the United States rather than a functional part of it. The last and absolute part of his estrangement is the denial of his past and the change of his name. He is no longer a stranger just to a race or a nation; he becomes a stranger to society.
Dan's paper raises the question about social alienation and how it arises. Simmel looks at the phenomenon of the stranger mostly from the perspective of the group and how the stranger is seen by them. I think Dan's paper does a great job of looking at the same phenomenon but from the stranger's perspective. Social alienation cannot occur without both society and the person playing a role, so to expand the paper, it would be interesting to look at how other people see the ex-colored man, and not just how he sees the world around him.