Minstrelsy in Sports

I'm rather ashamed that I hadn't noticed the references to minstrelsy in relation to Basketball in White Boy Shuffle. They're really quite obvious, particularly the costume Gunnar wears to his last game. That one I caught, but the extent of my thoughts on the passage were something like "Hm. White on his mouth. Black-face, maybe?" I'll try to be more thoughtful when I read from now on, because the book is surprisingly deep. On the surface it seems comedic and plot based, but it's often really thoughtful. I guess good comedy often is.
I think there are several components to Beatty's commentary on the world of sports, not all of which are related to race. An important part of the troublesome dynamic takes place even in Hillside, in the absence of white culture. Mostly what the book's getting at, I think, is the dehumanizing aspect of fame in general, but there seems to be something particularly bad about gaining fame for something like athletics (which Gunnar hasn't even put a lot of effort into).
This is hinted at even before basketball becomes Gunnar's claim to fame. he makes an interesting comment in response to Coach Shimimoto's complaints about being called "Coach". "Coach, if you want to be an authority figure, you've got to live with the dehumanizing consequences," Gunnar tells him. In a sense, Shimimoto's position is very different from Gunnar's, but in that it is a position that people look up to, and therefore defines you and overshadows your humanity, they're somewhat analogous. Taking a job in the limelight thrusts an image onto you, whether you like it or not, to the extent that even your wife will be addressing you by your occupational title.
At this point in the story, Gunnar doesn't really seem to sympathize with Shimimoto, but perhaps if he were to look back on his coach's complaints after his experience at high school, he would understand. While at first his status as a basketball god seems to be his way into the culture he's been trying to assimilate with, it quickly develops into an issue for Gunnar. He doesn't actually seem to make any friends through basketball, because he's not really one of their peers anymore, he's something more: a prize to the girls, a legend to the guys.
Another issue with the sports system is made particularly obvious at basketball camp. Here, the dynamic between the coaches/officials and the players is criticized. The players are seen as game-winning machines, their health and skills studiously measured. Race comes into play more here, as we witness mostly black teens being thoroughly controlled by white men. This certainly calls to mind images of slavery, but here I'm trying to talk about minstrelsy, so how does that come into play? Well, it's more obvious in later sections of the book, because at camp they lack an audience, but the concept of young black men performing for the sake of at least partly white groups, playing into stereotypes built around their skills (singing and dancing/basketball), and being defined solely by these stereotypes is familiar.
Of course, the dynamic is most obvious when Gunnar becomes a young black guy who is the star player for an all white audience. So obvious, in fact, that he points it out himself in his minstrel costume (the big painted on lips and gloves, undignified posture, etc.) at his last game. Nobody seems to understand. They all obliviously cheer his goofiness on. It's a little painful to read, but it makes Gunnar's point beautifully.
Basketball gives him an interesting power over his audience's emotions, as he notices while making a free throw for Hillside, which I imagine goes along (to some extent) with any sort of performance. So, maybe even minstrelsy. But this comes at a price: dehumanization and stereotyping. The kids at the rich school are excited to play with him because he's a back basketball player, a manifestation of a vague stereotype, not because they're legitimately interested in Gunnar as a person.
Sports in general are kind of a weird thing. The players may enjoy the game, but there's so much stress and pressure associated with athletics, it's hard to imagine they really enjoy playing competitively all that much. Really, the sports are for the spectators. So, the life of a star athlete may seem glamorous, but they become very much defined by their entertainment value.

White Boy Shuffle has been interesting for me to read because, despite the occasional (and I'm sure intentional) departures from realism for the sake of advancing a point, it's a pretty realistic book about growing up in modern America. It's about something I've experienced, so can relate to in a way I couldn't with the other books we've read. The issue for me is, while often I can relate to Gunnar's awkwardness and the stresses of moving and what not, objectively, the characters that are most similar to me are the obnoxious, privileged white kids. I too had a second grade class with like one black kid, but I wasn't that kid. I was the white girl who ate up, without question, the teacher's doctrine about colorblindness, and scorned those who answered questions wrong (there really wasn't much sarcasm or snark in second grade, but I probably wouldn't have appreciated that either).

The scene that got to me the most was the Shakespeare competition. The students from Gunnar's school are very familiar with the material and end up failing because of the pressure put on them by the perfect, advantaged white performances, with full costumes and everything. I have been those advantaged white kids. It made me feel somewhat icky then, but even ickier now, after reading that passage. On top of that, Gunnar portrayed the liberal white encouragement and pity as extremely patronizing so I feel icky for having felt icky. 

The analogies to the Shakespeare competition ring unfortunately true with my experience at Science Olympiad last year. We didn't have a coach or any funding or even enough people on our team so we kinda fancied ourselves the underdogs. We didn't even try very hard. One of the machines was made with a paperclip and some string literally 5 minutes before it was due. Iulianna and I were assigned to an event two days before the competition so we said our non-existent machine "had some complications" so that we could take the written test we hadn't studied for and get a couple points (don't tell the Science Olympiad people). And (though we didn't win those two events) our team still won overall by a healthy margin. And I thought, "Wow. That seems unfair. Those other teams tried harder." The idea that maybe the pressure put on other schools by our nerdiness could have played a part in our victory makes it even worse.
Although, it was kind of turned around on us at state, seeing all those other teams from out of town, trailing posies of supporters and wearing particularly expensive looking t-shirts. At least we were able to use their superior means as an excuse for not winning, which I suppose Gunnar sort of did too. It's a shame that the expectations of the other teams and the judges become self fulfilling prophesies, but that doesn't exactly mean they're at fault. Though they ideally shouldn't have to, Gunnar's team could have fought through the anxiety. And, actually I don't think that Beatty is exactly blaming anyone in this passage (well, maybe the judges). I mean, what could they have done? Inequality like this is bad, and as individuals who are part of the system we are somewhat at fault, but it's not clear what we (as privileged competitors) can actually do to fix the problem.

Mintsrel stuff

First, I would just like to mention that we learned the other day in History that Sambo was a derogatory term used for slaves that accepted their position and respected the plantation owners and what not, and immediately I though of Invisible Man. The name really enforces the submissive aspect of the caricature that the dolls embody (this caricature being the whole minstrel thing that we've been talking about). It removes every shred of a doubt that the doll could be dancing because its happy (for its own sake) and not for the sake of amused white onlookers. By the doll I mean the characters, of course: the characters that follow the minstrel tradition. My thoughts in this post are very disorganized, I apologize.
So, speaking of minstrels, let's get into that a bit. This was something I was not aware of till this class, but has come up in the discussion of three out of four books so far, so I take it it's a pretty big deal. Invisible Man touches on it relatively briefly because it goes over so much. The Sambo/coin bank bits are pretty much the extent of it I think, but it's obviously that minstrelsy is an important grievance that helps the narrator realize his anger toward racial injustices.
In their Eyes Were Watching God it's not explicitly mentioned, but one of the most substantive criticisms (in my opinion) of the book was that it promotes minstrelsy. I think that Hurston can't really be blamed for including some comedy in her book and the one dimensional characters are justified by the extent to which she explores Janie's character, but I would understand if someone were a bit offended by some of the characters given this country's history with minstrelsy.
Lets see, uh, White Boy Shuffle. Right. All of Gunnar's ancestors seem to be minstrels in a way. They all humiliate themselves to fit into white society. The one guy who ran away to slavery is a perfect example of a Sambo. Even Gunnar himself seems to fall into it a bit at the beginning, accepting his position as cool funny black guy. I suspect he will grow out of this, though. Also, his humor is less at his own expense and more at others', so it's not quite the same.
^^ This was written before I saw the movie. Now I have a little more to say. First of all, "Sambo" is not just a term used to describe subservient slaves. Later, it became the name of a prominent character and stereotype that evolved from Jim Crow: a goofy, raggedy, dancing slave man. Irresponsibility, child-like simplicity of emotion, and a happiness to serve all make this character very unsettling to modern audiences. However, the character spread through American culture quickly in the 18 and 19 hundreds, just the way that the laughing white crowds eat it up on the streets of New York in Invisible Man, giving no thought to the absurdity of the character.
On the topic of defense of Hurston, the movie wrapped up with a man explaining that the stereotype characters were not inherently bad, and that it was the lack of serious and complex African American characters that was really troubling. I think this fits in very nicely with my opinion of minstrelsy in Their Eyes Were Watching God: not all the characters are like that so it's alright. One could say, "but they're still two dimensional characters" but no one could ever be expected to flesh out every single character in a novel completely. Some characters exist to make a point or move the plot along or for comic relief and that's okay. In fact, it's more than okay, it's necessary.
I have decided that Gunnar isn't a minstrel at all. He really doesn't conform to any of the stereotypes that go along with Sambo or the Pickenineys (however you spell that). He's not violent or impulsive, his humor isn't self-deprecating (Though he says it is, all the examples he gives us have a sort of satirical sarcasm that almost attacks whoever he's speaking with. Rather than making him look simple and happy, it makes him look thoughtful and dark behind a fun exterior. Whether people see this or not is another question.)
More than anything though, the movie confused me about what think about racism. Through this whole class I've had to rethink it a lot (which is great), and after that whirl wind of ambiguity and complexity, I really just need time to gather my thoughts.

So, thus far in our class we have covered a book by Richard Wright, a book by Ralph Ellison, and most of a book by Zora Neal Hurston. The books are all part of the same curriculum and there are reoccurring themes for sure, but when dealing with a topic as complicated as African American fiction, there are bound to be differing opinions within the body of literature. All the authors wrote during a similar time frame, so I thought I would take a quick look at their relations with one another, and what they thought of each others' work.

Hurston's book wasn't very well received at first by a lot of people. Although several sites claimed Ellison was influenced by her work through the Harlem Renaissance, he actually said Their Eyes Were Watching God had a "blight of calculated burlesque". This is a creative way to phrase a really biting insult. I have a feeling he was criticizing the characters and their apparent simplicity. And if you think about it, in contrast with the narrator in Invisible Man, the characters in Their Eyes Were Watching God aren't very intellectually developed or complex. He gave the impression in his review that he thought Hurston's work (though "lyrical") was behind the times; she was apparently "unaware of the technical experimentation" influenced by Stein, Hemingway, etc. He also mentions that the "casual brutalities" of the South are not a part of the story, so I guess she wasn't political enough for Ellison, which is kind of ironic because he received similar criticism for Invisible Man. Also, he seemed to be all into the purity of art stuff, we know he wasn't aligned with the communists or the black power movement, and the movie didn't mention any active political work aside from his writing. So, I don't really know what Ellison was getting at exactly.

Anyway, moving on (and trying not to pick sides). I don't think Hurston got to be famous enough during her time to have written a lot of reviews herself (I read this thing that said she died broke and unrecognized by the literary community, which is sad), so I don't know what she thought of Ellison. Though I'm sure she was familiar with him because she lived for over ten years after Invisible Man was published. Similarly with Wright; she must have been aware of him, but I'm not sure what she thought of him.

Wright also reviewed Their Eyes Were Watching God, and took similar issue with it to Ellison. He admitted that it's written well, but insisted that she portrays her characters too simply and plays into the "minstrel" tradition forced onto African Americans (think Sambo dolls and coin bank). If you want to read the full article, here's a link: http://people.virginia.edu/~sfr/enam358/wrightrev.html  (warning, contains spoilers)

I haven't done any extra research on Wright's relationship with Ellison, but I know that they knew each other and he was kind of Ellison's gateway into the literary community. I wonder if they were still on good terms later in life given Ellison's harsh portrayal of the communist party in his novel. I can't help but see a little of Wright in Jack, given Wright's political views, and the (semi-autobiographical) book seems to depict a sudden, potentially enemy-creating split between the narrator and the communists. Then again, Invisible Man is almost an homage to Native Son, referencing it throughout and building off it's ideas. I don't know how sincere the allusions are, though. For all I know, Ellison could be mocking Native Son in a way. I bet Ellison would critique Bigger's simplicity.

I find it really interesting how much disagreement there was within the progressive, book-writing, African American community, and how, despite this, they are constantly being grouped as if they were all on the same side.
So, who do you agree with?

Jazz

In the movie in class, it was mentioned that Ellison actually started his career in music, specifically jazz. It's fairly plain that Invisible Man is a little bit autobiographical, and it seemed to me that jazz (and the desire to become a musician) to Ellison was something like writing (and the related aspirations of professional success) to the narrator. They were skills, passion even, that started to show early in life. The narrator's graduation speech is highly praised, and Ellison began playing the cornet at age 9. Both young men received a scholarship for their talent that sent them to (extremely similar) colleges. They perused their talent in college for some time before being side-tracked and leaving for New York.
In their jobs after this they abandoned their skills somewhat. Ellison worked briefly with the communist party, and the narrator's search for a job initially ended at a paint factory, where literary prowess was completely useless.
In the more long term jobs that they find after this their talents come in handy some, but are not primary requirements in the job description. I'm speaking here of the narrator's work in the Brotherhood and Ellison early literary work; short stories for magazines and what not. I do not think that these were exactly parallel times, because Ellison's job would evolve into something much more long term, while the narrator would soon become disillusioned with the Brotherhood, but both times represent old skills showing through in a new context.
Music introduced Ellison to artistic thought. More specifically, an interest in music generally comes along with some amount of lyrical consideration. In this way, Ellison was likely prepared somewhat for poetry. Jazz also influenced the style and themes of some of his writing. Ellison speaks in his introduction to Invisible man of how he drew from his training in Jazz when writing the novel. The way he describes the book coming out of itself is reminiscent of jazz improv, and Louis Armstrong's "Black and Blue" prompts the question that gets the book started.
Similarly, the narrator's oratory skills make him a useful member of the Brotherhood--it's even what gets him the occupation in the first place-- but it's not the primary aspect of the job. As we learn more and more throughout the story, he is a face more than a voice, but he builds his power as a symbol through his speeches.
I think it is important to note that, in the end of the novel, the narrator is pursuing his talent fully; writing a novel, while Ellison sticks with literature. However, the narrator is not using his talent for the job(s) he had originally intended to have. Likewise, while Ellison stuck with literature and did not return to Jazz, his fascination with music continued to influence his work (one example is his short story "Living with Music").

Jack's Eye

So what's up with Jack's eye? And, more importantly--since it is (yet another) instance of the surreal symbolism that defines this book--what's up with all the stuff it represents? (And there's a lot)
After a heated discussion with the narrator, Jack's glass eye pops right out of his head. Knowing Ellison, the meaning of this incident goes a little deeper, but the gravity of what the eye represents for us and for the narrator takes some looking into.
First, it represents the fatal flaw of the Brotherhood. The speech Jack gives that leads his eye to detach from his face tells all. The flaw comes from within; from among the leaders, who, however open minded and rational they pride themselves in being, will argue till their eyes pop out if their authority is challenged. They claim to be "brothers", but, like the narrator points out, act more like fathers, who refuse to acknowledge that they might be wrong, and more importantly, refuse to give the narrator any power of his own. Remind you of any/everyone else?
The speech also shows how they fail to take emotion and individual importance into account in their tactics and internal affairs. Jack makes it clear that when Clifton sold the dolls, he became completely dead to them, and his actual death was of no consequence.
There is a sentence a couple of pages before the eyeball incident in which Jack mentions that the Sambo dolls could "explode" in the "face" of the brotherhood. The narrator assures them that their faces are safe. He's wrong. A couple minutes later, Jack's face literally explodes, but it's not the dolls that are at fault, it's Jack's own inappropriate response to the narrator's speech.
Most importantly, the eye represents blindness. Though the narrator's realization of the blindness of the others around him is gradual, it culminates in the moment he sees Jack with no eye.
Like I said, he works up to it: In his speech about Clifton he tells people not try try to understand Clifton because there's no way they can see him fully. Just before everything comes together in his head, he sees into the dark half of the room for the first time--I don't claim to fully understand this, but something is happening in his mind-- and then, POP! It all comes together, he blabbers for a paragraph and comes out realizing that Jack's lack of sight is not only literal.
The blindness it represents gives us a new look at what Jack likes to think it represents; sacrifice and discipline. Jack lost his eye fighting for a cause, which he sees as a display of his virtue, but it could imply that to completely follow a cause, one must become a little blind. Certainly it could imply that to follow orders thoughtlessly causes and/or indicates blindness. Sure enough, after the narrator has his epiphany--thanks in part to Jack's glass eye--he starts to stop following the Brotherhood's orders.

Circus of the City

In addition to being a really interesting in itself, Circus of the City has a lot of themes in common with Invisible Man, so I thought I would try to expand on what we covered in class. Really, I think we just scratched the surface of the relevant stuff going on here. Rather than dissect the poem, I'm gonna try to tie it in with stuff from Invisible Man.
Similarities:

•  The poem is about hidden, misunderstood enlightenment of a sort; everyone's wrong but a select few who are shunned for their wisdom. One cannot be both wise and successful in society which seems to be the case in Invisible Man as well. In the book it's clear that, if you're black, and choose to be a part of society, you can be both lucky and immoral (Bledsoe), or you can suffer (grandfather, dispossessed people). The poem addresses this too, devoting a paragraph to those who fit in, but at great cost to their integrity (businessmen and indecisive women), and paragraph to those who have been destroyed by the city (the walleyed beggars and birds tie-dyed with soot). 

• In the book, those who reach an understanding of what's really going on (older narrator, vet) don't bother acting for others, making them come across as really weird till you listen to what they're actually saying. Like in the novel, the only truly wise character is the local "crazy", Mary. All these people are pushed from society in one way or another. They become invisible in that no one can take them seriously or see how they really think. 

• The path the narrator of the poem takes is similar to the path of the narrator of Invisible man. They both start off like most people, looking down on those considered "crazy", and end up admiring them

• Of course I have to mention the dream themes going on.  In the poem, "dreaming" represents the (potentially dangerous) oddities of human nature and our blindness to them when we all do them the same. Everyone is dreaming because we all do irrational things, but Mary dreams openly, while the city is said to "dream itself awake." In Invisible Man, the narrator's early life comes across much like a dream because of how he's pushed around with little control or awareness of the strangeness around him. He believes, of course, at this point, that he is completely awake. Recently in our reading, in the midst of a very dynamic stage for the character, he mentions he is half asleep and half awake. He was directly referring to his state upon waking in the morning, but Ellison hides stuff like this all the time and I think there's a deeper meaning. As the narrator becomes aware of his surroundings he seems to be dreaming less and less- in some ways. He's more lucid and seems to be making more decisions, but his life remains super surreal. I imagine this is something like what Mary (in the poem) experiences.
• Mary's unique point of view allows her a lot of freedom, and even some power. She is able do what she wants, when she wants, without shame. She is also immune to the "deep voiced commands to go away". She can "beat the air into obedience" and always make her words "come out right". The vet and the older narrator seem similarly free.
• Both have "white is right" themes. The poem seems to portray people's rejection of Mary as similar to their rejection of black people/culture. The narrator mentions how her family (like Mary) was less concerned about fitting in than most people in her city. 
• A character named Mary. Native Son too. 

Though there are many similarities, I think that Invisible Man's criticism of society kind of ends at racism, (and its related blindness and lack of opportunity) while Circus of the City's extends to any sort of irrational societal distinction between a right and a wrong. Normalcy and weirdness are not concepts that an enlightened character gives any thought to in this poem. In fact, those who claim to be normal, and seem to be harmless; "businessmen benign" have evil within them; "malignant interest rates". The rejection of normalcy is not quite so present in Invisible Man, I think. It shows up, but Ellison is not explicitly telling us to not worry about fitting in.