In consideration of the day, and of some of my pale brethren who STILL cant get over the fact that this is a holiday or say WE dont get any special day! (Dude-EVERY DAY is White Boy Day)- yall need to read White Lotus by John Hersey, author of Hiroshima. It was his attempt to process for himself an alternate reality in which white folk were enslaved by an alien culture and our reactions to that. It was written in 1964 at the height of the Civil Rights movement, and I thought it did quite well considering the ambitious scope of the project. It imagined a dystopian future where America was defeated and helpless under China . 400 years of African-American experience are compressed into the lifetime of a lone white girl; from her capture in Arizona and Middle Passage-ment via the Japanese to enslavement in China. All the different coping strategies- assimilation,insubordination, flight, resistance, self-destructive behaviors, suicide- all were part of the process of acculturation on both sides. Finally, under her inspiration the slaves adopted the symbolism of the dominant culture by using the the sleeping crane posture in silent, non-violent protest for their rights in their new environment. Becoming a mass phenomenon, the novel ends with White Lotus crane movement ultimately securing grudging civil rights from the government.
Posted on: Mon, 19 Jan 2015 23:19:43 +0000
Trending Topics
Recently Viewed Topics
© 2015