AMST 300 Abstract

Black Pass Discrepancies (272)

Definitions of Blackness in 21^st Century African America

This dissertation examines the conflicting meanings of what is black in the 21^st century. Beyond skin, this awareness encompasses and influences speech, clothing, and attitude. Deviations within the hegemonic framework of expectations is ostracized and denied full inclusion of black unity from some social groups. The post-Civil Rights generation asserts validation and status with affinity to specific styles and name brand loyalty. I will examine group identification models to support the mechanics that go into racial formation of African Americans. I will also use ethnographic excerpts of how black people view stigmas of ‘acting black’ and ‘acting white’. Popular items in fashion and technology will be reviewed for their significance to defining what black means to some people. These varying meanings have hampered the progression of blacks socially as a whole and continue the social hierarchical constraints whites enacted upon blacks pre Civil Rights. This dissertation suggests that after the Civil Rights era, blacks began emulating celebrities and other blacks that had success, money, and respect instead of activists and political pioneers. Why is a black person criticized for not liking things that most people like? Why is denying blackness and inferring whiteness a response to something different within the culture? Since the Civil Rights era, blacks are included in pop culture, as business entrepreneurs, and stars embodying personal success. Later generations are detached from the struggle for inequality and those that never get ostracized do not see the injustice within the racial dynamic of who is real, fake, or non-existent according to the favored majority.  Awareness of disunity and what is acceptable in confronting differences is essential to equalizing racial cognizance.