โ๐๐ฉ๐ฆ ๐ฑ๐ข๐ณ๐ข๐ฅ๐ฐ๐น ๐ฐ๐ง ๐ฆ๐ฅ๐ถ๐ค๐ข๐ต๐ช๐ฐ๐ฏ ๐ช๐ด ๐ฑ๐ณ๐ฆ๐ค๐ช๐ด๐ฆ๐ญ๐บ ๐ต๐ฉ๐ช๐ด – ๐ต๐ฉ๐ข๐ต ๐ข๐ด ๐ฐ๐ฏ๐ฆ ๐ฃ๐ฆ๐จ๐ช๐ฏ๐ด ๐ต๐ฐ ๐ฃ๐ฆ๐ค๐ฐ๐ฎ๐ฆ ๐ค๐ฐ๐ฏ๐ด๐ค๐ช๐ฐ๐ถ๐ด, ๐ฐ๐ฏ๐ฆ ๐ฃ๐ฆ๐จ๐ช๐ฏ๐ด ๐ต๐ฐ ๐ฆ๐น๐ข๐ฎ๐ช๐ฏ๐ฆ ๐ต๐ฉ๐ฆ ๐ด๐ฐ๐ค๐ช๐ฆ๐ต๐บ ๐ช๐ฏ ๐ธ๐ฉ๐ช๐ค๐ฉ ๐ฉ๐ฆ ๐ช๐ด ๐ฃ๐ฆ๐ช๐ฏ๐จ ๐ฆ๐ฅ๐ถ๐ค๐ข๐ต๐ฆ๐ฅ.โ โ James Baldwin
What was the last book you read that reminded you of yourself?
When I was in high school, my parents paid for me to go on a class trip to Europe. On the trip, I had my first real taste of a world that was culturally different from my own.
Upon my return home, I couldnโt stop talking about this trip, & I found some way to always tie the conversation back to what I had seen while I was away. Fed up, my father finally told me, that he hadnโt sent me there to come back & question he & my mother or the life they were providing for me.
I was stunned. In my mind, Iโd only been sharing my observations about the vastness of the world. But to my father, I had presented my observations in juxtaposition to the life he & my mother had provided me, & this was akin to blasphemy to my proud African-American parents. This experience mirrors Teeโs awakening in Crick Crack, Monkey by Merle Hodge.
Published in 1970, Hodgeโs novel is celebrated as a significant work in the Caribbean Literature canon. Set in Trinidad, Hodgeโs story is a coming of age story of Tee, a young girl who is shuffled between two auntsโ houses. Teeโs Aunt Tantie and Aunt Beatrice represent the working & upwardly mobile classes of Trinidad & Tobago, respectively, & both vie for a chance to raise Tee & shape her views on the world.
While this novel is not โaction-packed,โ it made me think of how forcibly โwhitenessโ gets thrust upon Black, Indigenous, and other people of color. We as minorities often never question ourselves or our cultural traditions until weโre sent to be educated in White spaces or come in contact with a White person who strips us of our humanity.
Watching Teeโs views of places she loves unravel as sheโs forced to try to move closer to an ideal of wealth & whiteness thatโs ever present on her island helped me began to understand why my father rebuked me waxing poetic about Europe so long ago.
