The Racial Imaginary: Writers on
Race in the Life of the Mind Edited by Claudia Rankine, Beth
Loffreda, & Max King Cap
Fence Books
285 pages $19.95 USD
Reviewed by Clara B. Jones*
Who is permitted to write about Race
and People of Color? Claudia Rankine is a renowned poet whose
popularity seems to increase as her “prosecutorial” formulations
multiply. Receiving several prestigious nominations and awards,
Rankine is at her best when writing about the Universal or the
Transcendent (“Some years there exists a wanting to escape.”),
literary configurations that Rankine dismisses in the volume under
review. The Introduction to The Racial Imaginary, written with
the writer, Beth Loffreda (hereafter, R&L), informs us that
Rankine initiated the Racial Imaginary project online with “an open
letter about race and the creative imagination” (p 13), soliciting
readers' responses. The resulting book presents 28 selected posts,
illustrated by strong and timely artwork chosen by the artist Max
King Cap.
R&L's Introduction is most emphatic
when rejecting “the imagination [as] a free space” (15) and when
arguing that “To say, as a white writer, that I have a right to
write about whoever I want, including writing from the point of view
of characters of color—that I have a right of access and that my
artistry is harmed if I am told I cannot do so—is to make a
mistake.” (15-16). These themes continually resonate with the
reader. The volume is divided into five Sections—Institutions,
Lives, Readings, Critiques, and Poetics. Institutions highlights
R&L's distinction between Race and Racism, and a wide range of
intensely personal, even, confessional, voices describe their
experiences, mostly in the form of seemingly cathartic expressions of
white guilt, realizing the Editors' prediction that, “[The
'internal tumult' will] be made up of some admixture of shame, guilt,
loathing, opportunism, anxiety, irritation, dismissal, self-hatred,
pain, hope, affection, and other even less nameable energies.”
(21). The entries in the book's first two Sections, and their
sometimes discomforting revelations, left me wondering about the
power differentials and dynamics between Rankine and most of the
other writers. The potential for Rankine's voice to influence, if not
intimidate, her subordinates should be considered; although, Rankine
might counter that attempts to construct a hierarchy based upon rank,
prominence, or authority inherently reflects structural racism,
classism, and sexism. Clearly, Rankine intended her Racial Imaginary
project to be an egalitarian and communal effort.
The Section, Readings, begins with a
well-researched and instructive essay by Joshua Weiner. He has a
fundamentally progressive goal, “to disrupt the structure, so that
we can see it” (124). Weiner's tools for dismantling power
structures are ideas and words, and his cogent analysis
of representations of identity in several texts, privileges
the universality of the theme, “the individual and society”.
Critique is a brief Section addressing
the challenging topic, “writing race”. As a self-described “black
woman”, Diane Exavier states, “I feel like race isn't something I
always want (or need) to talk about, but it is something that other
people won't let me forget.” (205). Importantly, this author
proposes a solution: “I truly believe that it is the recognition of
the Other that ultimately leads to unification.” (206). However,
Exavier does not tell us how to do this. In the same Section, Soraya
Membreno's perspectives on race and ethnicity are refreshing and
unique in this volume. “I am Hispanic, yes, but that's not your
business.” (212). And, later in her essay, “Race does not define
me, it is my culture, but it is not me.” (213). Membreno
asserts her right to define her own identity, a timely topic given
recent debates about Rachel Dolezal's “passing” (also see Lacy M.
Johnson;s piece in this section and Tamiko Beyer's essay on page
245).
The Poetics Section includes 15 brief
entries on how individual poets engage the topic, “Race” in their
practices. I wish this Section had been expanded to include more
personal reflections on the process of writing poetry. The book would
have benefited from a discerning summary chapter written by R&L
with the purpose of placing in perspective similar and different
themes and trends across essays, including, a (revised) conceptual
framework, particularly, since many of the contributors' views seem
incompatible with those of the Editors as proffered in their
Introduction. Throughout the volume, this reviewer was annoyed by
numerous editorial oversights, and one has the impression that the
book was hastily assembled. Nonetheless, The Racial Imaginary
is recommended as a genuine attempt to initiate a conversation about
Race. The Editors present a variety of viewpoints from a diverse
group of contributors.
A particularly evident, though,
possibly, useful, consequence of reading each essay is thinking about
the inherent inconsistencies of assumptions and intellectual
constructs employed by the authors, and it might be worthwhile for
scholars to “unpack” the subtexts and deep structures within and
between Sections. Indeed, Rankine, herself, may have some ambivalence
about her rejection of the Universal and the Transcendent, since the
“voice” of her 2014 book, Citizen (Graywolf), employs many
generic references and sentences relevant to all humans, especially,
marginalized groups other than blacks (“You are you even before
you.”; “Why do you feel okay saying this to me?”; As usual, you
drive straight through the moment with the expected backing off of
what was previously said.”). Furthermore, Rankine is aware that, in
a Postmodern world, identity is fractured, though she advances a
collective identity and meta-narrative based on Race. Hopefully,
Rankine and Loffreda will expand this program and other writers will
initiate their own. The project under review makes clear that poets
need to talk among themselves about definitions, motivations, craft,
and priorities and that poets of color should dialogue about the
potential to ignore facts that do not fit particular narratives or
metanarratives.
*Not sure if this was published; maybe on amazon.com; i recall not being pleased with it...
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