“Yes, and it’s raining. Each moment is like this—before it can be known, categorized as similar to another thing and dismissed, it has to be experienced, it has to be seen. What did he just say? Did she really just say that? Did I hear what I think I heard? Did that just come out of my mouth, his mouth, her mouth? The moment stinks. Still you want to stop looking at the trees. You want to walk out and stand among them. And as light as the rain seems, it still rains down on you.” (Rankine, 9). This paragraph was extremely powerful to me because the rain represents the microaggression that people deal with on a daily basis but don’t speak up. The narrator wants to walk out and stand among those who are dealing with the same issues as her but then she mentions that “as light as the rain seems, it still rains down on you” which I interpreted as her saying that the rain, being the racism, may seem like it’s just misunderstandings and slight mistakes people make without even realizing, are affecting her day to day but aren’t big enough to bring up and make a scene about. In this paragraph she says that there will only be an end to this when everyone experiences this for themselves, when we sit back and actually think about what we say and mean. Examples of this are thrown at us all throughout the first section of Citizen. One example is on page 7 when the narrator felt hurt about being called the same name as her friends housekeeper. She couldn’t even tell whether she was more hurt because it was an “‘all black people look the same’ moment or because you are being confused with another after being so close to this other?” (Rankine, 7). Yet the narrator doesn’t speak up about this mistake, and neither does her friend who eventually stopped doing this but never acknowledged the mistake. Another example of micro aggression in Citizen is on page 15 when the narrators neighbor calls the police on the narrators friend who the neighbor assumed was “not the nice young man that he’s met” but an intruder pacing around the front of the house. When the narrator finally comes home she is greeted with only her friend and her apologetic neighbor. The problem in this passage was when the narrator says that the friend should have been speaking on the phone where he might have been safe, even though he was causing no actual threat to anyone in his surroundings instead of facing the real problem which was the neighbor who didn’t mind his business and assumed the worst.
The first section of Citizen includes many different scenarios of racist interactions. The memories are written in second-person point of view to allow the reader to experience them and be able to step into the narrators shoes, instead of just reading through it. When first reading through all the scenarios you may pass right through them and think of them as simple misunderstandings or mistakes but as the section progresses, so does the anger and negativity of these scenarios. You begin to no longer accept these “misunderstandings” as just misunderstandings but as unacceptable racism that just so happens to be passed through because we let it. That is called microaggression. Microaggressions are the everyday verbal, nonverbal, and environmental insults whether intentional or unintentional which communicate hostile, derogatory, or negative messages to target people based solely upon their race, gender, or culture.
On the very first page of the section, a memory is told about how the narrator has barely spoken to a girl in her class who has asked to cheat off of her. “You never really speak except for the time she makes her request and later when she tells you you smell good and have features like a white person. You assume she thinks she is thanking you for letting her cheat and feels better cheating from an almost white person” (Rankine, 5). This quote was especially eye catching to me because it is a memory from when she was very young in her life, and was already dealing with microaggression from one of her classmates who probably doesn’t even know she’s saying something wrong. However, the classmate stated that the narrator has “features like a white person” after thanking her for letting her cheat. The narrator stated that she assumed she felt better cheating off of someone who has features “almost like a white person.” Do you think the classmate knew what she meant to say?
Questions:
- What are ways that Rankine could have prevented further abuse from those around her?
- Do you think microaggression can really be unintentional or does it define who we are when it comes to certain scenarios?
I like how you said “You begin to no longer accept these “misunderstandings” as just misunderstandings but as unacceptable racism that just so happens to be passed through because we let it” and touched on how the readers thoughts evolve based on the narrators memories from the beginning to the end of the section. I believe that microaggressions are commonly unconsciously said with no thought of how they might affect ones feelings. Many microaggressions are ignorant remarks such as “you don’t act like a normal (black) person” or “what are you” which I don’t think means that person is ignorant themselves, the society we grew up in cultured many people to be unaware of the wrongness behind remarks like these. Another example of microaggression is when the narrator goes to her new therapists house and she immediately screams “What are you doing here? get away from my house!” when she sees her for the first time, recognizing she is black (Rankine 18). The therapist then apologizes repeatedly when she realizes this is her client who she had been talking to over the phone.
I feel that microaggression could be unintentional to an extent. This is because children raised by racist/discriminatory parents hear things that they assume are correct. When you’re young, you’re easily impressionable and you copy what you hear. As the kid grows up, they could say something that they heard their parents’ say and it might not even register in their mind that it’s something bad. An example of this is when she says, “Because of your elite status from a year’s worth of travel, you have already settled into your window seat on United Airlines, when the girl and her mother arrive at your row. The girl, looking over at you, tells her mother, these are our seats, but this is not what I expected. The mother’s response is barely audible-I see, she says. I’ll sit in the middle” (Rankine 12). The little girl wouldn’t have come up with this thought if she hadn’t heard or witnessed similar behavior. However, if you don’t learn that these things aren’t okay to say or think, then it could end up defining who you are. The choice belongs to the person who is doing the microaggression to begin with. It’s all about learning to grow and adapt to your surroundings.
I love your second question. It makes you step in to other people’s shoes and analyze the situation. It also helps me to realize that it’s up to me to change how I think or react to things.
In the beginning of your blog post you mention the quote, “as light as the rain seems, it still rains down on you.” I like that you interpreted this as a misunderstanding to some people. I believe another way to look at this is how racism, although much less prominent in today’s society, is still there. There has been improvements in racism today, yet it still lingers on in society. This is seen when Serena Williams is asking the umpire if she is, “trying to screw her again” (Rankine 32). Although years had passed since the first incident of Serena being treated unfairly due to her race, the umpire still treats her the same way regardless of her improving tennis career.
I believe that micro aggression can be unintentional at times. This can be because of how children are brought up. If they are not surrounded by people of color and simply listen to what their parents tell them, racism and aggression can’t always be their fault. However, through experience they should be able to overcome this mindset, and therefore micro aggression can define who we are in certain situations.
Overall, great blog post! 🙂
It is foolish to think that one action defines a person’s entire being. We are relatively complex creatures, and we change day by day, minute by minute. Because of this, I do not think that a single case of microaggression should define a person. However, repeated instances of such bias can be an insight into one’s character. If they don’t realize such things are wrong, they should be told. If after they are told- or find out, through other methods- that what they are saying is not okay, they continue to say it anyways… it provides negative insights into their character.
I appreciate when you call microaggressions, “unacceptable racism that just so happens to be passed through because we let it” (K, 2). It is safe to say that most people do not realize that what they say is wrong. As a society, we should confront this and set a new standard. The oppressed should not be required to teach their oppressors. We should also acknowledge the fact that we have made mistakes. There is tragedy in the statement, “Eventually she stopped doing this, though she never acknowledged her slippage” (Rankine, 7). The problem was resolved, but not rectified. There was never the necessary closure. Never an apology. This is a mistake that we can not, in good concious, repeat.
The first question you ask reflects psychological place she seems to be coming from “You think maybe this is an experiment and you are being tested or retroactively insulted, or you have done something that communicates that this is an okay conversation to be having” (Rankine, 10). I feel like the purpose of her narrative in this section of the book is to describe a bunch of experiences she has had that have caused her to question what she is doing to make people think that its okay to say or act that way in her presence. She shows the progression of how she questions herself from being a young girl to an adult, and I think how she begins to realize that she can’t PREVENT the abuse she experiences or witnesses in the form of discrimination based on racism, but she can call out the abuser and ask for respect when in a safe environment. She holds herself back in moments where shes not sure if the conditions are safe enough for her to speak up about it, for instance when she demands that the man who knocks her child to the ground apologize to him, and the men on the train stand behind her in solidarity.
I liked some of the analogies you picked out that I didn’t notice!