Customer Reviews

Racism 101

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I though this was a great reader. The accounts of her life and the lesson that she is giving to her son and the readers kept me very interested in this book. She gives you the tools that one needs to combat racism. I especially like her critique of Spike Lee's movies!

This was my first encounter with Giovanni besides her poetry, and I was amazed at her perspective observations. This book was recommended to me because of it's chapter about black college students. This single chapter did wonders for helping me with my adjustment into the college setting. If I had an opportunity to thank the author face to face, I would definately ask her what influenced the to shape philosophies about race relations on college campuses, ironically we agree for the most part. It is refreshing to me to find a person of her stature willing to voice her own opinions about important issues without holding back.I strongly recommend this book to every serious black student. The necessity of this book before you enter the college classroom is more than you could understand until actually encounter the writer's truths.

Nikki Giovanni is an incredibly passionate, courageous, and imaginative poet. This book is full of amazing insights into the ways Black americans have contributed to American society. Even the more playful sections, like where she talks about how great Star Trek is and how much she admires Lieutenant Uhura, are full of important ideas.

Oddly enough, even though I've never been a big fan of Spike Lee, I think her attacks on his movie MALCOLM X are extremely distorted and unfair. She rages at Spike for five pages for "daring" to show Malcolm X chasing white women and wearing a zoot suit during his Harlem days when he was a small time gangster known as "Detroit Red." But what was Spike supposed to do? In his autobiography Malcolm completely admits to doing these things -- and he discusses his own mistakes with total frankness. Does Nikki Giovanni think black people are too fragile to handle the truth? Malcolm X didn't think so!

If Nikki Giovanni thinks Spike Lee is a third-rate filmmaker at best, that's fine. I agree with her completely. He's no John Ford. He's no Howard Hawks. He's no Alfred Hitchcock or Sam Peckinpah. He's not even a Steven Spielberg or a Martin Scorsese. What Spike Lee is (and I never thought I'd say this) is a determined, defiant black man in a smug, dishonest, all-white industry who defied enormous odds to get his Malcolm X movie made in the first place. In another part of the book Nikki asks that we remember that black slaves would never have got Sunday off if the black preacher hadn't been smart enough, and brave enough, to get the master's approval. It doesn't sound like much today, but it was heroic at the time. The same thing applies to Spike Lee's movies -- even if they really are pretty third rate as entertainment.

Another difficult moment occurs when Nikki Giovanni discusses Abraham Lincoln. She calls him "interesting" but swiftly ridicules him for not doing enough and not doing it fast enough -- opinions Spike Lee would certainly agree with. But like Spike Lee, Lincoln was facing real dangers and dealing with pressures that Nikki Giovanni either hasn't experienced or doesn't fully understand. And she misses the absurdity of ridiculing Lincoln while praising Star Trek. Without Lincoln there could have been no Gene Roddenberry, since the STAR TREK creator patterned his entire social approach on Lincoln's example. (See "The Savage Curtain" for a full discussion on Civil Rights between Kirk, Uhura, and Abraham Lincoln himself.)

As a black woman who lives and works in Virginia, I find it very strange that Nikki Giovanni has time to put down Lincoln -- but she never mentions a "gentleman" named Robert E. Lee. If Lincoln was no more than "interesting," does that make Robert E. Lee merely boring? What does Nikki Giovanni think of the millions of white Virginians who still revere Lee as a saintly hero? By trashing Lincoln all she does is let Lee off the hook, and enable the revisionism of southern whites who agree with her that Lincoln was no better than Lee. Does Nikki Giovanni have any idea what this implies? When do we get to read that essay?

Last but not least, I am extremely disappointed that an intelligent black woman who hopes to set an example for young black college students would openly brag about disgusting and destructive cigarette addiction. Anyone who's ever lain awake as a child listening to a beloved parent cough their lungs out will understand that smoking ruins lives and destroys families. Anyone who understands capitalist America will understand that white corporations love to make money off of black suicide. It's pointless to attack young black men for dealing dope and poisoning black children when the educated and life-affirming "Black Woman" of Nikki Giovani's dreams sets such a poor example.

And as Mr. Spock would say, it's not logical either.

Unless you are seeking a much needed feminist sensibility against Morrison's abusive Tar Baby narrative, I wouldn't bother. The rest of it is vague, presumptuous, shockingly lacking in self-reflection and criticism. For the most part, her flirtations at clear, responsible thought all to easily descend into her typical scolding tirades! She insults everyone's intelligence by speaking as if she is getting after an errant five year old!

Nikki Giovanni (born 1943) is an American poet, writer, commentator, activist, and educator. She has written many other books (mostly poetry), such as The Collected Poetry of Nikki Giovanni: 1968-1998 (P.S.). This book, however, is non-fiction.

She writes in the "Author's Note" to this 1994 book, "some of you may want to know how I put together this collection; or why it's called 'Racism 101,' when many of these essays ostensibly have nothing to do with race; or why I repeat myself and my themes sometimes. I think I owe you an explanation ... I just wanted to write an interesting book and look at the world I inhabit. I'm a poet; I believe that the image will reveal itself."

Here are some quotations from the book:

"How ironic that Fisk's Jubilee Singers kept the spirituals alive, yet the students at Fisk were anxious to deny that their ancestors were slaves; if people were to be believed, nobody but me ever had slaves in their family." (Pg. 51)
"I am an american Black. Period. The rest is of no particular interest to me. Afro-American, African-American, whatever. I am not a hyphenated American, regardless of how others define themselves." (Pg. 53-54)
"As a Black woman, I grow ever more disturbed by Spike Lee." (Pg. 70)
"What would have happened to our language if the preacher had not been allowed to study the Bible? How would our story have been kept alive if we had not found a song in code?" (Pg. 97)
"I can give you my perspective. (Do not take the burden of 22 million people on your shoulders. Remind everyone that you are an individual, and don't speak for the race or any other individual within it.)" (Pg. 104)
"Why is it important to get Blacks into colleges and universities? Because the biggest stumbling block to progress in America is still racism." (Pg. 143)
"Writing is both a public and a private pleasure. We write alone, talking to ourselves, trying to explain the universe in a series of metaphors, hoping to be understood. We mostly put away our thoughts, satisfied that we have written them..." (Pg. 157-158)
"People will ... ask a poet, 'How long does it take you to write a poem?' And the only answer that we can honestly give is, 'all my life.'" (Pg. 159)
"I have wondered why poets get into these petty quarrels when there are so very few of us and even fewer folk who care what we think." (Pg. 183)