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The Problem of Race in the Twenty-First Century
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by Thomas C. Holt
Harvard University Press
Due/Published
March 2002, 160 pages,
paper
ISBN
0674008243
New in paper (S02) "The problem of the twentieth century is the problem of the color-line," W. E. B. Du Bois wrote in 1903. As we enter the twenty-first century, the problem remains--and yet it, and the line that defines it, have shifted in subtle but significant ways. This book speaks powerfully to the question of how the circumstances of race and racism have changed in our time--and how these changes will affect our future. Foremost among the book's concerns are the contradictions and incoherence of a system that idealizes black celebrities in politics, popular culture, and sports even as it diminishes the average African-American citizen. The world of the assembly line, boxer Jack Johnson's career, and The Birth of a Nation come under Holt's scrutiny as he relates the malign progress of race and racism to the loss of industrial jobs and the rise of our modern consumer society. Understanding race as ideology, he describes the processes of consumerism and commodification that have transformed, but not necessarily improved, the place of black citizens in our society. This work reveals the radical nature of change as it relates to race and its cultural phenomena. It offers conceptual tools and a new way to think and talk about racism as social reality. |
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Review
The problem of race, a persistent issue in American life, has also been persistently misunderstood. Part of the difficulty, Thomas Holt argues in this succinct and perceptive collection of essays, is the common misuse of the crucial concepts of race and racism. More specifically, there are many who, because they regard racism as a fixed part of human society, come to view it in an ahistorical fashion. For his part, Holt contends that definitions of race and racism are constantly changing and inextricably tied to the cultural, economic, and political movements of their times. Thus, if we want to understand the issue of race in the twenty-first century we need to revisit and critique the categories and frameworks that have been deployed in the past. Holt devotes an essay each to three separate eras, the pre-Fordist, Fordist, and post-Fordist, providing a panoramic look at issues of race from the beginnings of the colonial enterprise to the assembly line to the contemporary globalized world. Holt manages to discuss a broad span of history while honing in on the crucial issues involved with the history of racism. He pointedly demonstrates how the changing economic and political structures have altered ideas about race and racism even while many of the same problems persist. This work is also an important and necessary exhortation to prepare ourselves for discussions of race as we enter a new century in an increasingly post-industrial, consumerist and globalized world. For other recent titles in related subjects: |
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