Acting White demonstrates how the charge that any African-American who is successful, well mannered, or well educated is “acting white,” is a slur that continues to haunt blacks. Ron Christie traces the complex history of the phrase, from Uncle Tom’s Cabin to the tensions between Martin Luther King, Jr., and Malcolm X to Bill Cosby’s controversial NAACP speech in 2004. The author also writes candidly of being challenged by black students for his “acting white,” and also of being labeled a race traitor in Congress by daring to be Republican. This lucid chronicle reveals how this prevalent put-down sets back much of the hard-earned progress for all blacks in American society. Deftly argued and determinedly controversial, this book is certain to spur thoughtful discussion for years to come.

One Response to “Acting White: The Curious History of a Racial Slur”

1. Kevin Currie-Knight says:

   October 22, 2010 at 12:00 am

   As a teacher who has taught in a middle-class school with 98% African-American youth, I am quite familiar with the legacy of the “acting white” idea. At its worst, it poses a serious obstacle to the civil-rights dream of an integrated society where skin color no longer matters. Ron Christie’s “Acting White” is an interesting historical examination of how the “acting white” concept has developed and manifested itself in American history, and why we need desperately to get beyond it if Du Bois’s, King’s, and Brown v. Board’s dream of an integrated society is to be realized.

   Christie starts with a chapter on Stowe’s famous novel “Uncle Tom’s Cabin,” which, of course, gave rise to the derisive label of “Uncle Tom.” While this chapter has the unfortunate feel of a book report (the writing assumes familiarity with the novel and is largely exegetical in nature), Christie shows that the character of Uncle Tom should not necessarily be seen as a sell-out, but was intended also to be seen as a very strong man whose desire to protect two slave girls leads to his death at white hands. In other words, our conflation of “Uncle Tom” with sell-out is not only oversimplistic, but belies a real misunderstanding of the novel and its intent.

   The next few chapters focus on the competing visions of Booker Washington and W.E.B. Du Bois, with the author firmly championing the vision of the latter. Washington, Christie writes, desired to see blacks accept inferior status by desiring, in some sense, achievement of “equality” by serving whites. Du Bois’s vision, as Christie writes, was for blacks to gain political and civic equality and prove that they could be equal to whites by becoming their academic equals as well.

   It is hard to argue with Du Bois’s vision, but I think that Christie’s view of Washington is a bit oversimplistic. As evidenced by books like Up from History: The Life of Booker T. Washington, Washington believed that sacrificing immediate political/social equality by having blacks “earn” equality economically would eventually lead to a more lasting equality that’s strength derived from self-sufficiency. Where Du Bois’s vision, in other words, might lead to a more immediate equality, but also one that left blacks largely dependent on white benevolence. Washington sought an equality that may have taken longer to achieve, but once achieved, left blacks dependent on no one but themselves. Interestingly, Christie also forgets to mention that toward the end of his life, Du Bois became a champion of segregated education as the only way to guarantee fairness to black students. (This would certainly complexity Christie’s portrayal of Du Bois as integrationist and Washington as separationist.)

   While I certainly share Christie’s admiration for Du Bois, I can’t help but think that his portrayal of Washington was oversimplistic (especially for someone who appreciates the nuances of Uncle Tom’s Cabin).

   From here, we discuss Martin Luther King and Brown v. Board. At the center of both visions was an assumption that the goal was integration rather than separation. Sadly, many whites did what they could to fight this vision tooth and nail and, perhaps only naturally, the Black Power movement and its call for blacks to separate themselves from white culture to a greater or lesser degree. While the intentions may have been good – if integration is proving too difficult, maybe we can bypass it – the effects were often devastating. African-Americans increasingly began to fall behind educationally and economically.

   From here, the book takes a more editorial tone examining the controversial “pound cake” speech bemoaning the lack of progress post Brown v. Board, his experience befriending supposed “sell-out” Clarance Thomas, and the presidency of Barrack Obama. Christie is, of course, a conservative, but the book itself is not a conservative screed. It is obvious that Christie has great respect not only for what Thomas has been able to achieve, but what Obama has as well. Christie only bemoans the fact that many African-Americans still experience (often peer- or self-imposed obstacles from seeing Thomas or Obama as someone that they, too, could be.

   All in all, this is a very interesting and provoking book that mixes history, personal narrative, and editorial. Christie does not “blame” anyone for the phenomenon of “acting white” per se, in that he even sees Washington, Malcolm X, affirmative action, et. al, as being motivated by good intentions. The idea of “acting white” is more or less portrayed as an unintended consequence of a confluence of factors, but nonetheless damaging for all that. The overall point: if America has any hope of being an integrated society where all are seen as equals and skin-color is seen as merely a cosmetic difference, we need to get beyond the idea that there is something it is to “act white.” Point taken.

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