Which New Negro Counts?

    In Davarian L. Baldwin’s text, Chicago’s New Negroes, he discusses the his conceptualization of what the real New Negro is. Unlike Alain Locke, who discusses the concept of the New Negro in terms of artists like Langston Hughes and others, Baldwin introduces a novice way at approaching this in which he argues that the New Negro is actually entrepreneurs. In his book, he opens the book with a detailed introduction about why he believes Jack Johnson is the first New Negro and also how Madam CJ Walker becomes the epitome of what the New Negro would and should become. Like Locke’s conceptualization of what the New Negro stands for, Baldwin discusses it in such a way which speaks about main goals of New Negro ideology having to do with dignity, racial pride, and the always-present goal at attaining some form of upward mobility.
   When Baldwin discusses Jack Johnson as the New Negro, he is making a statement that the epitome of the New Negro does not necessarily have to be an artist and that the artists are those who discuss what needs to be done in order for advancement as a race and as a people, and people like Jack Johnson are the “doers”- those that actually take action in order to attain the power that the artists suggest is possible. What I think is interesting about making Jack Johnson the first New Negro on Baldwin’s part is he chose a man that was extremely arrogant; Johnson was the first black man to ever make such a glorious achievement- to beat a white man and be awarded the Heavyweight Championship of the World- and he showed everyone that he was just as good, if not better, than white men. He demonstrated that he could beat them in boxing, date the same women, eat at and travel to the same places, and afford even more expensive things than the average white man- Johnson and his extravagant ways were really a testimony that not only he, but the black race, could and would accomplish anything and that there was nothing inferior about them. At a time when black people were considered mentally and physically inferior as a whole race, Johnson quickly debunked this myth and that is what Baldwin was really showing- that the same core goals that those artists Locke discussed valued were the same ones that people like Johnson actively put into motion.
    Similar to Johnson, Baldwin discusses beauty culture and the legacy of Madam CJ Walker and her cosmetic and beauty supply company as a narrative that contradicts Locke’s argument that the real or “ideal” New Negro was someone who was an artist, someone similar to the likes of what Du Bois would accept as part of his glorious Talented Tenth. Instead, Walker was the epitome of what Booker T. Washington argued for in that she worked hard and created a successful business built by a black woman that allowed her to help with the beauty dilemmas causing problems for black people, create schools in which to educate hair dressers, and enabled her to become the first black woman millionaire. She was not a well-educated woman yet she was obviously extremely bright and was able to help create a form of racial enlistment by creating new opportunity for women other than herself to become independent and work to make their own money.
    It is easily apparent though that even as Locke and Baldwin do have many differences in their own ideas of who is or can be considered a New Negro they do have many similarities in their conceptualitizations of the New Negro as someone who strive towards racial dignity and pride and a sense of upward mobility, and not for just their own individual benefit but for the good of the race as a whole.   

Upward Mobility

          In both of the texts, The New Negro and The Warmth of Other Suns, an extremely common theme that I think highly contributes to the ideal of a “new negro” has to do with the concept of upward mobility. The poem in The New Negro called “The Black Finger” on page 148 by Angela Grimke has a narrator describing the “most beautiful thing” that she has just seen and it is a person with a finger up in the air and the narrator questions why the finger is black and why it is pointing upwards. Also, the short story in the book that I focus on from the book was a piece about Durham as the place was an uprising of a black middle class (New Negro 333). I think that these two poems, along with the discussion from Monday with our guest speaker, really speak to the story in The Warmth of Other Suns about the upward mobility of Robert Joseph Perishing Foster becoming a great doctor in Los Angeles in the 1950s and making a name for himself.
          In “The Black Finger” poem the narrator is describing this beautiful vision that he or she is seeing yet is questioning why it is black and why it is pointing upwards. I think the narrator is describing a black person, I’m thinking a woman because of the other adjectives that are used, but speaking from and demonstrating the viewpoints of a white voyeur. The narrator is seeing something beautiful happening, an event that is literally unfolding before him or her and I think the person is questioning “why are you black” like dealing with ideals about race and Eugenics like why does this finger, why was this beautiful person born black. The question about the finger pointing upwards makes it as though this white spectator is seeing the unfolding of black people during the great migration and their quest for self worth and dignity in their struggle for equality and upward mobility. I think questioning why the finger is pointing upwards is resonant with a white person asking why this great migration is taking place and why black people are trying to improve their lives and “move on up” yet recognizing that this is a beautiful and important thing.
          Also in The New Negro, the short story “Durham: Capital of Black Middle Class” demonstrates this idea of a black middle class because it is all about black people on a mission to move up the economic, and in this case social, ladder towards a more comfortable life that before. It deals with the new possibilities that come from moving North during the Great Migration that allows for black people to have new and better opportunities. The short story discusses men like John Merrick who was born a slave yet built an empire out a business that he started himself, one that has a lasting effect and legacy that continues through his descendents. What came out of his quest for upward mobility, like the story of Robert in The Warmth of Other Suns, is that their moving enabled them to have new opportunity and make an actual lasting career that not only benefited them and their families but generations to come.
          I thought this idea of upward mobility and new opportunity during the Great Migration for blacks was extremely important to discuss because it introduces how blackpeople became involved in business and actual professions that are still highly regarded and respected to this day that actually counteracts years of racial stereotypes of black people as lazy and stupid and shiftless. Along with our guest speaks discussion of Atlata as this contemporary mecca for black people from all around to move to for a certain middle class respectability and liestyle, all of these readings discuss black people striving for upward mobility and taking advantage of the new opportunities available.

How I Got to Black Studies

                I came to UCSB Undeclared, yet knowing that a career in law was in my future so since the Law and Society major program was closed, I knew I had to find an alternative way to grasp the knowledge that I was so eager for. I have always wanted to be two things in my life: a lawyer and a mother. In our senior year of high school, my cousin had a baby who became my goddaughter. The baby, Evony, was mixed- half black- but her father refused to be in the picture so I became the person who helped out the most in order for her to have a simulated "two-parent household". So, in my first year here, when registering for classes I saw Black Studies as a category and was immediately intrigued. I signed up for Black Studies 1 with Banks, which I am incredibly happy I did, because I acknowledged that my cousin was going straight into a job and would not have the opportunity to do so and I began to think of how unfortunate it would be for my goddaughter to grow up in an all-Mexican family where none of us could really give any history or information about the other half of her.

               It may seem a little naive or even rude or ridiculous but this is honestly where my interest began- as if I did not have enough reasons for being grateful for having my goddaughter in my life, her beginning my involvement with Black Studies is definitely high up on that list. While many of my acquaintances here at UCSB have their opinions about Professor Banks, that she is incredibly hard and there is no way to BS in her class, I absolutely LOVED the class and found myself thinking in ways I never really had before in terms of the government and the way that peoples histories could be manipulated. I found the information challenging yet incredibly stimulating and generating a lot more interest in me. I went on to take Black Studies 6 with Lipsitz and felt every lecture completely tugging at my heartstrings. After discussing the Emmett Till Case and seeing the video and the imagery of his disfigured body in his casket and the lack of justice that occurred for him and his family as well as many black people who were the targets of the "pervasive presence of violence" as Professor Lipsitz would say, I was mind-boggled and knew this was something I wanted to continue learning about. The fact that events like these happened throughout history yet has been completely erased from the dominant history that we receive is astonishing- I felt sad, cheated and really uneducated. After that I took every class that fit into my schedule (as I commute and only come to campus certain days) which included another class with Lipsitz, Education of Black Children with Professor Johnson and two upper division classes with Dr. Banks in the same quarter (Women and Politics of the Body and Black Feminist Thought) and I finally realized that I had all of the requirements to double-major in Black Studies except this class and one lower division class. So I just recently declared a Feminist Studies-Black Studies double major and am so happy that I did so, even if it means taking one more class after Graduation. Black Studies has allowed me a new lens with which to view the world through and although the concepts I learn will still help me in educating my goddaughter, it is about so much more than that now. I am sincerely interested in social justice and hope to only further this and make a difference once I am a Civil Law lawyer.