Double Consciousness Essay Example
11/20/08
Sociology 444
My Double-Consciousness as an African American College Student
Despite the enduring popularity of DuBois’ double consciousness metaphor, Adolph Reed views it as an anachronism rooted in DuBois’s Jim Crow segregationist period and thus deems it not applicable to post-segregation Black America (Shaw 9). Some sociologists, however, possess a very different outlook on “double consciousness” that affirms its existence and application in the present day. Although the racism that exists today is a different type from that which existed in Dubois’ era (1868-1963), his term of “double-consciousness” and notions concerning blackness are still very much applicable to today’s society. In fact the term “double-consciousness” can be applied to my, and several other black students experiences within the black student populations of large predominantly white universities.
Roughly sixty-two years after DuBois first wrote about double consciousness and “the veil”, his demands of Black political, economic, and social equality were fulfilled by the 1964 Civil Rights Act and 1965 Voting Rights Act. Now almost forty years after those reforms, we have witnessed a fundamental change in the specific manifestations that race and racism have assumed since the days of strict Jim Crow segregation (Shaw 15). Bonilla-Silva argues that a less blatant “new racism” and accompanying “racial structure” has emerged. Omi and Winant also see the “veil of race” as a meaningful social construction, asserting that it objectively suppresses African American life chances (Shaw 20).
This paper will explore the ways in which “double consciousness” still exists by drawing on my personal experiences and findings at UNC as an African American student, research done on black students in predominantly white universities and theorizations of other important sociologists and the paradigm of race and double consciousness.
To begin, we must
Sociology 444
My Double-Consciousness as an African American College Student
Despite the enduring popularity of DuBois’ double consciousness metaphor, Adolph Reed views it as an anachronism rooted in DuBois’s Jim Crow segregationist period and thus deems it not applicable to post-segregation Black America (Shaw 9). Some sociologists, however, possess a very different outlook on “double consciousness” that affirms its existence and application in the present day. Although the racism that exists today is a different type from that which existed in Dubois’ era (1868-1963), his term of “double-consciousness” and notions concerning blackness are still very much applicable to today’s society. In fact the term “double-consciousness” can be applied to my, and several other black students experiences within the black student populations of large predominantly white universities.
Roughly sixty-two years after DuBois first wrote about double consciousness and “the veil”, his demands of Black political, economic, and social equality were fulfilled by the 1964 Civil Rights Act and 1965 Voting Rights Act. Now almost forty years after those reforms, we have witnessed a fundamental change in the specific manifestations that race and racism have assumed since the days of strict Jim Crow segregation (Shaw 15). Bonilla-Silva argues that a less blatant “new racism” and accompanying “racial structure” has emerged. Omi and Winant also see the “veil of race” as a meaningful social construction, asserting that it objectively suppresses African American life chances (Shaw 20).
This paper will explore the ways in which “double consciousness” still exists by drawing on my personal experiences and findings at UNC as an African American student, research done on black students in predominantly white universities and theorizations of other important sociologists and the paradigm of race and double consciousness.
To begin, we must