"Understandings around race is at the point where it feels invisible"
- Claudia Rankine
Racism is so prevalent in our lives that we don't realize it. Rankine successfully experiments with multimodality in her book to expose microaggressions that cause all scales of discrimination, racism, and violence in our modern world. Various voices in the narratives, striking images, and the definition of citizen established in Serena Williams' story are all contributing to the overall message that racism is not an entertainment, but rather a serious public crisis.
This video is an interview with Claudia Rankine on Citizen. Click on the video to hear more about her story behind the scenes.
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Claudia RankineCitizen: An American Lyric was written in 2014 by poet Claudia Rankine. The historical context that the book-length poem is focused around is the realities of systemic racism that has been going on for decades in the United States. In the late 1800s to the early 1900s, black citizens experienced racism from Jim Crow segregation that enforced “separate but equal” laws. Rankine comments on how Jim Crow still exists today, just in a different form. Black citizens in the US face vast amounts of racism and discrimination that occur on different scales, from microaggressions that Rankine’s friends experienced to the realities of police brutality.
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NARRATIVES
The use of second-person pronoun, "you," is shown throughout the book.
Citizen consists of various stories of day-to-day racism that Rankine collected from many African Americans. All of the narratives directly address the reader as “you” and put yourself into the ridiculous situations that occur to African Americans casually. From these striking narratives, Rankine implies that this book is not a mere ordinary book about citizens, but a book with histories of racism, pain of undervalued people, continuation of segregation, and other abuses of the citizens’ rights. Rankine’s prominent use of the second-person pronoun “you” enables the book to truly connect to the readers' emotions.
As you listen to the following narratives that are directly from the book, close your eyes and imagine yourself being in the middle of the situation. Focus on the “you” and try to at least feel a little bit of the ongoing discrimination in our modern, culturally “integrated” community.
As you listen to the following narratives that are directly from the book, close your eyes and imagine yourself being in the middle of the situation. Focus on the “you” and try to at least feel a little bit of the ongoing discrimination in our modern, culturally “integrated” community.
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Below are 3 images taken from the book that link back to the narratives above.
Figure 1 (left) shows the scene of public lynching where the African Americans are erased and the white people who came to see the lynching are highlighted. The contrast between blackness of the erased lynching and the white people standing below the tree links back to the narrative from page 77 where the guy in the line says he really didn’t see you. The “you” - black body - is gone and cannot be seen.
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An uncanny image of an animal body with a human-like face in figure 2 (right) illustrates how people treat you different and “you” are othered from the crowd. For instance, in the narrative from page 44, the manager is surprised when “you” walk into the office because you are African American. The image makes us reflect on how are “you” dehumanized and underlines the isolation of “you” from society.
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Lastly, figure 3 (left) has an endless repetition of the line “I feel most colored when I am thrown against a sharp white background.” The sentence is very distinctive from the white background and easy to read, but it gets harder to read and the ink gets smudged all over the place as the repetition continues. The effect of transition from clear to unclear is metaphorically displaying how racism was explicit in the past and over time it became implicit in the society and no one can distinguish the discrimination.
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Reflection on the Auditory & Visual Experience
After listening to the narratives and looking at the images, please give us a short reflection on your experience. The criteria marked with an asterisk sign (*) are required.
We will collect the responses to make adjustments to our interactive features in the future. Your reflection will not be used for any other purpose than for research and development. Thank you for your participation! |
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Citizen vs. Citizenship
Everyone is born with citizenship in the world, but not everyone is a citizen.
Being a citizen means being a part of a culture, belonging to a community, and earning the values.
Being a citizen means being a part of a culture, belonging to a community, and earning the values.
Serena Williams, a famous black tennis player, is used as an allegory in the book to draw the readers’ attention to racial adversity that exists not only for poor or underprivileged people but also for people with reputations. During Serena’s journey to her current achievements, she had to face consequences that deterred her from being a good athlete. Serena could not control her temper during the semifinal match at the 2009 US Open when the line judge made an unfair call on her. Acting insane and going over the acceptable line at a public event is definitely wrong. But Rankine’s narratives make us question, is it fair for Serena to be mistreated due to her race? Focusing on Serena Williams’ hardships created a shred of evidence that racism still exists, and that it is not limited to uneducated, poor people. You may not be the offender or the victim of these human rights violations. However, as individual citizens, we have to take responsibility and raise awareness of ongoing racism. We need to allow everyone around us to be citizens of the community in which they live.
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Click on RAÚL ZURITA to explore Song For His Disappeared Love