Black Diamonds

[Yoshie Furuhashi]

><<Black Diamonds parties, like the weekly after-work mixer at Aubette,
>on East 27th Street, are designed for the African-American elite,
>culled from carefully screened databases. The list of invitees --
>about 10,000 of the young black bourgeoisie in New York, Chicago and
>Washington -- is Black Diamond's bread and butter.>>
>
>CB: More accurately, this class status is petit bourgeoisie, tres petit.

Right you are, except that many of them are not even petit-bourgeois 
-- they are just better-paid workers in fashionable industries.  Have 
you (or has anyone here) read _The Rage of a Privileged Class_ by 
Ellis Cose?  For those who haven't, here's a review of the book: 
<http://krypton.mankato.msus.edu/~cbury/web/Courses96-7/Student/lesliebook.html>. 
Do the Black Diamonds feel the rage that Cose discusses?


>1. You can read the article on the web here:
>http://partners.nytimes.com/2000/11/14/nyregion/14DIAM.html
>2. The Black Diamonds web site:
>http://www.blackdiamonds-ent.com
>Art

Alas, we do not have someone like Dorothy West (who went to the 
Soviet Union in 1932 -- together with 22 black writers, artists, 
etc., including Langston Hughes -- to participate in an abortive film 
project on racism in America) to chronicle & subject to critical 
scrutiny the lives of Black Diamonds.

Yoshie