i am supposed to be going through all the boxes we brought here from storage, repacking some stuff and organizing, as well as getting rid of what i should no longer be pack-ratting. for instance, i unpacked a box and found some baby powder, a brand called "Kids" that I probably bought at discount 15 years ago to give to an expectant mother in my circle. i have no idea. it was still in the box and i guess i figured i'd sell it in a garage sale, since no one in my circle had more kids. the garage sale never happened. way too busy. and it's likely to never happen now given that my proclivity is to stay in the city, where it's unlikely that i will have a garage or yard to have a sale. yay for maintenance free condos and townhomes! yay!
i unpacked another box, an assortment of books and unearthed a book i'd gotten as a desk copy when i took an adjunct position teaching sociology of culture. i ended up using Tricia Rose's <em>Black Noise</em> in that course, and never did read this book, Ellis Cashmore's <em>The Black Culture Industry</em>. I remember being all over the place with the planning of that course, not sure how I wanted to teach it or what subjects to focus on. it's a big topic, of course, and easy to be all over the place.
this book looks fabulous, though. i wonder why i never read it?
Ellis Cashmore wants to argue that it is a myth to conceive of black music as "an unbroken continuum that stretches back from rap music through soul, gospel and Negro spirituals to the African-derived slave traditions." He thinks this is a "melodramatic construction of black culture and one which does no justice to its intricacies or indeed hiatuses. Although impressive as a rallying cry for unity, a "call to consciousness," as the film director Mario van Peebles once put it, the concept of a distinct black cultural tradition is questionable. Cultures, whether African or European in origin, have merged and melded over time and space."
A little further he writes, "In the process of chronicling, I will suggest that inflating the significance of black culture ay work against tangible enhancements to the lives of African Americans. The most significant value of black culture may be in providing whites with proof of the end of racism while keeping the racial hierarchy essentially intact."
Which was interesting because this is pretty much what I think Obama does.
Hum. Seems like I need to kick back and read and relax. I worked hard this week and decidedly do not want to unpack boxes. I did three loads of laundry and unpacked three. The bedroom's a mess of unpacking and repacking. But fuckabucket. I'm going go relax.
shag
http://cleandraws.com Wear Clean Draws ('coz there's 5 million ways to kill a CEO)