-bell hooks' essay 'Eating the Other: Desire and Resistance' is definitely a blunt critique of white culture's continued infatuation with Blackness. Arguing that profit driven use of Black images is used to generate and satisfy our hunger for different cultural experiences, hooks regards this as modern colonialism. I have to agree with her, but this leaves me wondering what the hell I'm supposed to do with my Wu-Tang and Biggie Smalls cds? Having provided me with hours of listening enjoyment they now cause me a certain level of internal strife. Do I really like it? How would I know? On what grounds? Whether it's the "positive" intellectual hip-hop artists like Mos Def, Talib Kweli or Lupe Fiasco or the slightly edgier Jay-Z, or the super ganstas, hooks is right, much to my embarrassment: I can spice it up with Black culture without ever having to engage. I love all of the above musicians though, a lot! Even if it does embarrass me to admit however, consuming rap/hip hop, and there's meaning in that distinction, does kind of add to one's hipsterishness. The same can be said for art-stars; the avant-guard falling over themselves for Jean-Baptiste Basquait is case in point. As I deconstruct my cd collection though, I'm left wondering if it's possibility of operating from the margins that draws me in. Kanye West looked straight into the television cameras during the fundraiser for victims of hurricane Katrina and said "George Bush does not care about Black people" I couldn't even believe it. Kanye West said what everyone already knew, but wouldn't or couldn't say, and this made me cry.
In honour of the Spice Girls reunion tour (insert sarcasm) I pulled up this picture. hooks' assertion of colonialism and primitivism is fairly evident. Scary Spice is looking pretty wild, what with the hair, head to toe animal print, and ...the roaring? Why is she called Scary Spice anyway? 
My following of the Democrat nomination is a bit out of hand considering I'm not American, but there is something about the way it's playing out that compels me to stay up until 5am to see who wins California. My issue is not with either of the candidates per say, but with the media and cultural representations of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. For instance, what do white people mean when they say that Obama transcends race? Does he transcend his Blackness? I haven't heard any Black supporters say he transcends race? It seems to me that Obama represents a shot at redemption at home and abroad.
He presents a remarkable skin color for the rest of the world to admire." — Steve Scheibel, 51, voted for Barack Obama.
Comments such as these are abundant in the newspapers and internet, and they really do give pause in the face of hooks' theories on the commodification of Blackness.
My following of the Democrat nomination is a bit out of hand considering I'm not American, but there is something about the way it's playing out that compels me to stay up until 5am to see who wins California. My issue is not with either of the candidates per say, but with the media and cultural representations of Barack Obama and Hillary Clinton. For instance, what do white people mean when they say that Obama transcends race? Does he transcend his Blackness? I haven't heard any Black supporters say he transcends race? It seems to me that Obama represents a shot at redemption at home and abroad.He presents a remarkable skin color for the rest of the world to admire." — Steve Scheibel, 51, voted for Barack Obama.
Comments such as these are abundant in the newspapers and internet, and they really do give pause in the face of hooks' theories on the commodification of Blackness.
