Key Concepts from "Black Power"

Nicolas Siino

09/12/14

ENGW 1100

Professor Young

Key Concepts from “Black power”

 

1.            The media portrayed the concept of Black Power as white against black as exemplified in their criticism of black athletes over white athletes.

2.            Mother’s appreciation for black power was strong.  She viewed the civil rights achievements of black Americans with pride and put Malcolm X in the same category as other civil rights heroes.  She often spoke about “the white man” in the third person, as if she had nothing to do with that race.

3.            McBride’s encounter with the Black Panther on the bus is different from the media’s portrayal of them.  The Black Panther’s son was handsome, nicely dressed, and sophisticated.  They shook hands and the young boy sat on the bus waving to his dad.

4.            The people that believed in black power were influenced by the Black Panthers and are portrayed as having afros, listening to conga music and in the colors of red, black and green.

5.            The phrase “we thought he was god” referred to the driver of the soup-ed up GTO with the words Black Power written on the side of the car.  This individual symbolized power, as a person that overtook others in every race, as an individual that could not be caught by the police, as someone who did not care for authority.  This connects to McBride’s understanding of Black Power as a force that did not care for others and as a group that did what they wanted to do, regardless of right or wrong.

6.            The concept of contradictions consists of a logical incompatibility between two or more propositions.  Contradictions do permeate throughout the reading in that McBride’s mother did not believe in following society but in providing a contradiction to society as exemplified in her desire to have her kids attend White schools for a better education and her dislike for money but was in need of it.

7.            Your identity can be a contradiction as was McBride’s mothers when she did not follow social norms and did what she wanted to do such as going to the projects to visit her friend.