The Melanin Millennium Ronald E. Hall Editor The Melanin Millennium Skin Color as 21st Century International Discourse In honor of Carlos Moore, the light of liberation 123 Editor Dr.RonaldE.Hall SchoolofSocialWork MichiganStateUniversity EastLansing,MI,USA ISBN978-94-007-4607-7 ISBN978-94-007-4608-4(eBook) DOI10.1007/978-94-007-4608-4 SpringerDordrechtHeidelbergNewYorkLondon LibraryofCongressControlNumber:2012947360 ©SpringerScience+BusinessMediaDordrecht2013 Thisworkissubjecttocopyright.AllrightsarereservedbythePublisher,whetherthewholeorpartof thematerialisconcerned,specificallytherightsoftranslation,reprinting,reuseofillustrations,recitation, broadcasting,reproductiononmicrofilmsorinanyotherphysicalway,andtransmissionorinformation storageandretrieval,electronicadaptation,computersoftware,orbysimilarordissimilarmethodology nowknownorhereafterdeveloped.Exemptedfromthislegalreservationarebriefexcerptsinconnection with reviews or scholarly analysis or material supplied specifically for the purpose of being entered and executed on a computer system, for exclusive use by the purchaser of the work. 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Printedonacid-freepaper SpringerispartofSpringerScience+BusinessMedia(www.springer.com) “Doer ofDiversity,Deanof SocialSciences: Dr.MariettaL. Baba,” MichiganStateUniversity Preface In any postcolonial civilization, the creation of knowledge is of plausible significancebecauseitisthemeansbywhichcultureistransmittedandsustained. Bythefifteenthcentury,variousEuropeanpowers,includingGreatBritain,Spain, Portugal, and France, transmitted Western culture via the colonial subjugation of non-Europeanpeoples.ThosewhowerecolonizedbytheWestwerephysiologically differentiatedfromEuropeansvis-a`-visarelativelydarkerskincolor.Referredtoas “peopleofcolor,”thesenon-EuropeanswerenativetoAfrica,Asia,theAmericas, and the Caribbean. Subsequent to colonization, Europeans as Western operatives imposed their traditions and customs upon people of color while simultaneously denigrating anything other than the Western lifestyle. Germane to that effort is Western intelligentsia’s control of information by the selective manufacturing of knowledge,validatedbytheprestigeofitsacademy. As a resultofcolonization,a virulentintellectualnarcissismevolvedtocontrol the information of the Western intelligentsia, which was indicative of the post- colonialera. Despite this pathology,peopleof colorreacted to the narcissism that had internalizedthe West’s alien ideals in an effortto appease the Western power structure.Consequently,depictionsofexistentialrealitywereconveyedinacontext thatwasirrelevanttopeopleofcolor.Accordingly,theirpainandsufferingbecame nonexistentorinvalidatedbecauseithadnottheforceorpermissionoftheWestern intelligentsia.EnabledbythereachesofWesternprestige,whatoperatedasfactual extendedfromWesternpower,Westerntradition,andaWesterncoloniallegacy. ThemagnitudeoftheWesternintellectualnarcissismcanbedocumentedrelative totheexistentialcontradictionsfoundamongpeopleofcolor.Whatisprioritizedas fact, about black males in particular, by the Western social work academy attests to the force and will of the social work intelligentsia, who control the creation ofits knowledgebase throughcolonialtraditions.Existentialcontradictionsin the socialworkknowledgebasethenescapechallengeandblurthelinesbetweenfact andfiction.Forblackmales,existentialrealitybecomesaproductnotofwhatthey experiencebut of the mightof Western operatives,the preferencesof commercial interests, and the hegemonicoutcomesof intellectualnarcissism. These requisites impact not only the people social work proposes to serve but extend to the roots vii viii Preface of what is proclaimed to be objective scientific research. In the aftermath, that which is omitted by the social work intelligentsia is assumed to be neither valid norsignificant. In 2006Dr. Ronald B. Mincy,an Affiliated Scholar with the UrbanInstitute in Washington, D.C., published an excellent work entitled Black Males Left Behind. Dr. Mincy compiled an extensive collection of social work data to substantiate his rigorously executed thesis, a dramatic illustration pertaining to the state of blackmalesinAmericawhosequalityoflifehasbeensystematicallyneglectedby socialwork’sadherencetoapostcolonialagenda.Asamemberofthesocialwork academy, the efforts of this esteemed colleague—who is armed with Ivy League credentials—would normally carry the intellectual force of a factual tsunami. Instead, his works have managed little more than a trickle of response from the academy of social work and its social science equivalent at large. Suffice it to say that the gist of his research scientifically substantiates what many in a Westernpostcolonialacademyareunpreparedtoacknowledge.Thatis,everyother demographic—beingmoresuitedtothewhimsofWesterndiscourse—permeatesits literature,garnersitssympathy,andrelishesitsresources.Enhancedbythelegacyof theWesternhistoryofcolonialimperialism,whatprevailsas“factual”productsof modernsocialscientificendeavorshavebeenreducedtothecertificationofcolonial tradition.Subsequently,theneedsandexistentialcircumstancesofblackmalesare accordinglyregardedasirrelevant,justifyingtheirrelativeabsencefromsocialwork literature, curriculum content—ultimately being assigned the most minimum of resource allocation. As in Western tradition, the needs of women and mothers in particularhavebeenprioritizedasbeingmoreurgent,commensuratewiththeideals of the postcolonial intellectual power structure. The existential circumstances of blackmalesare acknowledgedonlyto the extentthattheyservethe intelligentsia, asstereotypicalperpetratorswhoarepronetoviolentconfrontation.Inregimented unison, stalwarts of the social work academy who are opposed to Dr. Mincy’s thesis maintain a perspective that institutionalizes the absence of men in need whilesimultaneouslybringingforthanintellectualpedagogy,whichtrivializesthe hardships of their existence. This is so, notwithstanding advances in science and a social work mantraof social justice by empowermentof oppressedpopulations. It is a contradiction between existential human realities sustained in the West by the omnipotentreachesof its intellectualnarcissism. Itis an unspokenbutno less tangible offspring of a postcolonial empire in that the existential realities of the people,whichfailtoserveitsnarcissism,ceasetoexist. Similar to that of black males is the denied existentialreality amongpeopleof color,relativetotheimplicationsofskincolor.TheWesternintelligentsiahaslong proclaimedtheexistentialabsenceofskincolorinitsproxyforrace.Indeed,inthe postcolonial West, race has dominated discourse pertaining to human interaction. Subsequently,racehasbeenvalidatedasaskin-colorproxyand,assuch,dilutesany potentialdiscoursedevotedtotheimplicationsofskincolorforpeopleofcolor.Es- trangedfromconsiderationistheexistentialrealityofpeopleofcolorwhointernal- izedalienidealsbycolonialtradition.Suchalienidealssustainedtheircolonization, notonlyphysiologically—duringEurope’simperialreign—butpsychologicallyin thispostcolonialera.Today,thevariousmanifestationsoftheirpsychologicalcolo- Preface ix nizationaredramaticandincludea predispositiontostandardizerace indiscourse despite skin color being an existential force in their lives. By submission to the discourseonrace,alienidealspertainingtoskincolorevolvedaself-destructivedy- namicamongpeopleofcolor,adynamicsimilartophysiologicalcolonization.Rela- tivetotheirsubmission,peopleofcolorthenactoutvariousformsofdiscrimination againstotherpeopleofcolorasamanifestationofpsychologicalcolonization.Race is all but totally irrelevant. The most dramatic manifestations of discrimination have been the nefarious construct of a hierarchy, whereby inferiority is preferred and assigned in proximity to Western attributes. Thus, those who are lightest by skincolorarethemostcelebratedamongnonphysiologicallyWesternpopulations. In contrast, those who are darkest have been denigrated as inferior by their least proximity to the Western ideal even to the point of being denied their humanity. Similar to physiological colonization, this more covert psychological version perpetratedbypeopleofcolorishistoricallyrootedinwhiteracismandisacutely insidious. It is a critical aspect of world history that, for the most part via racial discourseandintellectualnarcissism,hasmanagedescapefrominvestigation—such astheplightofblackmalesfromthescrutinyofWesternacademe. Notwithstanding an intellectual faux pas, the psychological colonization of people of color, evident by the dominance of the race construct, is not a mere political abstraction reflected passively by culture, scholarship, or its institutional ideals. Nor is it representative of some nefarious plot to hold hostage and exploit people of color by some postcolonial Western intellectual. It is rather a tacit distributionofscientificdiscourseintoaesthetic,scholarly,andphilosophicaltexts. ItisanelaborationnotonlyofaWesternintellectualempirepraisedastheultimate ideal but also of an existential perspective of humanity. In this perspective, the intelligentsia of Western scholarship not only controls but also in some cases manipulates that which is manifestly different. It is otherwise a discourse that is bynomeansinarelationshipofconspiracywithintellectualfactionsintherawbut is generated by an uneven exchange with various sources of power. These power sources include, but are not limited to, knowledge power, intellectual power, and existential power. Indeed, the legacy of Western imperialism and its product— colonization—donotrepresenttheacademyasawholeandassuchhavelesstodo withthedominationofcolonizedsubjectsthanwithworldwidehumancoexistence. Because the psychological colonization of people of color by skin color is a cultural, political, and social reality, it does not exist in an archival vacuum or demented fantasy. Quite to the contrary, it is apparent that what is thought or said about people of color follows certain intellectual patterns. It is seen as the mechanism of a broader Western superculture by a considerable degree of nuanceandelaboration.Thus,mostmodernintellectuals,includingthoseinsocial work,ignoretherealitythatsocialscience“fact”evolvedinanarcissisticWestern colonial context. They overlook the explicit connection between that context and the standardization of race in the existential history of its colonized subjects, whichkeeps“scientific” investigationspure.Anyefforttostray fromthe anointed preferences of a Western frame has been perceived as crudely iconoclastic. But there is no negating the fact that modern discourse in the shadows of Western academehasavoidedanefforttoseriouslybridgethegapbetweenwhatisandwhat