Rethinking Racial Uplift: Rhetorics of Black Unity and Disunity in the Obama Era

These incisive essays by Malcolm (One More River to Cross), a professor of communication at Keene State College, probe the intersection of class and race in contemporary Black communities. He examines six books, published between 2007 and 2014, by authors ranging from Ta-Nehisi Coates to Bill Cosby, and posits that their use of “rhetorics of Black unity” (encouraging Black collective action) or “disunity” (stressing Black individualism) points to the “divided state of Blacks in the post-civil rights era.” The author holds up Eugene Robinson’s Disintegration (2010) as exemplary of the disunity strain and suggests that Robinson’s discussion of stratification within the Black community demonstrates the limits of racial uplift by contending that well-off Black people sometimes “identify more with whites” and undermine racial solidarity. However, Malcolm is also wary of certain manifestations of unity rhetoric, drawing on Randall Kennedy’s Sellout (2008) to argue that accusations of “selling out” serve to reify “an essentialist notion of race” by shaming Black people who are perceived to embrace a white mainstream. The author’s arguments are deeply nuanced yet frequently provocative, as when he asserts that Black people “live in the land of the free, knowing that they are slaves to each other.” This is sure to spark debate. (Jan.)