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by John Howard Griffin
Content: 5/5
Poetic Mastery: 3/5
Literary Truth: 5/5
Mr. Griffin’s work (10 million+ copies sold; required reading in many universities and public schools) detailing the life of an African American in the South comes from a unique angle: it comes from a white man who changed to a black man for 7 weeks and lived in the deep south in the late 50s. When Griffin alters his superfacia he and we white readers enter a shocking, shocking world that it is impossible to imagine.
In simple, unassuming, accurate narrative Griffin’s journal is of inherant substance sensational. Moreover, since the book is simple narrative, a relation of facts, it is unarguably persuasive. It is not an interpretation of data, a study, a thesis, any thing that could be debated or re-evaluated. It is fact. And the fact is more horrifying and recent than I was prepared to discover. This book is, without question, required reading – especially for whites :D. Read Black Like Me, even if you never read another book I read. The book will take only two days or less to read, but it should magnificently alter your thinking, a bonus worth more of an investment of time.
by Herodotus
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Content: 5/5
Poetic Mastery: 5/5
Literary Truth: 5/5
The Histories is the most surprising good read I can remember. When I picked it up — in a great hurry, grabbing anything on the classics shelf before a weekend a camping trip — I expected to encounter 600 pages of something like the most dull parts of the pentateuch: full of catalogues of names and places unknown and meaningless to me, convoluted, stilted, foreign, and ultimately uninteresting for anyone but the super-pre-acquainted. But only a few pages of reading this book were necessary to fully reverse that opinion. The Histories is a page-turner. Herodotus’ (ca. 484 – 425 BC) style and content are both clever and readable. I must say, though, that while the book is as straightforward and clear as it could be, nonetheless the sheer scope of the work makes the book a tough nut to crack; I found myself very often rereading sections of a narrative strain suspended some 200 pages back to refresh my memory of what had happened and who was who. Seriously, I’ve probably read half of this book two times to make sure I remember enough to justify the time taken to read it. But, fortunately, it was very interesting. It’s the type of work you could read more than once or thrice. My 4th and 5th graders have loved what of this work I’ve retold to them.
The Histories is a roaming history of the Persian-Greek wars, which Herodotus presents not-too-tacitly as the heir to Homer’s account of the sack of Troy in the line of great Greek historical and literary phenomenon. The tale is much more than a battle description; in fact the immediate lead-up to and action of the Greco-Persian battles comprise probably (wild guess…) less than 10% of the work. Herodotus treats the reader to extensive ethnographies, geographies, and histories of the major and minor players in the world leading up to the crisis, based upon the author’s fantastically well-traveled personal inquiries (a luxury of being Greek at a time of Greek supremacy, no doubt). Egyptology comprises all of what is now called Book II (of nine books).
Herodotus is aptly called the father of modern history. His content is “detatched” in that he succeeds in presenting the glories and downfalls of all people, whether Greek or not. Typical histories are ethnocentric: our gods are true, yours are false; our greivances against you are legitimate, and yours are not; our men are the bravest; our monuments are the grandest; and so on. But Herodotus is wide-eyed. Herodotus’ mission, he explains when reporting histories that he has factual reservations about, is not to always to tell what happened but to simply report what nations’ histories are about themselves. Herodotus also surprises me with the acumen of his mind, which brings him not only to be able to have a memory extensive enough to remember and record all within the work, but also to be able to collect with so curious and open a critical mind the stories, people, and geographies. I’ll never forget his hypothesis — based upon the alluvial quality of Egyptian soil, historical Nile flood measurements, and other data — that Egypt was once underwater (by a finger of water going south just as the Red Sea goes north). He argued that for silt from the Nile to have accumulated to create the land as it is would take “just” 10 thousand years, maybe 20,000 tops, based upon his measurements.
I’ll end this summary with a few side notes of importance to me but not of the work. First, I love the Persians’ mettle. Secondly, it was interesting to note that the Jews were never mentioned. Going to Sunday School every week since birth makes a Christian child see history as revolving around Jerusalem and Jews, much as the earth used to be thought of as the center of the universe. But noticing that Herodotus, in a giant volume listing seemingly every small tribe imaginable, refers not once to the Jews and only twice to Palestine at all, was truly an informative silence. Point of interest: The most extensive reference to Palestine is in a few sentences about how he knows the stories are true about an Egyptian pharoah who carved women’s genitals on the victory poles he erected in countries that were especially easily conquered; Herodotus says he saw one with such a carving himself in Palestine. Thirdly, I’d like to comment on the Penguin edition of this work. The paperback MSRP is $6.99, which seems almost wrong considering the the edition’s copious resources: maps, timelines, outlines, extensive endnotes, and bibliographic suggestions. I hope you enjoy the work some time!
by Clete Hassan Ladd
In “The Theology of Minister Malcom X: Afrikan American Male Rite of Passage,” Clete Ladd’s narrative barges ahead with the tidal weight of history rather than the academic dot-connecting of most scholarly projects. From tales of the Afrikan American community struggle for human rights to the individual’s tale of limited opportunity, hate, and prejudice, Ladd depicts Afrikan American juvenile males’ need for strong forces to swiftly and regularly transition them from childhood to productive manhood. Malcom X’s journey serves as the paradigm for this switch.
The thesis is compelling. However, for me the most striking aspect of this work is the opportunity to view the Afrikan American situation from the perspective of an Islamic Afrikan American, which is vastly different from the interpretation of race relations taught/assumed by a conflict-sheltered, Judeo-Christian, middle-class European-American.
Beginning with the thesis, adolescence is considered by many psychologists to be a uniquely modern phase of development (or lack thereof) in which a person is biologically but not socially an adult. For Mr. Ladd, Afrikan American’s slavery and exclusion from the white-led, segregated society for the bulk of American history is the primary cause of the Afrikan Americans’ lingering in adolescence and poorly transitioning into manhood.*
The father figure, a crucial factor helping young men grow into good men, is a role that is present or absent in a cycle of massive inertia: those who have a father figure are much more likely to be father figures, while those born from absentee, careless fathers are usually deadbeat dads themselves. Therefore, he argues that the nearly total damage to Afrikan American familial structure done by slave owners’ over two centuries by actively banning familial relations–mating them like “bulls” and “heifers” and separating the men from their families–is directly responsible for the continued epidemic of absentee fatherism in Afrikan American households and the impoverished rearing and hope of the teens.
Another factor contributing to the hopelessness of Afrikan American males’ transition to adulthood is the lack of religious identity. Ladd argues that being sold from Afrika as slaves destroyed many Afrikan Americans’ historic cultural and religious identity (Islam) as they were force-fed slave-owners’ Jesus figure. This religion was unacceptable to many who could not tolerate the religion of their oppressors, a religion that used Jesus’ submission to death and the NT passages on slavery as a mandate from God to maintain their position.
Ladd also pleas with his narrative that besides lack of father figures and acceptable religious identity Afrikan Americans had too few career opportunities to help young adults make good career and identity choices. To many blacks, an Afrikan American has to be a servant, a sharecropper, a factory worker, or a criminal. Of these jobs the one that offers identity and promises power, consequence, identity, value, and equality is gangs. This is the choice too many Afrikan Americans make. Being an investment banker is “white,” being a scientist is “white.” Etc.**
Islam, however, can provide a viable identity alternative for Afrikan Americans. Islam gives ancient Afrikan heritage and religion to guide behavior in the vacuum left by rejected Christianity of the slave-owners and segregationists; Islam provides powerful, social-bettering adult male figures; Islam arms them with the opportunity and power and justification to fight back with whatever means works against their oppression (including “eye for an eye” and self-defense — instead of that “submit to authority” of the New Testament). Islam provides therefore a swifter, more effective rite of passage. And Malcom X’s life and conversion offers a superlatively inspirational exmple of the power of Islam to accomplish the most difficult of transitions for Afrikan Americans. For Malcolm, Islam changed him from being an underachieving young, immature, prison-bound pimp and gang member who liked the name “Satan” to being a spokesman that demanded human rights in his country before the nation and before kings and presidents from all over the world.
Perception of Malcom X is markedly different depending upon whom you talk to. Some see him as a violent political figure–an angry, lesser Dr. King–while others view Malcom X as a spiritual leader, prophet, minister. I do not know enough about Malcom X to pass judgment on this, and anyway I wouldn’t like to engage in a battle that focuses a-productively on the epithetic interpretation of a person rather than on the future, on moving forward.
Many of the people in Mr. Ladd’s book said with angry dispair that America and Christianity are “for white people.” It is natural that Europe’s long history of conquest and their widespread use of the NT passages exhorting meek submission to oppression to beat down Afrikan Americans’ struggle for rights would fuel the feeling that Christianity and America are for white people. Dr. King proved that white racists’ Christianity is not the only version of the religion. And America does not have to be for whites or for blacks; America is its citizens. As Afrikan Americans gain their rightful place of equality America takes the shape of all its people.
We have a long way to go, true. But it’s hard to believe that only 41 years since the Selma-Montgomery march (my parents were preteens!), a Republican president from the South–elected with Southern, white Christians’ votes–would post two Afrikan American to the position of Secretary of State. (And Rice and Powell are popular in the South, too, unlike Marshal whose appointment in administration of L. Johnson was not well received, to say the least.) We have a long, long way to go. Anyone who inspires or trains people to grow up to be men and women of integrity, compassion, justice, and equality–whoever he may be, X, King, Ladd, Jesus, Hughes, Longfellow, Michael Jordan, Condoleezza Rice or Jerry Rice, your high school science teacher, Morgan Freeman, Johny Cochran, or Barney the purple dinosaur–is helping this nation of all the people and for all the people be a home for all races and religions. America will hopefully continue to accelerate its harvest of mature adults from the scattered, trampled seeds of our people with the help of Mr. Ladd, until “white America” exists only in memory.
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*Various factors contribute to the indefinite pause between childhood and adulthood, including financial, social, and familial experiences. Mr. Ladd addresses only the factors pertinent to Afrikan Americans’ unique environmental struggles to transition from boys to successful men. For young adults from affluent, white homes, trouble entering adulthood is caused by the opposite problem, I think: too many options and financial freedom to make no choice for a long time. The Industrial Revolution bettered economic conditions (for them) until they could send their children to high school and then college rather than working them in the family’s manual labor occupation from the early end of childhood at 11, 12, or 13. Responsibility-less autonomy now stretches late enough for many that degree-holding adults are still looking for themselves (in idle criticism) as their life becomes a sitcom of value only to those alike in life-phase. Thus, their problem is not being restricted from choices and being pushed into a bad choice by the pressing demands of survival, but rather having too many choices and no reason to make one. Well, it’s a pity, but not as bad as the adolescent problem of everyone else.
** To this day, for want of role models, many Afrikan Americans consider being smart, pursuing a college education, and living in the upper or middle class to be inconsistent with Afrikan Americanness.
by Pietra Rivoli
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Content 4/5
Poetic Mastery 2/5
Literary Truth n/a
As a professor at Georgetown in the 90s, Rivoli was around for the student protests against American companies’ indifference to working conditions at its suppliers’ factories. At one such rally, Rivoli heard a
“young woman seize the microphone. ‘Who made your T-shirt?’ she asked the crowd. ‘Was it a child in Vietnam, chained to a sewing maching without food or water?…. forced to work 90 hours each week, without overtime pay? Did you know that she has no right to speak out, no right to unionize? That she lives not only in poverty, but also in filth and sickness, all in the name of nike profits?’I did not know all this. And I wondered about the young woman at the microphone: How did she know?” (viii)
So, Prof. Rivoli bought a typical, Florida beach scene tourist t-shirt and then tracked down every farmer and lobbyist and knitter and cutter and sewer and printer and vendor that brought it into her hands. And then she followed it into the surprising “after-life” after the Salvation Army truck took it away. And she did large amounts of reasearch on the history of textile production and its role in society (i.e., cotton manufacturing ignited the industrial revolution in Britain, the US, and now…. China).
Rivoli states up front that she her work, being anecdotal, is “unable to confirm or discredit a theory, or to settle definitively a debate between opposing views on trade or globalization.” (211) However, she obviously believes her anecdote has a role in enlightened discussion, and her statement that “I brought to this story my own biases and I no doubt harbor them still…” was quite insightful. (ix) If anything, this story shows that personal biases and sympathies, protectionism, misinformation, ethics, and politics politics politics have as much weight in understanding the issue as pure economic theory; so while one story cannot be turned into an equation, in this case it has great power to enlighten the human and political reality of a situation so heated and so remote. In this case the truth is interestingly different than my expectation.
The main topics are easily understood in the chapter titles:
- King Cotton traces the surprising origin of raw cotton (Teska), as well as explaining the political and scientific factors making this location flourish.
- Made in China takes the reader to the yarning, knitting, and sewing places
- Trouble at the Border recounts the T-shirts salmon-like struggle to come back home to mate with a consumer
- My T-Shirt Finally Encounters a Free Market follows the t-shirt’s surprising trips in the “afterlife”
I highly recommend this book.
by Rob Cook
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Content 2/5
Poetic Mastery 1/5
Literary Truth 0/5
How silly and unsuitable my categories are for judging a non-fiction work about a drum company! To throw the tradition of my reviews out the window seems appropriate, therefore… here’s a summary of the book rather than a review (short review: interesting, lots of primary sources).
The Leedy drum company, started by U.G. Leedy at the turn of the last century, was the country’s leading drum manufacturing organization during its golden age of jazz, swing, and modern classical music. Notable endorsees who would only play Leedy include Sonny Greer (Duke Ellington’s drummer); the Green brothers (mallet percussion experts); George Way; George Braum (Metropolitan Opera of NY); and John Philip Sousa’s whole drum section (including bass drummer of all those legends, August Helmecke). Leedy invented the vibraphone as well as the snare drum stand (snares heretofore were slung around on the side, as in the army, or set on a chair); and they built the Purdue Drum, the largest bass drum in diameter in the world (yes, it took a long time to find two cows that would produce 7’2” diameter heads!).
This volume contains about 40% text by the author and 60% photocopies of primary source material, consisting mainly of photocopies of the catalogues and magazines put out by Leedy.
It is a somewhat heartwarming read as the company was a one-man startup by the percussionist son of a carpenter, who had relentless ambition, imagination, attention to detail — and business sense. For me, the story was especially interesting 
because the original building in which Leedy accomplished its greatest feats (including all mentioned above) is now the home of my school, SENSE Elementary.
What happened to the Leedy company? When U.G. retired, he had no sons to pass the company on to, so he sold it to Conn. Ludwig and Ludwig, incidentally, sold out to Conn about the same time. The two companies slowly morphed from pioneering, cutting-edge, high-quality drum lines to the proverbial red-headed-step-children-of-a-woodwind-and-brass-manufacturing-company (OK, so there’s no proverb about just that yet). After a while, the line died out. Why’s Ludwig still around? Ludwig bought his name back. Fred Gretch bought the Leedy name in the 80s, sold it to Baldwin, and bought it back a few years ago. They just recently started producing drums again.
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