Books by Floyd W. Hayes, III

A Turbulent Voyage: Readings in African American Studies / Forty Acres and a Mule: The Rape of Colored Americans

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Race in US Politics

Syllabus

PS 303, Race in U.S. Politics Fall Semester 2003

NORTH CAROLINA STATE UNIVERSITY

Department of Political Science & Public Administration

Professor Floyd W. Hayes, III 

One is astonished in the study of history at the recurrence of the idea that evil must be forgotten, distorted, skimmed over.  We must not remember that Daniel Webster got drunk but only remember that he was a splendid constitutional lawyer.  We must forget that George Washington was a slave owner, or that Thomas Jefferson had mulatto children, or that Alexander Hamilton had Negro blood, and simply remember the things we regard as creditable and inspiring.  

The difficulty, of course, with this philosophy is that history loses its value as an incentive and example; it paints perfect men and noble nations, but it does not tell the truth.—W. E. B. Du Bois, Black Reconstruction in America, 1860-1880

Buttressed by their belief that their God had entrusted the earth into their keeping, drunk with power and possibility, waxing rich through trade in commodities, human and non-human, with awesome naval and merchant marines at their disposal, their countries filled with human debris anxious for any adventures, psychologically armed with new facts, white Western Christian civilization during the fourteenth, fifteenth, sixteenth, and seventeenth centuries, with a long, slow, and bloody explosion, hurled itself upon the sprawling masses of colored humanity in Asia and Africa….For the West to disclaim responsibility for what it so clearly did is to make every white man alive on earth today a criminal. —Richard Wright, White Man, Listen!

America became white—the people who, as they claim, “settled” the country became white—because of the necessity of denying the Black presence, and justifying the Black subjugation.  No community can be based on such a principle—or, in other words, no community can be established on so genocidal a lie.  

White men—from Norway, for example, where they were Norwegians—became white: by slaughtering the cattle, poisoning the wells, torching the houses, massacring Native Americans, raping Black women….But this cowardice, this necessity of justifying a totally false identity and of justifying what must be called a genocidal history, has placed everyone now living into the hands of the most ignorant and powerful people the world has ever seen:  And how did they get that way?...By deciding that they were white.  By opting for safety instead of life.  

By persuading themselves that a Black child’s life meant nothing compared with a white child’s life.  By abandoning their children to the things white men could buy.  By informing their children that Black women, Black men and Black children had no human integrity that those who call themselves white were bound to respect.  And in this debasement and definition of Black people, they debased and defamed themselves. —James Baldwin, “On Being ‘White’…and Other Lies”

In ways so embedded that it is rarely apparent, the set of assumptions, privileges, and benefits that accompany the status of being white have become a valuable asset—one that whites sought to protect and those [blacks] who passed sought to attain, by fraud if necessary. Whites have come to expect and rely on these benefits, and over time these expectations have been affirmed, legitimated, and protected by the law.  

Even though the law is neither uniform nor explicit in all instances, in protecting settled expectations based on white privilege, American law has recognized a property interest in whiteness that, although unacknowledged, now forms the background against which legal disputes are framed, argued, and adjudicated. —Cheryl Harris, “Whiteness as Property”

By racism I mean the self-deceiving choice to believe either that one’s race is the only race qualified to be considered human or that one’s race is superior to other races.--Lewis R. Gordon, Bad Faith and Antiblack Racism

PURPOSE OF THE COURSE:

This course investigates the impact of race(ism) on US political development.   Hence, the broad purpose of this course is to encourage students to think and write critically about the manner in which white supremacy, as a modern global system of thought and practice, came to function as the keystone in the making and maintenance of America.  We will examine the manner in which modern Western ideas of racial superiority and inferiority legitimized the strategies of conquest, colonialism, genocide, enslavement, and land expropriation in the establishment of the United States as a white republic.  

We will explore how whiteness has operated as the invisible norm in American political culture, a transparent, yet ubiquitous frame of reference so pervasive that even today most whites consider themselves absolved from race matters.   We will investigate how white intellectuals have constructed the national identity as white, excluding any direct reference to African Americans and other people of color.  We will examine closely how white supremacy operates to protect the power, privileges, profits, and pleasures that whiteness affords.  

Finally, we will examine critically a number of contemporary public policy issues and the manner in which America continues to deny racial justice to African Americans and other people of color.  In the last analysis, we will want to answer the following questions: What does it mean for Americans to speak and write about such lofty principles as freedom, justice, and equality, but then to devalue these values (historically and presently) by denying them to African Americans and other native populations?  Does America’s racist political culture call into question the United States as a democratic polity?

REQUIRED TEXTS:

Feagin, Joe R. 2000. Racist America: Roots, Current Realities, and Future Reparations. New York: Routledge.

Mills, Charles W. 1997. The Racial Contract. Ithaca: Cornell University Press.

Morrison, Toni. 1992. Playing in the Dark: Whiteness and the Literary Imagination. Cambridge: Harvard University Press.

Rothenberg, Paula S. 2002. Ed. White Privilege: Essential Readings on the Other Side of Racism. New York: Worth Publishers.

Walters, Ronald. 2003. White Nationalism, Black Interests: Conservative Public Policy and the Black Community. Detroit: Wayne State University Press.

COURSE OUTLINE AND READING ASSIGNMENTS

RECOMMENDED  READING (Not Required)

Drucker, Peter F.  1993.  Post-Capitalist Society. New York: HarperCollins.

Fernandez, John P.  1993.  The Diversity Advantage.  New York: Lexington Books.

Handy, Charles.  1989.  The Age of Unreason. Harvard Business School Press.

Marable, Manning, and Leith Mullings. 2000. Eds. Let Nobody Turn Us Around: Voices of Resistance, Reform, and Renewal. Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield.

Reich, Robert B.  1991.  Work of Nations. New York: Alfred A. Knopf.

Rifkin, Jeremy.  1995.  The End of Work. New York: G. P. Putnam’s Sons.

Takaki, Ronald. A Different Mirror: A History of Multicultural America. Boston: Little, Brown & Company.

Toffler, Alvin.  1990.  Powershift. New York: Bantam Books.

SECTION B:  WHITE SUPREMACY AS THE UNNAMED POLITICAL SYSTEM: THE RACIST CONTRACT MADE VISIBLE

W Aug. 27        READ: Racial Contract, Introduction

F Aug. 29         READ: Racial Contract, Chap. 1

M Sept. 1          Holiday: No Class

W Sept. 3         READ: Racial Contract, Chap. 2

F Sept. 5           READ: Racial Contract, Chap. 3

SECTION C:  CONSTRUCTING THE WHITE REPUBLIC: DECONSTRUCTING AMERICAN DEMOCRACY

M Sept. 8          READ: Racist America, Introduction

W Sept. 10        READ: Racist America, Chap. 1

F Sept. 12         READ: Racist America, Chap. 2

M Sept. 15        READ: Racist America, Chap. 3

W Sept. 17        READ: Racist America, Chap. 4

F Sept. 19         READ: Racist America, Chap. 5

M Sept. 22        READ: Racist America, Chap. 6

THOUGHT PAPER DUE

W Sept. 24        READ: Racist America, Chap. 7

F Sept. 26         READ: Racist America, Chap. 8

SECTION D:  THE POLITICAL CULTURE OF WHITENESS: RACIST EVASIONS AND NATIONAL IDENTITY

M Sept. 29        READ: Playing in the Dark, Preface

W Oct. 1          READ: Playing in the Dark, Chap. 1

F Oct. 3            READ: Playing in the Dark, Chap. 2

M Oct. 6           READ: Playing in the Dark, Chap. 3

                       MID-TERM EXAMINATION DUE

W-F Oct. 8-10  FALL BREAK

SECTION E:  WHITENESS AS PROPERTY: POWER, PRIVILEGE, PLEASURE, AND PROFITS

M Oct. 13         READ: White Privilege, Introduction

W Oct. 15         READ: White Privilege, Part I, Chap. 1

F Oct. 17          READ: White Privilege, Part I, Chap. 2

M Oct. 20         READ: White Privilege, Part I, Chap. 3

W Oct. 22         READ: White Privilege, Part II, Chap. 1

F Oct. 24          READ: White Privilege, Part II, Chap. 2

M Oct. 27         READ: White Privilege, Part II, Chap. 3

                       THOUGHT PAPER DUE

W Oct. 29         READ: White Privilege, Part II, Chap. 4

F Oct. 31          READ: White Privilege, Part III, Chap. 1

M Nov. 3          READ: White Privilege, Part III, Chap. 2

W Nov. 5          READ: White Privilege, Part III, Chap. 3

F Nov. 7           READ: White Privilege, Part III, Chap. 4

SECTION F:    WHITE SUPREMACY, NEOCONSERVATISM, AND THE ASSAULT ON RACIAL JUSTICE

M Nov. 10             READ: White Nationalism, Black Interests, Introduction

W Nov. 12             READ: White Nationalism, Black Interests, Chap. 1

F Nov. 14               READ: White Nationalism, Black Interests, Chap. 2

M Nov. 17             READ: White Nationalism, Black Interests, Chap. 3

                                THOUGHT PAPER DUE

W Nov. 19             READ: White Nationalism, Black Interests, Chap. 4

F Nov. 21               READ: White Nationalism, Black Interests, Chap. 5

M Nov. 24             READ: White Nationalism, Black Interests, Chap. 6

W Nov. 26-28       THANKSGIVING HOLIDAYS

M Dec. 1                READ: White Nationalism, Black Interests, Chap. 7

W Dec. 3                READ: White Nationalism, Black Interests, Chap. 8

F Dec. 5  READ: White Nationalism, Black Interests, Chaps. 9 and 10

M Dec. 8                FINAL EXAMINATION (8:00-11:00 AM)

EXPECTATIONS:

You are expected to read thoroughly and think seriously about all assignments before coming to class and be prepared to discuss them effectively in class.  Indeed, this course will emphasize active discussion as the major pedagogical strategy employed in this class.  Therefore, you should develop personal syntheses of class discussions and readings.  This course will test your ability to integrate these bodies of knowledge and to communicate this learning both through speaking and writing.  Hence, simply memorizing isolated facts and regurgitating them are insufficient in regard to class discussions, examinations, the research paper, and grading.

My intent is to challenge you to demonstrate the ability to think analytically, independently, and critically about the subject matter of this course.  The aim is to encourage you to formulate and defend your own arguments thoughtfully, intelligently, and persuasively.  At times we may contest the interpretation of the authors we read and discuss.  The political, social, economic, and cultural life experiences of African Americans are complex and complicated, allowing for differing and competing explanations.  

Thus, I urge you to forego the usual anxiety about always having to discover and articulate the "right" answer to questions posed.  Multiple and sometimes competing explanations or interpretations may be more appropriate than a single all-encompassing one.  Our task, in the final analysis, is to develop the ability to think, speak, and write intelligently and critically about race(ism) in American politics.  This kind of critical reflection and discussion also can be a formula for changing ourselves and for changing society.

The character of class dialogue enhances the process of learning about political life.  Political dialogue also encourages the development and refinement of skills needed to practice political knowledge in complex and diverse social settings—the ability to keep an open mind, to stand in another person's shoes, to make decisions with others, and to make compromises while maintaining integrity.  Ideas should be openly discussed and debated so that people can choose which ones they will endorse or reject.  Hence, it is important that all class members actively participate in class discussions.

To accomplish these objectives, students will be divided into discussion groups that will review and analyze each day’s reading assignment.  Following this, there will be a general class discussion of the reading; each group will present to the class the major points of its deliberation. Groups should be careful to describe the reading’s subject, theme, or issue; state the author’s purpose and thesis or argument; briefly summarize the assignment’s key points, identifying the evidence used to support the thesis or argument; provide constructive criticism when appropriate; and raise questions in the reading for class discussion. 

In order to maintain continuity and improve the learning process, discussion groups should point out the present reading’s relationship to previous reading assignments.  An important learning mechanism, class discussion also can result in problem identification and handling, political and cultural change, resisting cultural imperialism and enslavement, and societal renewal and advancement.  It enhances mutual understanding and respect.  In the absence of communication, misunderstanding, rage, resentment, and cynicism can become the order to the day.

EDUCATIONAL PHILOSOPHY:

As this course suggests, we live in a period of rapid, uncertain, and often chaotic change.  My educational philosophy is both simple and complex, drawing strongly from The Hidden Curriculum by Benson R. Snyder: "We are confronted with the necessity of educating students without either the students or their education becoming obsolete."  Education is the practice of liberation.  I view learning as a struggle for knowledge, wisdom, and understanding in order to prepare for a future of freedom. 

Therefore, I will challenge you not so much to agree or disagree with me as to grow intellectually, personally, and socially.  Don’t be afraid to learn something new, and be prepared to take intellectual risks.  The classroom needs to become a setting in which to create an environment where you can discover who you are and where you are encouraged to be more of who you already are.  Free your mind!  Think independently and critically!  Act audaciously in the world!

To what passions may we surrender with assurance that we will expand rather than diminish the promise of our lives?  The quest for knowledge that enables us to unite theory and practice is one such passion.  To the extent that professors bring this passion, which has to be fundamentally rooted in a love for ideas we are able to inspire, the classroom becomes a dynamic place where transformations in social relations are concretely actualized and the false dichotomy between the world outside and the inside world of the academy disappears. 

bell hooks, Teaching to Transgress: Education as the Practice of Freedom

Every university student own and use a dictionary as well as a good writing handbook.  There are numerous writing guides.  I find the following quite helpful. 

Gibaldi, Joseph. 1998. MLA Style Manual and Guide for Scholarly Publishing, New York: The Modern Language Association of America.  

posted 30 December 2005

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The White Masters of the World

From The World and Africa, 1965

By W. E. B. Du Bois

W. E. B. Du Bois’ Arraignment and Indictment of White Civilization (Fletcher)

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Ancient African Nations

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