The inescapability of their social condition and positioning, of their erasure and vulnerability, is also emphasized in Rankines highly stylised poem about the Jena Six (98-103). This was quite an emotional read for me, the instances of racial aggressions that were illustrated in this book being unfortunately all too familiar. From this description, it is clear that Rankine sees the I as a symbol for a human being, for she later states: the I has so much power; its insane (71). While reading Citizen, people may interpret Rankine's use of different pronouns as a . Rankines clear emphasis on form here enables us to not just see, but feel the inevitability and anxiety that is conveyed in the content. It is part of a 3-part PBS documentary series called "RACE - The Power of an Illusion. Whereas Citizen focuses on the minute-to-minute racism of everyday life, this documentary series focuses on systematized racial inequalities. It was a lesson., Instant downloads of all 1699 LitChart PDFs Considering what she calls the social death of history, Rankine suggests that contemporary culture has largely adopted an ahistorical perspective, one that fails to recognize the lasting effects of bigotry. On a plane, a woman and her daughter are reluctant to sit next to you in the row. You can also submit your own questions for Claudia Rankine on our Google form. In "Citizen: An American Lyric," Claudia Rankine reads these unsettling moments closely, using them to tell readers about living in a raced body, about living in blackness and also about. Each word is a lyrical tribute to Black Americans and all that isn't shouted out on a daily basis. Rankine writes from great depth, personal experiences, and also from a greater, inclusive point of view. Rankines use of the second-person you also illuminates another kind of erasure, where dissociation becomes another kind of disembodiment that Black people are subjected to. This metaphor becomes even more complex when analyzing the way Rankine describes the stopping-and-frisking of Black people by the police. 1, 2008, pp. This symbolism of the deer, which signifies the hunting and dehumanization of Black people, is emphasized throughout the work through the repetition of sighing, moaning, and allusions to injury: To live through the days sometimes you moan like deer. LitCharts Teacher Editions. The large white space on top of the photograph seems to be pushing the image down, crushing the small black space. Its dark light dims in degrees depending on the density of clouds and you fall back into that which gets reconstructed as metaphor. Clearly - from the blurb and the plaudits - this is an 'important work' - and my failure to 'get it' is a failure to police my mind (or something). In essay, image, and poetry, Citizen is a powerful testament to the individual and collective effects of racism in our contemporary, often named "post-race" society. What that something else . The narrator assures her: "The world is wrong. As a woman of color, I am always concerned about bringing a raced text into a classroom, especially at universities that are less diverse. The mess is collecting within Rankine's unnamed citizen even as her body rejects it. You nobody. By utilizing form, visual imagery, and poetry, Rankine enables us to see the systemic oppression of Black people by the state. Claudia Rankine's acclaimed 2014 poetry book "Citizen" was a potent and incisive meditation on race. By the time she and her partner get to their house, the police have already come and gone, and the neighbor has apologized to their friend, who was simply on the phone. Teach your students to analyze literature like LitCharts does. At one point, she attends a reading by a humorist who implies that its common for white people to laugh at racist jokes in private, adding that most people wouldnt laugh at this kind of joke if they were out in public where black people might overhear them. A neighbor calls while you are watching the film The House We Live In to say that "a menacing black guy" (20) is walking around your house. They're like having in-class notes for every discussion!, This is absolutely THE best teacher resource I have ever purchased. ", After reading Citizen, its hard not to hear Rankines voice as I ride the subway, walk around NYC, or even pick up other books. While she highlights a vast number of stories that illustrate the hate crimes that have occurred in the United States during the 21st century, the James Craig Anderson case is prevalent because his heartbreaking story is known by few individuals throughout . Citizen is comprised of multiple different artforms, including essayistic vignettes, poems, photographs, and other renderings of visual art. Considering Schiller and Arnold Through Claudia Rankine's Citizen Reading Between Lines of Citizen Figure 5. Perhaps this dissociation, seen in the literariness of Rankines poetics and use of you, speaks to the kind of erasure of self that happens when you experience racism every day. In this instance, the black body becomes even more animal-like. You are told to use the back entrance of her house because this is where patients go to get trauma counseling. In this memory, a secondary memory is evoked, but this time it is the author's memory. Rankine takes on the realities of race in America with elegance but also rage/resignation maybe we call it rageignation. This parallel between erasure and lynching can be seen more clearly when we look at Hulton Archives Public Lynchingphotograph, whose image had been altered by John Lucas (Rankine, 91) (Figure 1). The first of these scripts is made up of quotes that the couple has taken from CNN coverage of Hurricane Katrina and the terrible aftermath of the disaster. She joined me at The Kaye Playhouse at Hunter College in New York City. Rankine stresses the importance of remembering because forgetting is part of the erasure. Find related themes, quotes, symbols, characters, and more. Rankines deliberate labelling of her work as lyric challenges the historical whiteness of the lyric form. The placement of the photograph at the bottom of the page is deliberate, as it makes the empty black space seem even smaller in comparison to the white figures and white space that surrounds it. Detailed explanations, analysis, and citation info for every important quote on LitCharts. Although this is meant to help avoid misunderstandings, oftentimes too much is understood. "Yes, of course, you say" (20). Citizen: An American Lyric essays are academic essays for citation. More books than SparkNotes. Rankine stays with the unnamed protagonist, who in response to racist comments constantly asks herself things like, What did he just say? and Did I hear what I think I heard? The problem, she realizes, is that racism is hard to cope with because before people of color can process instances of bigotry, they have to experience them. By using such an expensive paper, Rankine seems to be commenting on the veneer of American democracy, which paints itself white and innocent in comparison to other nations. "The rain this mourning pours from the gutters and everywhere else it is lost in the trees. By my middling review, I definitely dont mean to take away anything from. It's / buried in you; it's turned your flesh into . Eugene Jarecki, 2003) is about racial injustice. (including. However, Rankin explores this idea of citizenship through alienation. Claudia Rankine on Blackness as the Second Person. Guernica, 5 Jan. 2017, www.guernicamag.com/blackness-as-the-second-person/. The repetition of this visual motif highlights the existing structures of racism which has allowed for slavery to be born again in the sprawling carceral state of America (Coates 79). At a glance, the interactions seem to be simple misunderstandings - friends mistaken for strangers, frustrations incorrectly categorized as racial, or just honest mistakes. The route is often . And this ugliness is some of what being an American citizen means. The emptinessthe lack of a corpse or a live body or faceis a literal representation of the erasure of African-Americans. Time and Distance Overcome. The Iowa Review, vol. Even though it will be obvious that the girl behind her is cheating, the protagonist obliges by leaning over, wondering all the while why her teacher hasnt noticed. To see so many people moved and transformed by her work and her vision is something that should give us all hope. In addition to questioning unmarked whiteness, Claudia Rankine's Citizen contains all the hallmarks of experimental writing: borrowed text, multiple or fractured voices, constraint-based systems of creation, ekphrastic cataloging, and acute engagement with visual art. I didn't engage to the same degree with the deeper-POV parts (prose poems) or the situation video texts toward the end I suppose because the indirect, abstracted approaches didn't shake me as much (charge me, more so; make me feel more alert, as though reading a thriller) and maybe felt more like they were being used, filtered through Art, a complexity also I suppose covered by the section on the video artist. She never acknowledged her mistake, but eventually corrected it. The next situation video that Rankine presents is about the 2006 soccer World Cup, when Zinedine Zidane headbutted Marco Materazzi, who verbally provoked him. 137163., doi:10.1017/S0021875817000457. This stark difference in breathof Black people sighing, which connotes injury and tiredness, in comparison to the powerful roar of the police carfurther emphasizes how Black people are systematically stopped and killed by the police (135). Instant PDF downloads. The world says stop that. The door is locked so you go to the front door where you are met with a fierce shout. Moaning elicits laughter, sighing upsets. Detailed quotes explanations with page numbers for every important quote on the site. Teachers and parents! Chingonyi, Kayo. Black Blue Boy, 1997.Courtesy of Carrie Mae Weems. Claudia Rankine's Citizen is an anatomy of American racism in the new millennium, a slender, musical book that arrives with the force of a thunderclap.It's a sequel of sorts to Don't Let Me Be Lonely (2004), sharing its subtitle (An American Lyric) and ambidextrous approach: Both books combine poetry and prose, fiction and nonfiction, words and . Her formally and poetically innovative text utilizes form, figuration, and literariness to emphasize key themes of the erasure, systemic hunting, and imprisonment of African-Americans in the white hegemonic society of America. With the sophistication of its dialectical movement, the gravitas of its ethical appeal, and the mercy of its psychological rigor, Claudia Rankine's Citizen combines traditional poetic strains in a new way and passes them on to the reader with replenished vitality. It's more than a book. Nor are the higher echelons of the academic and literary worlds any insulation against such behavior. You see Venus move in and put the gorilla effect on. A mixed-media collection of vignettes, poems, photographs, and reproductions of various forms of visual art, Citizen floats in and out of a multiple topics and perspectives. At Like in Sections IV and III, Rankine puts special focus on the body and its potentials to be made known. Complete your free account to access notes and highlights. While this style of narration positions the reader as [a] racist and [a] recipient of racism simultaneously (Adams 58), therefore placing them directly in the narrative, the use of you also speaks to the invisibility and erasure of Black people (Rankine 70-72). The wrong words enter your day like a bad egg in your mouth and puke runs down your blouse, a dampness drawing your stomach in toward your rib cage. 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