Ref.comparison of WEB DUBOIS and AMBEDKAR
Colour(RACE)is the biggest problem of 20th century-(a duboisian question)
Just like ambedkar tried to raise that question in indian society CASTE..
--- On Sun, 9/11/08, C.K. Vishwanath <[EMAIL PROTECTED]> wrote:
From: C.K. Vishwanath <[EMAIL PROTECTED]>
Subject: [GreenYouth] Mayavati to OBAMA by Gail omvesdt
To: [EMAIL PROTECTED]
Cc: [email protected]
Date: Sunday, 9 November, 2008, 2:20 PM
Maya to Obama, signs of the new millennium
GAIL OMVEDT
Obama has won! I was in the US in May 2007, when Mayavati became chief
minister of UP, and Obama was coming forward in the US primary. With
my daughter's friends, mostly young and radical South Asian Americans,
and all Obama supporters we celebrated Mayavati's achievement. After
years of depressing Republican presidencies, war and neoliberalism,
something new was happening in the world.
An African American was aiming for the presidency, while a Dalit (and
a woman!) was heading India's largest state and promising to become
Prime Minister in 10 years. Old barriers of caste and race were being
not only challenged, but surmounted. Obama has made history: will
Mayavati?
It seems that we were truly entering a new millennium! Obama's victory
itself reflects not only his own impressive leadership, but also a
long history. I remember the 1960s: Thirty to forty years ago there
were huge "race riots" in the US. In fact, they were urban ghetto
uprisings, protests against the continued racism of American society.
A bloody civil war — the bloodiest in American history — had been gone
through a century earlier; but in the reaction afterwards segregation
was reimposed in the south and the former slaves were deprived of the
voting rights. It took decades to make really solid changes. W.E.B.
Dubois, as a militant, Left-leaning leader of African Americans, and
Dr. Babasaheb Ambedkar can well be compared; theoretically and
practically there were great similarities.
Yet while Ambedkar could become the head of the Constitution drafting
committee and a minister, first in British Indian, then in independent
India, Dubois could not get a job as postmaster in Washington D.C.
which he had applied for. Bitter at the end, Dubois ended as a
Communist in Africa.
The 1960s saw the civil rights movement; Martin Luther King (moved by
a brave woman named Rosa Parks) emerging to leadership of a Montgomery
bus strike as Blacks revolted against being forced to sit at the back
of the bus; then came sit-ins by militant Black students resolving not
to move away from restaurants refusing to serve them coffee.
In Freedom Summer, an event organised by the Student Nonviolent
Coordinating Committee to bring whites and Blacks together to fight
segregation in Mississippi, four men — three whites and an African
American — were killed. One of the slogans of SNCC was the sarcastic,
"there's a town in Mississippi called Liberty; there's a Department in
Washington called Justice" — a comment on the lack of support they
were getting from the Federal government. Little children moving to
integrate schools were forced to go through mobs of cursing and
shouting white segregationists. And then came the uprisings in
northern ghettos, cities outside the Deep South which had their own
harsh forms of racism.
They were historic years, a time of spreading militancy. A youth group
I was working with in Berkeley, calling themselves "Youth Council for
Community Action" (they had wanted "Youth Party for Youth Protection"
but it was felt too militant), had the saying: "There are Negroes,
niggers and Black people. We have a lot of niggers in this
organisation, but we at least we don't have any Negroes!"
Negroes, once the preferred term, had gotten the connotation of a
middle class sellout; "nigger" was a derogatory term when used by
whites (known insultingly as "honkies") but when used among themselves
had a rather desirable connotation of someone who was (ironically)
"bad" — tough, riotous, uncontrollable, one who never gave in or gave
up. And "Black" by then was the preferred term, someone who was
"together", a real "brother".
America has come a long way since then. Sparked by the protests and
uprisings, which had the support of growing groups of whites, the
government responded with a number of "affirmative action" programmes.
Some sections preferred to build "Black Capitalism", which radicals
such as myself at the time saw as rather a sellout. Yet all of these
had their effect, Blacks — now calling themselves "African Americans"
— began to move ahead in many fields. Emerging writers, men and women
alike began to make their impact. Films such as Roots brought home the
reality of slavery to millions of viewers; the Color Purple (from the
novel by Alice Walker) saw Black women coming in masses and crying
through its showing — and sterling first performers by Whoopee
Goldberg and Oprah Winfrey. Oprah went on to become the highest paid
TV personage in the country, said to be worth a million dollars an
hour, her endorsement for Obama worth a million votes.
Among the youth of the country, the change in attitude was often
profound; people began to choose their friends and mates without
looking at colour. According to Census bureau figures, for example,
black-white marriages increased from 65,000 in 1970 to 422,000 in
2005. Racism is hardly dead; but it is under challenge as never
before.
Then came a young Senator of mixed parentage, white and African, with
a history of community organising, with a Kenyan father and a
childhood in Indonesia and Hawaii. When he announced his candidacy as
a Democrat for the presidency in 2007, he was a "dark horse", a
relative unknown; Hillary Clinton was the overwhelming favourite. Yet
Obama began to waken tremendous enthusiasm, drawing huge crowds and
provoking emotion. His slogan was simple: "change".
By the time of the vote, Obama's victory was no surprise. Charged with
being young and inexperienced, he won over his primary and main
election opponents not only with the most impressive funding seen in
history, but also with powerful organisation, going to the grassroots
with a practical machine and using the Internet, YouTube and SMS
cellphone messages. He remained cool and unflappable in the face of
every challenge. And he awakened something like a new dream among
Americans, mostly young, but of every class, Black and white and
Hispanic.
Throughout the campaign, he drew crowds like a rock star or a famous
preacher, emotional, swaying. The night of the election itself tens of
thousands gathered in Chicago and New York, singing and weeping,
hugging each other as the results became clear. When he stated in his
acceptance speech "change has come -- we have proved today it is a new
and real 'United' States of America", the emotional achievement of
breaking through three hundred years of American slavery and
oppression was visible in many faces.
As one columnist, Frank Rich in the New York Times, wrote: "Obama
doesn't transcend race. He isn't post-race. He is the latest chapter
in the ever-unfurling American racial saga. It is an astonishing
chapter."
For African Americans, it was symbolised in a message sent from phone
to phone: "Rosa sat so Martin could walk. Martin walked so Barack
could run. Barack ran so your children can fly." Hopefully, this will
symbolise the new millennium, not only for people of every colour in
the US but for people of all castes in India.
Gail Omvedt is an America-born sociologist whose essential work has
centred on Dalit empowerment movements in India. Among her many books
is a political biography of B.R. Ambedkar. Omvedt became an Indian
citizen in 1983 and lives in Maharashtra.
Unlimited freedom, unlimited storage. Get it now
Add more friends to your messenger and enjoy! Go to
http://messenger.yahoo.com/invite/
--~--~---------~--~----~------------~-------~--~----~
You received this message because you are subscribed to the Google Groups
"Green Youth Movement" group.
To post to this group, send email to [email protected]
To unsubscribe from this group, send email to [EMAIL PROTECTED]
For more options, visit this group at
http://groups.google.com/group/greenyouth?hl=en-GB
-~----------~----~----~----~------~----~------~--~---
