East Tennessean

Issue date: 2/26/09 Section: News

Media Credit: Travis Brown Bakari Kitwana, author and Rap Sessions CEO, in an interview before the event. [Click to enlarge]

Media Credit: Travis Brown students sit in the Culp Center's Auditorium Monday night for the Rap Sessions Tour event. [Click to enlarge]

The N-word and post-racism were the subjects of part of the national Rap Sessions Tour that occurred Monday night, Feb. 23, in the Culp Auditorium.
Panelists included: Rosa Clemente, 2008 vice presidential candidate for the Green Party; MC Serch, host of VH-1 shows "The White Rapper Show" and "Miss Rap Supreme" and half of rap duo 3rd Bass; M-1, half of rap duo Dead Prez; Lisa Fager Bediako, president and co-founder of Industry Ears, Inc. and Elwood Watson, professor of history and African-American studies at ETSU.
Bakari Kitwana, author and Rap Sessions CEO, served as moderator.
"Post-racial asks to give up your identity," said Bediako, "but only people of color are asked to give up identity. I don't want to be post-racial, I want to be post -racism. When we can get to that, I'm all for it," said Bediako.
Panelists kept the racial conversation flowing on the matter of post-racism.
"We had a girl on the show, Persia, she was from the hood," said Serch. "She got really drunk and used the N-word on national television.
We got a giant 10-pound chain with a big N-word nameplate, and made her wear it. Then we went miniature golfing in the Bronx. Two Tuskegee airmen came up to her and said, in a calm tone 'you disgust me.' I never heard her say the N word after that."
"For her, the N-word was post- racial for her. It didn't mean to her what it once did, it was just what her friends called her. But it showed her that in the bigger world, that's not going to play," said Serch.
The dialogue on race was not limited to African-American and white relations.
"Ignorance is not institutionalized in this country, racism is," said Clemente. "Race is now a European/African American dialogue; Latinos and Asians aren't even present. Puerto Rico is still a U.S. colony, so my people are still colonial subjects - that's not post-racism."
"On the way back from Norway, somebody told me they thought all this black stuff was antiquated," said M-1. "But that's just what that person was past."
"A black president doesn't make up for 400 years of slavery," said M-1.
The subject of America's indifference toward certain racial topics was further elaborated on.
"The stimulus bill includes $3.1 billion for prisons to be built," said Clemente. "You have a president who can't say anything on TV about the execution of a black man, but he can put out a press release about Socks, President Clinton's cat, dying," said Clemente.
Kitwana brought up the blackface incident that occurred at an ETSU fraternity party during the fall semester as being part of a series of similar national occurrences. When asked about the incident, Watson said he was "very disappointed but not shocked."
"Some of the students in that fraternity, due to ignorance and lack of education, didn't think it was offensive," said Watson, "but that doesn't mean it wasn't offensive."
During the question and answer session, a white student asked how to respond to his white friend who makes him uncomfortable by referring to him using the N-word. The responses from the panelist varied.
"Stamp out oppression when you encounter it or you're in collusion with it," said M-1. "I'm not about semantics. Say it as much as you want - just not to me."
"Why would you want to say it? Say it as much as you want, you'll never recapture it," said Clemente.
"It depends on the company and context," said Watson.
More than 100 students were in attendance, and seemed to have a generally positive reaction.
"It was kind of tense," said sophmore Alan Prigmore, "but I think it benefitted from it because people are afraid of the tension discussion like this can cause, and think it was good to take it to that level."
"I was especially impressed with the insights offered by Rosa Clemente and M1," said Jared Story, an ETSU graduate student. "I was somewhat disappointed that we had a 2008 vice presidential candidate and a member of one of the most politically astute Hip-Hop groups on the planet and the Culp Auditorium was not standing room only," said Story.

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