Tuesday, November 27, 2007

My Education

Let me share my university experience with you. What follows happened last night, but it is part of a larger trend at my new educational facility.

My class last night is a silent cinema class. It is in the English department, of course, just like the economics class I have tonight and the women's studies class I have tomorrow. That's right, I'm going for my literature PhD. Makes sense, doesn't it?

Anyways, we watched a 1920s film with an all black cast and a black director. In the class discussion that followed, degrees of blackness were examined. The term "mulatto" was used to describe a bi-racial actor in the film. Nobody seemed to mind or notice.

The discussion continued and another "mulatto" reference got my attention. I craned my neck, searching for any reaction from anyone else. Negative.

Mulatto this and mulatto that, the class went on and, as a whole, accepted this term and used it repeatedly as a substitute for bi-racial or mixed-race. I was stunned. I waited for someone to use "colored" or to drop an N-bomb, but class ended before anyone got the chance. At least, that's my theory.

Where the fuck am I? How did I end up in such a place? If someone were to ask me what my dream was or what my one wish in life was, I'd say I want to invent a time machine. But maybe somebody beat me to it. How did I end up in 1955? Or is it just Pennsylvania?

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