Black Studies The Black Experience In Southern California - Essay Example

Black Studies 28th Oct 2006 THE BLACK EXPERIENCE IN SOUTHERN CALIFORNIA The book Popular Culture in the Age of White Flight: Fear and Fantasy in Suburban Los Angeles, quite effectively combines the many aspects of African-American history, ethnic identity and white suburban life and explores the cultural fractures and race divides that came about between inner city Los Angeles and its suburbs in the years after the Second World War. This book was written by Eric Avila who studied American History at the University of California at Berkeley and obtained a B.A., M.A., and Ph.D. In 2004 he was promoted to associate professor and has published numerous books on popular culture, urban and American history. His book traces the development of society in Los Angeles following the war. The city was vibrant with economic activity and cultural diversity. Avila narrates the city's cultural history from the end of the war till the seventies when immigrants from the rest of America and indeed the world flooded into LA to share in the potential economic boom of the time. This immigrant population brought with them their cultural baggage of various ethnic and racial identities. They included whites who formed the dominant part of the mix and it was they who defined the whiteness of the city. Better educated with a history of previous employment, the white population were able to secure well-paid jobs with benefits and incentives. They soon formed the dominant race and established its 'whiteness' interspersed with a mix of various ethnic and racial cultures. Avila explores the subsequent interactions between popular culture, suburbanization of whites and the exodus of cultures from middle and Eastern America to the West. He explains the social and spatial consequences of this cultural shift alongside other notable events that occurred during the period. He attributes some key events such as the Brooklyn Dodgers move to Los Angeles, the setting up of Disneyland and the building of the Californian freeways, to the drastic reorganization of urban spatial zones and the redistribution of ethnic and racial minorities in the city. Many of the minority groups, amid political turmoil and much opposition were forced to shift to other areas to make way for construction of the new stadium and the freeways. Marginal neighbourhoods faced the threat of destruction and those that were bypassed ran into neglect. Although residents attempted to halt the construction of the Californian freeways and the stadium they efforts were ultimately futile. Political policies during the period attempted to zero in on the white hot spots interspersed in non-white neighbourhoods, ignoring the significance of the racial population. Over several decades as outer towns and towns within the immediate vicinity of LA, became encapsulated with the larger city, the city leaders tended to segregate the city, demarcate it according to the racial mix existing in those areas. Locales that were more developed or affluent gained more attention and investment than the areas that seemed to show less potential. Due to the political neglect, the underdeveloped neighbourhoods became infested with all kinds of crime and misdemeanour. Less job opportunities and lack of focus on education in schools, poorly paid teachers, shifting of professionals to more affluent parts, all contributed to the rise in crime. The consequence of this was that the underprivileged in ethnic and racial communities, fell prey to lawlessness. The blacks resorted to criminal violence, robbery and murder as a means to maintain their livelihoods. A culture of violence spread through the city and grew rise to gangs. Involvement with drugs and other illegal activities also became a means to an end. This brought about the image of crime to be associated with blacks. Further reinforcement came about through the depiction of crime in television and film and many of the instigators of violence were shown to be black. Avila makes the point of how television and film noir depictions of Los Angeles created an image of a white suburban society threatened by the menace posed by the non-whites. LA was depicted as a dark and dangerous urban jungle, unsafe for the white populace, the grouping of non-whites forced into criminal behaviour as a result of poverty, a lack of education and peer pressure. Many of these representations toughened the mindset of whites into believing that non-whites were illiterate and prone to unlawful conduct. Normally when a crime took place, the first suspects were usually someone from the black community. Many TV shows depicted the run down conditions of African-American family life, torn between lack of education, poor upbringing and negative social forces. This was prevalent not only in popular TV but also in film. Avila does not offer only a negative account of the black people's pattern of existence. He narrates how the perception of black culture has been challenged in popular culture through the entertainment media, particularly in rap songs. Although no songs implicated blacks as the instigators of violence, the rise of rap music delivered by blacks themselves sought to offers reasons as to why crime had become a part of the black culture. He gives an example of George Clinton whose Chocolate City song paints the black ghetto as a place of power and vigour in a bigoted society. Other singers too have recognised this undeniable "otherness" as a contemporary culture that has occupied the urban city. Avila has written with great clarity about the cultural and inner city geographies existing in Los Angeles. The demarcation of ethnic and racial distinctiveness has been ably focused on, but in spite of the wide-ranging areas covered, Avila seems to have given only a cursory treatment of racial identities. Avila gives apt description of the societal landscape of Los Angeles, the multi-faceted culture existing there, the diverse racial mix, the economic rift in the different pockets of the city and the political complexity. He gives a solution to the problem for this vast multi-faceted city. A new Los Angeles will have development oriented local politics that would aim to implement improvements where they are needed most. This local progressive politics involves initiatives where citizens can vote to approve or reject proposed laws. Other initiatives include procedures where people can propose their own laws and submit them to the state legislatures for deliberation. Citizens would also have the ability to remove an elected official from office through a procedure called recall. Many social justice laws would be enacted such as child labour law, workers compensation etc. Some degree of efficiency whereby the service offered by the government to the people would be better improved. The running of local government would work better if the activities were place in the hands of professional administrators. The author offers this model against which the complex framework of power can best be understood. Avila gives us a better understanding of how social fractures manifest themselves over several decades until a melting point is reached. He has a hopeful vision of a future Los Angeles. He describes it as a city of promise where established inhabitants and new immigrants could reform the city, with a common view of democracy and justice. WORKS CITED 1. Avila, Eric. Popular Culture in the Age of White Flight: Fear and Fantasy in Suburban Los Angeles. University of California Press. 2004 Read More