Moving Up or Selling Out:

The Conflict of the Black Middle Class

Randall Kennedy references author Andrew Hacker as stating that among racial slurs, nigger “stands alone [in] its power to tear at one’s insides (28).” The word itself reflects the subjugation of the Black race that has been built into American culture. It demarcates a crystal clear boundary between who is white and who is black; a boundary originally built on economic inequalities, and now solidified by terrorism and exclusion. “Nigger” is a word that can take away humanity in a moment. Through this one word, an entire social system can turn against a Black individual and brand them a criminal, a liar, and a thief. It challenges a Black man’s self-image of masculinity, and breeds violence in its wake – when used by a white person.

In the mouth of the American Black however, “nigger” becomes protean. Helen Jackson Lee is quoted by Kennedy as remembering learning the intricacies of the word from her cousin:

Cousin Bea had a hundred different ways of saying nigger; listening to her, I learned the variety of meanings the word could assume. How it could be opened like an umbrella to cover a dozen different moods, or stretched like a rubber band to wrap up our family with other colored families…. Nigger was a piece-of-clay world that you could shape… to express your feelings (Kennedy 37-38).

With this shapeable word, a Black man can talk about “his main nigga” and a Black woman can dismiss a child with, “Nigger, please!” The American Blacks have, after centuries of repression, claimed the weapon of whites, and molded it into a tool of fraternity and inclusion, when used among Blacks. With rare exception, this white term of degradation is denied the freedom of the Black vocabulary among its progenitors.

The Black middle class also lays claim to territory once thought to be the exclusive domain of white professionals. They are moving up and out of the desperate poverty imposed on them by white culture and exclusion. Equal opportunity laws insure that employment in respected professional fields is available to Black Americans – at least enough to help white policy makers feel like they are keeping their hands and political careers clean of the taint of racism.

The reality of Black middle class life is centered on the limbo state in which they find themselves. No longer part of the desperately poor, they are instead confronted on a daily basis with the racism built into American culture through interaction with the white social order. Even though they can afford to leave the ghetto for a white neighborhood, with low crime and great schools, they are met with a fairly solid white wall of distrust and fear, and rapidly falling property values as white families find other, “safer” (read, less colorful) places to live. No longer accepted fully by the ghetto, and rejected by the white suburb, the middle class Black family is left holding a bag full of dreams to help them negotiate this new way of life.

Unfortunately, while ABC After-School Specials tout the advantages of reading and going to college, the shows offer very little real advice on the unspoken rules of succeeding in college. However, daily witnessing of the enticement of fast money, respect and power in the streets provides a powerful incentive to work hard at social and political affiliations that work decidedly against a college career. Even when cultural capital exists in the home, the temptations of the street can sabotage the best laid plans of parents. Early, unsupported pregnancy or drug convictions can derail the brightest student’s opportunity for professional advancement. When a middle class Black stumbles on the path to advancement, the fall is more likely to be fatal, to their economic success, and to their very lives. There isn’t a social safety net to keep them from falling back into the desperate poverty of the ghetto.

White Americans however, have a racial boundary they cannot fall beneath. They might be poor Appalachian whites, experiencing the same bone-crushing poverty as the Black American in the ghetto, but they have the social safety net of their skin color to rely on. Stumbling on the economic road to success is very unlikely to result in their death. Conversely, the specter of death is never far from the homes of the middle class Black American. They are more likely to have family and friends who are still in the ghetto, or who have fallen from the middle class. Mary Pattillo-McCoy hauntingly refers to family members and friends who “faded or disappeared (115),” consumed by the violence of the streets.

The allure of life among the poor of the ghetto is romanticized by Hollywood, and major media providers. Gangster rappers glorify the stories of their life by flaunting their invulnerability to bullets and the law to impressionable youth eager to escape the mediocrity, or poverty, of their lives. Movies depict gunfire on the street as glorious and manly. The media capitalizes on the male need for power and control. Women are seduced by the flash of money that implies security among the poor. A dangerous man, one with secrets and power, has its own allure for those who have no other outlet to secure power on their own.

Psychologically, this leaves the Black middle class fighting a battle for their children’s futures in a way a white middle class family can never comprehend. While I am encouraging my son to practice the violin, and fighting to ensure he gets a slot in this summer’s dance camp, the mother of a Black child has to fight to keep gangs and weapons out of her child’s school. While I plan for my son’s education by teaching him to read at six, and prohibiting television in my home so he will have more time to read, the Black child across town is getting the message to “Stay in School!” but not actually getting the tools, time or attention from her educators that she needs for a successful education and college career.

The Black middle class American is beset with conflicting messages about how to function in society. Because the Black middle class is so new to American culture, there are few rules of behavior, few social norms, and a slowly growing body of mentors to provide guidance for the next generation. On one side, the ghetto beckons seductively to their children, frequently consuming their intellect and promise in a haze of smoke and gunfire. On the other side, a wall of white fear seeks to halt the promise of the Black race. The Black middle class is thus damned if they leave the ghetto and damned if they don’t.

Works Cited

• Kennedy, Randall. (2002). Nigger. New York: Pantheon Press.
• Pattillo-McCoy, Mary (1999). Black Picket Fences. Chicago: University of Chicago Press.

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