On Being Articulate
I’ve heard a good bit about Senator Joe Biden’s recent gaffe as he introduced Senator Barak Obama:
…the first mainstream African-American who is articulate and bright and clean and a nice-looking guy.
Now many of the people I’ve spoken to were more hung up on the word “clean,” as if Biden was saying “Gee what a surprise! Obama takes regular showers!” But I have to admit that I, like Washington Post columnist Eugene Robinson in his recent column, never got past the word “articulate.”
What does “articulate” mean? I learned a long time ago that a black person being described as articulate equates to saying, this black person {remarkably} speaks standard English without a trace of Ebonics. I have been described as being “articulate” more times than I can count.
Think I’m being overly sensitive? Well see how Eugene Robinson describes it in his editorial:
I realize the word is intended as a compliment, but it’s being used to connote a lot more than the ability to express one’s thoughts clearly. It’s being used to say more, even, than “here’s a black person who speaks standard English without a trace of Ebonics.”
The word articulate is being used to encompass not just speech but a whole range of cultural cues — dress, bearing, education, golf handicap. It’s being used to describe a black person around whom white people can be comfortable, a black person who not only speaks white America’s language but is fluent in its body language as well.
And the word is often pronounced with an air of surprise, as if it’s an improbable and wondrous thing that a black person has somehow cracked the code. I can’t help but think of the famous quote from Samuel Johnson: “Sir, a woman preaching is like a dog’s walking on his hind legs. It is not done well; but you are surprised to find it done at all.”
Articulate is really a shorthand way of describing a black person who isn’t too black — or, rather, who comports with white America’s notion of how a black person should come across.
Whatever the intention, expressing one’s astonishment that such individuals exist is no compliment. Just come out and say it: Gee, he doesn’t sound black at all.
“He doesn’t sound black at all!”
“You don’t sound black.”
“You didn’t sound black on the phone.”
This is what the articulate business is really about. Articulate = not sounding “black.” And dare I even enter the offensive and divisive dialogue about what constitutes blackness? I’ll save that for another day. Let us shorthand for the moment that many majority individuals expect blacks to “sound black,” that is to split verbs, use certain inflections, misuse words, and accompany said speech with black gestures (such as the quintessential black woman neck rolling). I’m even going to go farther on my limb and add that many black individuals also expect blacks to “sound black” in the same manner. To speak otherwise encourages taunts like, “you’re trying to act white” or my personal favorite “you’re so stuck up.” Yet again, let me save my rant about my people and their blacker-than-thou assessments of what is black for another day. I don’t have the energy to take on the Biden-esque and my folk all in the same Saturday. I merely mention them here before someone goes to the “black people do the same thing” position in my comments.
So back to Biden and being articulate. It’s time for people like Biden to stop being so damn surprised that there are those of us black folk out here who actually can string a sentence together without misuse of the verb “to be.” That ability doesn’t make us articulate. It makes us educated.
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My best friend is black, and when we were 19 she worked for the summer on reception/phone answering at a local building firm. She lost count of teh times people came into reception, having spoken to her on the phone, and said: “Wow, i didn’t realise you were….so young!” She found it moderately funny, I find it astounding that 20 years later this is still a surprise to people.
Good old Biden….when I went to D.C. to lobby for RESOLVE, I got to meet with his staff. Let’s just say they’re about the same level as Biden is. Alan Glass (his aide and also an RE in his former career) told me that Sarge and i would be sure to get pregnant as soon as we adopted. An RE, people!
Biden’s comments were offensive and I’m sure the media will continue to crucify him. Which, I suppose, is exactly what he deserves. I hope this will serve to bring about true heart change for him but I dount it will.
Biden’s comment was just dumb all the way around, I think that how Obama handled the whole thing was the real reason people are attracted to him as a potential candidate – he’s more concerned with the things that are really important instead of playing party politics. And as a definite plus he has a far more interesting and engaging personality than the flat affect of the past few democratic candidates!
This comment made me SO PISSED OFF. The “first”? C’mon Mr. Biden, meet the Congressional Black Caucus. For that matter, meet any number of African-American professionals… grrrr. And yes, “articulate” is so often used as a euphemism for “doesn’t sound ‘Black’” – which is disgusting on so many different levels….
This comment ticked me off too… Why not call it was it is? My young cousin “got it”… He once told me “Ewww, Francine, you talk like a white girl…”
But on a serious note and as a different kind of “ism,” isn’t Barak “1/2 white?” Why is it that you’re considered African-American if you have even an inch of Black Blood in you? Not that I’m not “down with my peoples,” because I am… Being in an interracial relationship, my white husband is just waking up to the reality that his soon to be born son will be Black and that on some levels he won’t be able to relate to the things that he’ll have to deal with in life, such as surprised comments such as “He’s very articulate…” aka “He talks like a white boy…”
What a thought provoking topic.