We can also start asking other questions like “what happened to black women during this time?” “We do not need to lose the Middle Passage,” Wright said. Wright affirmed that we should not understand World War II as the origin of blackness but understand it as a “mediating moment” in the creation of a black identity. Wright identified World War II as a better period to use to understand the formation of black identity. The identity of “Black America” is extremely relevant today with the election of the Barack Obama and the constant discourse over his “blackness.” “ general understanding and agreement that it is slavery that produces the ‘Black America.’” There is a “notion that African Americans originate in the Middle Passage, and that is where identity begins to form,” Wright said. Wright said that this concept too narrowly defines the black experience and identity.

DuBois, Paul Gilroy and Henry Louis Gates, Wright said that many black writers have only discussed Africa as something of the past and have created the “notion that black is an object of history.”Īccording to Wright, the Middle Passage narrative, a reference to the passage of slaves from Africa to the Americas, is the widely accepted and one-dimensional characterization of blackness most Americans have today. Referencing many acclaimed books and authors, like W.E.B. Michelle Wright, associate professor of African-American Studies at Northwestern University and author of “Becoming Black: Creating Identity in the African Diaspora” gave the 24th annual Black Experiences Lecture that focused on black identity in America. The notion that black identity stems from the Middle Passage is an idea that too narrowly defines the black experience and identity, said an author and professor Tuesday night.

Becoming black michelle wright