Citizen, a book written by Claudia Rankine shows different themes throughout the book. The one I’m going to be explaining is anger and Emotional. In citizen, Rankine shows how emotional difficulties of processing racism. She explains how anger affects an individual by telling stories in the second person. On the first page of the chapter, she starts with some years there exists a wanting to escape you, floating above your certain ACHE still the ache coexists. She illustrates the frustrating problem many people of color experience when they encounter small problems of discrimination. In the Book Rankine supports, that people of “Color” should simply move on from their anger, meaning to let racist remarks slide and to get along with society. Because of this, she says many black people have found different ways just to avoid conformation with others by just processing their anger within themselves. Rankine shows the problem with this “problem solver” by pointing out that even if the person can process racism, there is no way you can avoid the fact that each moment must be experienced before it can be processed. This means, even if people of color find a way within themselves to help them endure racism, they are still dealing with the pain from the moment it happens. There might be a problem with this problem solver if someone is keeping their anger in, they might eventually have an outburst and the outburst might only put them in a deeper hole. This problem of just putting it behind them is a bad way to go about in life and it shows us how poorly people of color are being treated. Rankine begins showing us how emotionally fatiguing it is to face constant racism and prejudice. In her life she is familiar with what it feels like for somebody to say something unkind or discriminatory, it doesn’t get any easier for her to process such exchanges. This is because people won’t know what racism is until they are the victims. Because there is seemingly no avoiding the pain that comes with racist remarks or actions, Rankine turns her attention to the anger that arises in response to this kind of mistreatment.
In chapter seven Rankine shows a different side of the book she describes events that happened to her and how she was a victim of racism. Rankine stated “Yesterday, I began, I was waiting in the car for time to pass. A woman pulled in and started to park her car facing mine. Our eyes met and what passed as quickly as the looked away. She backed up and parked on the other side of the lot. I could have followed her to worry about my question, but I had to go, I was expected on the court, and I grabbed my racket (169). To be able to know what the other person is thinking of you because you are a person of color. Rankine knew by just her actions that the person across from her was uncomfortable being in her presence. The women’s actions in front of Rankine were not right and showed us how people could look at people of color and just think of bad things because they are a different color. Also, Rankine showed us how she wanted to say something to that lady but just avoided her and picked up on her racket, and left, she showed us how people of color just avoid confrontation when it happens. While the woman leaving after she made eye contact made Rankine feel like she didn’t belong. Rankine also experiences that as she stated, “The worst injury is feeling you don’t belong so much” (156). Rankine shows us in chapter 7 the ways that she dealt with it, and you can only feel the pain if you are the victim.
In the section “July 13, 2013,” the protagonist thinks about numbness. One of her friends has written about numbness. One of her friends has shown us how humming numbs him to certain things, and this reminds her of the way she often sighs. She realized that when she does sigh it becomes quoter than it used to be. This is because she thinks she is getting older and is getting used to the “Ache” she constantly feels. That morning she is driving with her partner when they hear a man in a neighboring car say something racist while listening to a radio broadcast about Martin. The protagonist’s partner jumps out of the car, wanting to yell at the man, but the protagonist tells him to stop. She ushers him back into the car senses that his actions could put her in danger. The reason why the section is July 13, 2013 (162) was that on this day Trayvon Martins’s killer was acquitted, as a jury ultimately found him not guilty. The decision of not guilty made united stated separated, as shown when the partner loses his temper when he hears a racist comment about Martin. Knowing that anger often leads to more harm than good, the protagonist urged him to calm down, having committed herself to go numb to a state of being that has apparently become a part of her. This is why it’s a bad thing to just get over it a build-up because something like this can happen and we can have an outburst.
Rankine also connected her stories with some of the pictures she gave us in the book. The interesting picture is on page (157). This picture is weirdly shaped, but it can also be a part of the quote that I stated before “the worse injury is feeling like you don’t belong.” As we can see from the picture is that there are hands that are grabbing the throat of a different person. Rankine shows that not owning your own self is one of the worse injuries. As she stated “When you lay your body in the body entered as if skin and bone were public places. When you lay your body in the body entered as if you’re the ground you walk on, you know no memory should live in these memories becoming the body of you”. I felt like this paragraph shows how it’s important to find yourself and connect with your body and if you don’t you will just feel like you don’t belong.
Discussion questions
- Do you think the quote “The worse injury is feeling like you don’t belong” must deal with the picture on 157? If so, how?
- What does Rankine mean when she says, “come on. Let it go. Move on”? (151)
- Discuss the closing of this book and the closing line “It wasn’t a match. It was a lesson”.
Works Cited
LitCharts. “Anger and Emotional Processing Theme Analysis.” LitCharts,https://www.litcharts.com/lit/citizen-an-american-lyric/themes/anger-and-emotional-processing.
Rankine, Claudia. Citizen: An American Lyric. Minneapolis, Minnesota, Graywolf Press, 2014.
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Hey Michael! I really enjoyed reading about your ideas on the theme of anger throughout the book. I definitely agree that Black people have found alternative ways to deal with the anger from being discriminated against. To answer your second discussion question, the quote “Come on. Let it go. Move on” (Rankine 151) immediately sent me back to the end of chapter 4. The speaker states,”Move on. Let it go. Come on” (Rankine 66). In this situation, the speaker seems to be reflecting on what Serena Williams may be thinking as she finishes the game that involved an argument with the umpire. It can also be interpreted as the speaker being triggered by the situation and how they are trying to comfort themselves by thinking “move on”. On page 151, the speaker is also forced to ignore their true feelings and how they would like to react but can’t because of their race. In both these situations the Black speaker convinces themselves to move on in order to protect themselves and others from worsening the situation. This can also be supported by the quote, “…the justice system had other plans” (Rankine 151). The speaker knew that if they went through with their actions they would be blamed for it because of their color so they chose to stay quiet. This is also an example of how police discriminate against Black people.
Fantastic evidence and analysis here, Ginamarie!
Score: 5 out of 5
Hi Mikey! Great blog post, it was well thought out and organized! To answer your first discussion question, the picture does connect to the quote. After reading your post and your discussion question, I studied the picture for a few minutes and noticed a few things. I also noticed the hand grabbing a person’s throat, a few other things I noticed are a mouth bit which could be an arm, and blood coming from a wound or I believe it looks like an eye. A lot of these details that I notice are injuries caused by someone else’s actions like choking. Rankine states, “is the aftertaste” (146). I think this quote is related to the image because it is the “aftertaste” or the result of someone’s actions. People’s actions can affect others to the point where they don’t feel like they belong to a community. In the end, yes, the picture does connect to the quote that you included and also the quote that is stated above.
Hey Mikey, this is a good blog post. It was good to see how you talked about the book as a whole, the specific chapter, and how the speaker uses the pictures. When the speaker said “come on. Let it go. Move on”, she is again implementing the idea of not confronting racism and letting it go, as she says in the quote. This story that the speaker shares is set on the date of when Treyvon Martins killers were found not guilty as mentioned in your blog post. The speaker said, “you pull your love back into the seat because though no one seems to be chasing you, the justice system has other plans” (151). The racism that the speaker is not confronting is the fact that the justice system, which in its name is supposed to provide justice, failed to do so for the black kid that was killed because he was black. Letting it go and moving on are in the speaker’s words “how you are a citizen”, so being a citizen means conforming to the social norms, which one of those norms is racism, and if you want to remain a citizen and not be treated as anything else, then you must fight your anger toward racism and let it go. I agree with you Mikey and believe that this is not the right way to go about dealing with racism, this anger will only get bigger and bigger until it can’t be contained.
Hi Mikey, after reading your blog post I really enjoyed your thoughts on page 162, “July 13, 2013” but I wanted to answer your second discussion question retaining Rankine’s quote “come on. Let it go. Move on” on page 151. I think this quote relates back to Rankin’s feeling of invisibility and can also be another example of how Serena felt. Serena and many others struggle with having to hide their emotions because they can cause scenes that are taken out of proportion just because of their skin color. Rankine states “Can feelings be a hazard, a warning sign, a disturbance, distaste, the disgrace?…. It’s not that (Is it not that?) you are oversensitive or misunderstanding” (p 152). In this short section, Rankine is describing how it feels to be Black in a world that can misunderstand and mistreat people with the slightest human reaction. Many events have taken place involving a Black person that has been misinterpreted leading to unjustifiable consequences and the revolving question is whether these precautions would have been taken place if this was a white person.
Hey Mikey great post. I’m glad you tied in the book as a whole considering we are at the end. I agree with the quote “The worse injury is feeling like you don’t belong” corresponds with the picture left on page 157. The image on page 157 is a blank page. This is much a representation of the African american in America. Invisible. Neglected and oppressed so much to the point that they feel as if they are invisible, and they have been invisible to start with. I mean at least that is how the rest of America treats them. The quote “You are not sick. You are injured. You ache for the rest of your life. (Rankine 122) This quote shows a really good job of the way African Americans feel in America. They are not able to fight against the injustices against them, so they ache. They are not injured but they must ache for the rest of their lives