HOMEWORK FOR OVER THE WEEKEND

Each of you have been assigned 2-3 questions based on the New Jim Crow readings posted on the blog. Be sure to have answers prepared for our class discussion on Tuesday 10/23/18. You should write your answers down, but be prepared to TELKL us your answer and DISCUSS it and not  read what you wrote out loud.

SLAVERY as a Form of Racialized Social Control

ALEXIS

1. Describe the interactions that took place between blacks and whites in early colonial America, before chattel slavery.
2. Why did plantation farming shift from using indentured servants as labor to enslaved African people?

MALVIN

3. What reasons does Alexander give to explain why Africans were deemed the “ideal slaves”?
4. Explain the events of Bacon’s Rebellion.
5. What signal did Bacon’s Rebellion send to the planter elite?

HATIM

6. How did the “racial bribe” that resulted from Bacon’s Rebellion help to construct the idea of race in America?
7. According to Alexander, how did whites attempt to reconcile the ideals of democracy with the system of slavery?
8. Alexander writes, “The history of racial caste in the United States would end with the Civil War if the idea of race and racial difference had died when the institution of slavery was put to rest.” Explain this statement.

AUSTIN

9. How does Alexander explain the South’s “dilemma” after the Civil War?
10. What was the economic impact of emancipation on the South?
11. What was the role of contact under slavery? Why do you think Alexander is pointing to this in her discussion of the death of slavery?

MATTHEW-KYLE

12. What did the Southern white elite accomplish by passing the black codes?
13. Explain how vagrancy laws and convict laws worked in tandem to create another system of forced labor. How was this system of forced labor different from enslavement?
14. In your own words, summarize the achievements of the Reconstruction Era. Do you agree that Reconstruction had “the potential to seriously undermine, if not completely eradicate, the racial caste system in the South”?

ROAN

15. In the final paragraphs of the excerpt, Alexander foreshadows the next system of racial control that will emerge following Emancipation. What questions and predictions do you have moving forward in our reading?
16. Alexander writes, “The concept of race is a relatively recent development.” In light of this statement and the argument she makes to defend it, have your own ideas about race changed? How might our society change if this were accepted by all as fact?
17. Bacon’s Rebellion created a multiracial alliance. What issues or interests unified poor whites and enslaved Africans during the rebellion? Give an example of a similar alliance that exists today, or make the case that one is needed to address an issue in your community.

JOACHIN

18. How is “racial bribe” described in this excerpt? How can the notion of a racial bribe be useful in understanding contemporary social policy debates (i.e., healthcare, affirmative action)?
19. What is the fundamental contradiction of the United State’s founding discussed by Alexander in this excerpt? Does this contradiction still exist in U.S. society?

JIM CROW as a Form of Racialized Social Control

JAYDEN

1. What was the goal of the Southern “Redemption”? What were whites seeking? What were their tactics? What were the effects on Reconstruction?
2. How did the withdrawal of federal troops from the South after Reconstruction change what Alexander calls the “racial equilibrium”?
3. How did the harsh enforcement of vagrancy laws threaten to place African Americans into a new form of slavery? 

MICHAEL

4. How was the idea of white supremacy used as a racial bribe to gain support for segregation? What does Alexander mean when she writes that for poor whites the “racial bribe was primarily psychological”?
5. What were some of the areas of daily life where Jim Crow laws disenfranchised and discriminated against African Americans? Give an example of the harm done to an individual experiencing discrimination. Now consider the exponential harm and collective suffering caused by Jim Crow. As systems of racialized social control, what are the similarities between Jim Crow and slavery?
6. What is commonly understood to be the beginning and end of Reconstruction, Jim Crow and the civil rights movement? What issues does Alexander raise as problematic about these markers?

ZIAD

7. What two factors does Alexander identify as significant in bringing about a Northern consensus that Jim Crow needed to end?
8. What was the contradiction between Jim Crow segregation and the United States role in WWII? How did this contradiction undermine the United States’ criticisms of communism?
9. What Supreme Court decisions preceded Brown v. Board of Education and created a pattern of desegregation? Look back at question six. In what specific areas of daily life did these decisions provide protection from Jim Crow?

EVAN

10. How did Brown v. Board of Education differ from the Supreme Court’s previous desegregation rulings?
11. Describe Southern white opposition to Brown v. Board of Education and the impact of their resistance.
12. List some of the tactics civil rights activists used to counter white resistance to desegregation. What impact did their activism have on Jim Crow? Cite two specific accomplishments of the civil rights movement in permanently reversing segregation.

EMRAN

13. How did the civil rights movement evolve in its approach to bring about true equality? What opportunities for alliance building were created by this shift?
14. What are the “needs and constraints” racial caste had to conform to in the post-civil rights era? What are your predictions about how conservative whites re-created a racial order to meet their interests in light of the death of slavery and Jim Crow? 
15. While most people may know that the 13th Amendment to the U.S. Constitution abolished slavery, fewer know that it still allowed for slavery, as well as indentured servitude, as a punishment for crime. Prior to reading the excerpt from The New Jim Crow, did you know that? How does this knowledge change your thinking about emancipation and more generally about race in the United States?

RAUL

16. Alexander writes that the racial bribe to poor whites during Jim Crow was merely “psychological” in that their actual quality of life was not made better by segregation. Describe a situation you’ve experienced or seen where a person or group was given a false sense of racial superiority. 
17. This chapter highlights the important role the Supreme Court played in dismantling Jim Crow. Has the court system of your lifetime tended to rule in ways that protect the rights of minorities and the disadvantaged? Give examples to support your view.

MASS INCARCERATION as a Form of Racialized Social Control

JOSE

1. How did conservatives depict civil rights activists and the federal courts that ruled in their favor during the 1950s and 1960s? Why?
2. What two causes does Alexander suggest for the rising crime rates in the 1960s? Why do you think these factors were generally ignored?
3. What conclusion did conservatives attempt to draw from the riots and uprisings of the 1960s? What explanation did civil rights activists give instead? Follow both arguments to their conclusion in terms of what ought to be done in response to the uprisings. What are the implications for racial hierarchy? 

VALERIY

4. How does Alexander characterize the motivation behind some blacks’ support for a “law and order” approach to fighting crime? What did the conservatives gain from their support? What did the black communities gain?
5. How does Alexander describe the racial politics that followed the civil rights movement? How did the Republican Party seize white resistance to desegregation?
6. Alexander writes, “a disproportionate share of the costs of integration and racial equality had been borne by lower- and lower-middle-class whites, who were suddenly forced to compete on equal terms with blacks for jobs and status and who lived in neighborhoods adjoining black ghettos.” How did the conservative “law and order” rhetoric provide a new racial bribe to lower- and lower-middle-class whites? How did this wedge impact the Democratic Party?

ARIS

7. Alexander points to Reagan’s presidency as the full development of the Republican revolution and what she later refers to as the “Age of Colorblindness.” According to her analysis, how did racial discourse adapt to the needs and demands of this period?
8. At the time the War on Drugs was launched, less than 2 percent of the American public viewed drugs as the most important issue facing the nation. What steps did the Reagan administration take to justify and garner support for the “war”?
9. What main factors contributed to the destabilization of inner-cites in the 1980s? Where did the War on Drugs fit into this reality?

DENNIES

10. Why do you think Alexander finds it so significant to note the beginning of the War on Drugs preceded the start of the crack epidemic?
11. List five examples of federal action taken under President Reagan once the crack epidemic became a public concern.
12. How did President George H. W. Bush continue the racialized “crackdown on crime” and the War on Drugs while in office?

IVAN

13. What happened to the War on Drugs and its racial agenda when Democratic President Bill Clinton took office?

14. This excerpt ends with Alexander writing that the New Jim Crow had been born. Based on what you have read so far, why do you think she’s naming the phenomenon of mass incarceration this way?
15. How does Alexander compare conservative and liberal views on poverty? Do either of these opinions reflect your own? What about your family? Explain.

RICHARD

16. How do you think the War on Drugs has affected your generation? Do you think your response is influenced by your race and your family’s socioeconomic class? Explain.
17. Do you hear and see stereotypes today similar to the ones mentioned in this excerpt, such as “welfare queens,” “crack babies” and “gangbangers”? If so, where do they appear? What are some present-day ways of sending racialized messages and stereotypes about people of color without using explicitly racial language?