ta nehisi coates we were eight years in power pdf

As a result, she knew all about the historical and contemporary struggles of the black community. Here’s her story.ĭuring university, Michelle Obama minored in African-American studies.

That’s because Michelle Obama’s own story about her life is far removed from the more conventional narrative about slavery and white oppression. However, as he heard her story, he was surprised. Had racism finally been banished from the face of the earth? Was this the end of white supremacy?Īt the time, such achievements seemed possible, and it was in this climate that the author got an assignment from The Atlantic magazine to do a profile on Michelle Obama.

In 2008, the year of Obama’s election, the author was filled with euphoria. He believes that the racial problems of contemporary society are the result of a post-segregationist, pathological black culture that fetishizes gangster rap and drugs.Ĭosby even ignores legitimate claims by black citizens and activists that white supremacy is still prominent in America today and that the criminal justice system is in dire need of reform. He’s turning white racism back onto black people, making it an issue stemming from African-American culture. If it’s not already clear to you, Cosby is dead wrong. He vehemently announced to the crowd, “we’re not Africans.” In the same speech, he said that segregation produced “good things,” arguing that it made black people learn self-sufficiency. Cosby attacked black Americans for, among other things, giving their kids African names. Worse was Cosby’s so-called “Pound Cake speech,” made in 2004 at the National Association for the Advancement of Colored People, or NAACP, in Washington. Cosby said that African-Americans needed to clean up their culture and take responsibility for their lives.

He told the black audience that, while racism may be ever-present, it’s no excuse for black Americans to fail.

In summer 2016, the author saw Cosby speak at Detroit’s St Paul Church of God in Christ. It’s that of the prominent comedian, Bill Cosby, who preaches to the black community about discipline, moral reform and personal responsibility. However, the author disagrees with one voice among them. But these accomplishments stretched beyond just the president himself.ĭuring his term, and as a result of it, many black journalists and writers rose to prominence, giving a voice to black Americans. That would’ve been inconceivable in the not too distant past. For the first time in US history, a black president sat in the White House. The 2008–2016 presidency of Barack Obama was a historic achievement.

Ta nehisi coates we were eight years in power pdf