One of the claims Paul Gilroy argues in chapter two of “The Black Atlantic,” is that much of Western modernization and history leaves out the origin and idea of race. Rather, the “innocent modernity” that many theorists and post-enlightenment thinkers critique from, is the emergence from the “happy social relations that graced post-Enlightenment life in Paris, Berlin, and London,” essentially the lens driven from a very Euro-centric perspective (Gilroy 44). Gilroy draws in on the importance of perspective specifically from the black individual’s narrative. While he argues that slavery is the root cause of transnational black identity within the development of modernity, majority of the storytelling is largely told through the white Euro-centric theorist view, as he puts it; the “system produced an un-genteel modernity, de-centered from the closed worlds of metropolitan Europe that have claimed the attention of theorists so far” (Gilroy 58). Because of this, Gilroy asks us to try and distinguish the differences between credibility and racial authenticity when analyzing Western modernization.
While the period of modernization and post-modernism is viewed significantly for the shaping of racial relations and identity, it somehow lacks knowledge and understanding of ‘race’ itself and the “genesis and development of successive forms of a racist ideology” (Gilroy 44). Gilroy addresses that black subcultures of Western nations were not determined by the nation itself, but that black subculture is derived from the movement and origin of its nation. Ultimately, he points out that it is important for the individual to gain a comprehensive approach and knowledge of the fundamentals of modernity as the “time has come for the primal history of modernity to be reconstructed from the slaves’ points of view” (Gilroy 55).
One must study the relationships of the foundation of black history to be able to trace the racialized reasoning’s. Gilroy builds to this by arguing that modernization was built under a perceived lens. He explores the concept of autonomy and the routine of one’s consciousness. On page 50, he begins to explain that because of the “severing” of cultures of Westernization, an individual is given a fixed lens based on the functions within the social system of a nation. It is clear that Gilroy stresses the importance of interpreting various theoretical views rather than from a limited account. However, because history was built from fixated narrations, Gilroy recognizes that under these factors, it is crucial to separate “everyday consciousness,” from the practice of “reflective, self-critical practice, or the chance to analyze experiences in terms of distinct, cognitive, practical, and aesthetic standards” (Gilroy 50). Therefore, the concepts of authenticity, originality, and identity, specifically within black culture, have been sharply filtered throughout Western history and “demands that we rethink the meanings of rationality, autonomy, reflection, and subjectivity” in relation to the period of modernization (Gilroy 56).
Discussion Questions:
- Has the concept of race evolved since the periods of modernism and postmodernism? Essentially, is the meaning of race ever changeable?
- Do any works of art (written, visual, dance etc.) come to mind from the modernist period that give way to the identity of black culture and expression?
Gilroy, Paul. The Black Atlantic: Modernity and Double Consciousness. Verso, 2007.