At age 14, I loved dirty dancing. We called it booty shaking back then. But I weighed less than 100 lbs and not much was shaking on me but bones. I would watch my summer camp friends dance while, in the corner, I twitched in a pattern that imitated rhythm to stay unnoticed. The girlsContinue reading “Tales from the B-side of a Skinny Twerker”
Tag Archives: race
MLK, Jr. Should’ve Kept His Day Job?
It is the 50th Anniversary of the March on Washington. I grew up a black girl in a mostly white fundamental Baptist denomination. Only one white pastor ever let the truth leak out on their opinion of Martin Luther King, Jr. Our youth group climbed into the church van on a Friday evening for aContinue reading “MLK, Jr. Should’ve Kept His Day Job?”
Uncle Toms, Aunt Jemimas, and Other Distant Relatives
Harriet Beecher Stowe has likely rolled 500 miles in her grave by now. She wrote the second best-selling novel in the 19th century, Uncle Tom’s Cabin, only for it to be boiled down to the grime of an epithet over 200 years later: Uncle Tom. The title character she illustrated in 1852 laid down his life for escapingContinue reading “Uncle Toms, Aunt Jemimas, and Other Distant Relatives”
Zimmerman’s Valid Fear
“I’m gon’ put some lead in him,” Mr. Williams says. His raucous laugh holds no mirth, but his belly shakes a little beneath his hands. “If I catch ’em in my yard, I’ma beat the piss out of ’em!” “Mhmm. I ain’t got too good an aim, so I’ma buy me one of them shotguns.Continue reading “Zimmerman’s Valid Fear”
A Racist Apologizes
Dear Offended Black People: I meant exactly what you thought I meant when the word nigger leapt from my mouth. It did not escape. It did not slip out. I launched it with all the force my vocal chords could muster. I wanted it to stick. If I was sorry for offending you, I wouldContinue reading “A Racist Apologizes”
dara t. mathis 