Later, reading the course description online, I reasoned that to most young people, Mark Twain’s Adventures of Huckleberry Finn probably seemed a waste of time. It would be much more practical to study the American pragmatists William James, Charles Peirce, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Frederick Douglass, W. E. B. Dubois, or Booker T. Washington than to be confronted with reading and hearing the word nigger again and again. I had certainly heard about the book and its contents, but never thought to read it until now.
I was on sabbatical for a year, but my sabbatical was really not a time to rest because I had to wrestle with the language and meanings of Mark Twain and Joseph Conrad and Charles Chestnutt. A language laden with the forbidden word nigger. A Sabbath is a time of daily, weekly, monthly, or yearly rest as a result of recognizing the work that God has allowed us to do. It is a spiritual experience that suggests the beneficiary of such a deserved and well-earned gift will take time to bask in the opportunity to meditate and reflect, to write, to read, and to plan for the future—absorbing the sights and sounds of adventure and wonder. To the intellectual, this is ultimate pleasure, freedom, and serenity. The ancient rabbis taught that this menuha makes God’s creation complete. Without rest, creation is unfinished. Jewish scholar and theologian Abraham Joshua Heschel says that the Sabbath is an atmosphere, not a date. “The Sabbath teaches all beings whom to praise.” Yet my own sabbatical was hard to fully embrace. It was somewhat out of character for me; except, I reasoned, that my study of literature was indeed in praise of God. I wanted to spend time studying and learning a new discipline—conquering another subject in praise of God’s gift of love and grace to me.
English literature, rhetoric, and writing had been a part of my theology and humanities training, but now I was determined to focus on literature and writing fiction and non-fiction. I am possessed by a desire to read more works by some of the Black literati: Nella Larsen, Ernest Gaines, Ralph Ellison, Langston Hughes, Charles Chestnutt, Toni Morrison, Marita Golden, Zora Neal Hurston, Richard Wright, James Baldwin, and Charles Johnson. And not just Black writers, but others such as James Joyce, Joseph Conrad, Adrienne Rich, Albert Camus, Vladimir Nabokov, and the so called king of American literature, Mark Twain. I was excited, but I was also sorely afraid because these days education is highly technological and I am so Neanderthal. Everything is done online: application, registration, drop/add, reading assignments, grades, etc. I have been in school off and on for thirty years, long before everyone started coming to class with a laptop and a jump drive. Believe it or not, I still write with a pen or a pencil and use a notebook, the old-fashioned kind made of paper with lines to write on. I was afraid that I would be out of place in a postmodern craze of self absorption and subjectivity. The environment of laptop computers and online research was daunting. And, that was not the major fear. The weakness of my understanding of literature scared me so much that I almost decided to forgo learning anything new. I have no natural talent for this type of learning given that I can barely ever get a story straight. The story of my own life is an infinite search for a self that is in perpetual motion.
Still, I picked up the telephone, called the university, and set up a meeting with the chairperson of the English department to discuss the fact that I had done twelve seminars of graduate work in philosophical theology, ethics, and culture at the University of Virginia in Charlottesville. I was doing that to augment my teaching ability—not seeking another degree. I was readily received by the department chair and assistant dean, an expert in American literature. She was a charming and compassionate woman who encouraged me to register for six courses. “Some credit hours can be transferred from the many graduate courses you have taken,” she said. “That sounds great for a guy like me,” I responded. I had accumulated straight A’s and A–minuses while studying at some of the Commonwealth of Virginia’s best universities.
Once in a particularly engaging seminar where the discussion centered around American democracy, I interjected that Jeffersonian democracy was grounded in duplicity, inequality, and racism. I went on to say that not only did Jefferson own slaves while writing about liberty and justice for all, but he was also a slave trader and sexually active with Sally Hemings, a fourteen year old slave and half-sister of his deceased wife. Some historians have written that he is the father of her six children who looked a lot like him to the amazement of neighbors and visitors to Monticello. “Is this modern day sexual abuse,” I asked. I said that he was a promoter of the commodification of the Black body, explaining that the duplicitous behavior of Jefferson was in fact as American as Twain’s use of nigger. “Dad blame it.” Talk about democracy! All the whites in the room knew this and more. And yet there was a deafening silence, like a dark pall of smoke and ash had engulfed the entire classroom. Again, I was the only Black in the room and all eyes were jabbing my soul as if I had committed a heinous crime. Smiles turned to frowns. Puffy white faces became red as Hanover tomatoes; smooth brows became deeply furrowed and the young white doctoral students refused to recognize that there was more than one voice in the room. I had spoken up that day after sitting in silence for a long time. I was hoping that I would not be compelled to speak. But nobody, not even the professor, seemed willing to acknowledge that there is an “otherness” that must be heard if learning is to take place. Long before that class, I realized how political and propagandizing American education really is. I also felt that younger Blacks had to be struggling with their identity as African Americans in environments that often brushed aside the Black experience. Liberal Arts ain’t too liberal after all, I thought to myself. Univocity is the order of the day.
When my son graduated with a JD/MBA from Boston College Law School and the Carrol School of Business, thirty-five family members and friends made the trip to Newton, Massachusetts to witness this grand event. I noticed that of the nearly 300 graduates, only three were African American. This was one percent of the graduating class. Looking at the family and friends walking into the grand refectory together, my son said, “Dad, I have never seen this many Black people here during my four years on this campus.”
“I know you’re right. This is a pretty elitist school, you know. Senator and presidential candidate John Kerry and the Black congressman from Virginia, Bobby Scott, graduated from here.”
“Yeah, I know, Dad.”
“Look at the high ceilings and the walls paneled in California redwood or is that red oak? The Jesuits ain’t doing too bad,” I said.
I could tell he was happy because everybody could witness the pride of the Black family in his accomplishments. We all graduated from Boston College Law School that same day.
Before the commencement ceremony, we had lunch together in the law school cafeteria. It was for the graduates and their families. I told the hostess that we had a bus load of people from Virginia coming in at any minute. “Can you help me hold these six tables for my family?” I pleaded.
“I’ll try to keep them for you,” she said, while gesturing to her colleague to help her hold the tables. I went to help direct our family and friends to the right place. When I returned, all the tables were gone except one. I asked the hostess what happened and she threw up her hands and said, “Sorry. I couldn’t stop them. There are no reservations, you know.” Unable to sit together, we integrated ourselves into the sea of Jews and Gentiles, Catholics and Protestants who were there.
Throughout the day I observed and took mental notes on the state of graduate education and the conditions that Black people still have to negotiate to survive and get ahead. Well, so much for diversity and affirmative action, I thought. Culture means acculturation to most white folk even in the prestigious liberal universities: theology and culture, religion and culture, philosophy and culture. In my theology and culture seminar at the University of Virginia the focus was on St. Augustine, Schleiermacher, and Kathryn Tanner. This is the extent of the worldview regarding the study of God and humankind—theology and culture’s only axis was through Western Europe and the United States’ kinship to Europe. Africa and the African diaspora played no part in the formal discussion of culture.