La Bourgeoisie Noire

Frazier, Edward F. "La Bourgeoisie Noire." The Portable Harlem Renaissance Reader. Ed. David L. Lewis. New York: Viking Penguin, 1994. 173-81. Print.

Well, we have another nature documentary on that elusive animal known as “the Negro” to read through. I’ve seen documentaries on the Discovery Channel about meerkats that were more interesting than this trash. Firstly, the author supposes that society is below him. The people he is talking about are discussed with the lexicon of an outside observer free from prejudice, which he is anything but. Secondly, who cares? He does not make a point, but rather goes on about the intricacies of black society and how no one likes anyone else. The world is not the way Frazier seems to make it out to be. Although he preempts much of what he says with the proclamation that no ethnic group is socially homogeneous, he then goes on to argue exactly the opposite; all black businessmen are too white to care for their poorer brothers, all field workers are too ignorant to want anything more, and so on. No point is made other than the author is himself bigoted, and yet does not realize it.

Those who attempt to derive generalizations from a society are always going to fail. Why? Because society is an abstract concept that has become a blanket word for individuals who, through one means or another, become grouped under one label. It is not a physical thing, nor is it something that has one definition or one lexicon. Ask three different sociologists what a society is and, aside from the dry textbook definitions, you will receive three very different pictures. Frazier, in his essay, has absolutely no concept of this. To him, societies are unbreakable and absolute, which is why his essay is a load of garbage that, frankly, should not be included in this anthology.