Dear Mr. Thomas Holt,

I write to you in order to challenge one of the arguments that you posit concerning race and identity  in your book The Problem of Race in the 21^st Century. While I tend to agree with many of the conclusions that you draw—namely that race cannot be easily (or possibly)  defined and that traditional notions of race as genetically or phenotypically rooted do not hold up to scientific scrutiny—your hypothesis that “’social constructedness’ has an air of unreality about it that may limit its influence” in popular culture does not hold up to my own anecdotal evidence. Although people outside of academia may not talk about race as a social construction, they often clearly accept this notion without realizing it in how they look at themselves and how they interact with others. While we can agree that race, culture, and ethnicity are nebulous and mostly un-useful terms, I’ve found that they do exist as proved by my own experiences as socially-constructed phenomena.

It is true that race or ethnicity are not things that people simply have or do not have. There is no essence that exists in our physical or biological makeup that means we are this or that race. For example, my wife identifies as a black woman although many people see her as being white because of her fair complexion. Thus, it’s obvious that neither skin color or a so-called black gene exist. Converse to this “essence hypothesis” that you, too, debunk—I believe that race and ethnicity are actions and doings. Consider how in my book Running a Thousand Miles for Freedom:  The Escape of William and Ellen Craft from Slavery how during my escape from slavery I began to refer to my wife as “master.” I did not switch back to the term “wife” when I was alone with her in my narrative. Even though it was clear to my readers that Ellen was not really my master, that is how I referred to her. That is because we were acting as master and slave. For all intensive purposes, we were not together as wife and husband on that trip. Rather, she was my master, and I was her slave. What determined our identities were are roles and actions.

Consider also how my master was treated by the innkeeper in Charleston: “On arriving at the house the landlord ran out and opened the door: but judging, from the poultices and green glasses, that my master was an invalid, he took him very tenderly by one arm and ordered his man to take the other.” Of course, my master was not really invalid, but because of how he looked and how he behaved, the innkeeper judged him to be an invalid and thus treated him as such. How we interact with others and how we define ourselves as not determined by anything other than behaviors we have been trained to do by our society. My wife’s passing during our escape proves that how we as a society do gender, race, and social class are all constructions—not inherent parts of ourselves. Identity is performance.

You presented the case of Colin Powell as an anomaly, but I find it rather normal. The reason that no one balked at the idea of Powell becoming president was because of his conservatism. Being conservative is considered a white action. By being a republican and military man, he was essentially “doing white” and passing as a white man, despite his inability to physically pass because of his darker complexion.

So, although people may not talk about white and black as social constructions—it is clear that it is in how we behave. Powell performed as what is socially considered to be white behaviors, and people accepted that without question.

Sincerely,

William Craft

Questions:

1. Are our identities simply a matter of performance--a collection of various behaviors and actions that we do? Ellen Craft's ability to pass as another gender, race, social class, and ability level suggest so. How does thinking of race as a performance or a doing complicate our understanding of identity?

2. How does language factor into identity? Craft made note of the strange way that the blacks in South Carolina talked. I remember thinking that Craft himself was particularly eloquent. As I was reading, I asked myself how did an escaped slave who was raised not learning how to read learn to speak this well? I suppose this is because of my understanding of a 19th century black man was not to be particularly articulate.