A swamp of white power

"At the Palais de Tokyo in Paris-are currently the artist Theaster Gates exhibition, Amalgam (12 may). It is the one closest to the ritual anklagelseakt against a united states that has racism in its dna. The theme is the little multi-ethnic colony on the island of Malaga in Maine, a functioning society is built of individuals of different background and skin color. The colony provoked the apparently much – both racist and klassförtryckande reasons and was dissolved by the government in 1912."

"the Exhibition is based on the dreamy film, sculpture, installations, and soundtracks. Artifacts from a bygone civilization, exhibited as if they were archaeological finds. "

"It is an exciting and oxygen-rich exhibition. The events at Malaga is only a century away. But I had perhaps not been as moved by it if I had not had the Ta-Nehisi Coates, We had the power for eight years in the bag."

"Coates writes until the u.s. racist history, in eight chapters – one for each of the years Obama was president. The articles have been previously published in the venerable magazine The Atlantic, and each chapter is prefaced by a personal reflection."

"The eight years' long, fruitless, and sometimes obsessed with writing (Coates the entire family is pulled around to the sites and museums dedicated to the american civil war) shows a strong curve upwards: the book is worth reading from the first page and the last texts are even better. The format is of course some repetition, which could possibly be edited away. On the other hand, articles also be read as separate works."

"We had the power for eight years will be a comprehensive essay over the Obamatiden. And Trumptiden. It is built of two seemingly colliding arcane events: When the united states permeated by racism, how did Obama get elected? And if Obama-the time proved that a black man can be and is successful as president, how then can a white racist to get elected?"

"After the civil war, 1861-65, had followed a couple of decades of greater equality between black and white american population. The title's eight years, of course, refers to Obama's time, but is also a quote from the 1895 by a black congressman in South Carolina, Thomas Miller. He explained how much progress has been made during the eight years. Black people had power and influence, but at the end of the 1800s came repressionens time. Coates quotes the historian W E B Du Bois: ”If there was something that South Carolina citizens feared more than bad black government, so it was a well functioning black government.”"

"the Parallel to the contemporary united states is striking, and Coates argue that it is a big part of the explanation to Trumps of victory. It didn't matter how well-maintained the united states was. Trump won the election on the horror of the black (and Latin american) the united states would be able to take the power away from the white."

"the Book's chapter follows, then, is not Obamatiden on an annual basis, but analyzes the contemporary relations of power in relation to the history of oppression: the performances of skötsamhet as the path to acceptance, massinspärrningarna of black men, the issue of compensation for slavery. On the way gather insights that I previously had only in scattered bursts."

"the united states is built on white supremacy, the state is a pigmentokrati, with Coates words."

"And yes, Coates convinces even me, if necessary in american government, at least, can be persuaded to investigate the question of damages. How far away this is now, is not possible to calculate with any existing scale. Slavery was abolished while in 1865, but apart from the first passage of liberalisation, has been the story since its been written, the segregation – Jim Crow laws from 1876 to 1965 brought with it an economic inequality that still have importance. Slavery built the wealth once upon a time – and the wealth disappeared, not that the slaves became free. The united states is built on white supremacy, the state is a pigmentokrati, with Coates words."

"Donald Trump's road into politics was racism: he was the one who most loudly pushed the questioning of Obama's origins. He was the one who white voters chose. Both the working and middle class. For, as Coates writes in his just as angry as sad epilogue: the black working class has also suffered from the structural changes, finanskrasch and bostadsbubblor. Probably in addition more. Why they voted no on the Trump? To Trump is the first penalty the president, the first to be selected for a black president. The kampanjande successful identitetspolitiskt as just white."

"the”White-collar workers do not differ from other white groups in the strength of its work; they are distinguished from other workers by virtue of their whiteness,” writes Coates in his settlement with the contemporary debate in the united states. The way out of the morass of white power, which the country ended up in the must simply be klassmässig solidarity. It is, unfortunately, a little pointing in that direction. Not even Bernie Sanders could keep his tongue right in the mouth but was forced to in identitetspolitisk spirit point to his background in, that's right, the white working class."

"We had the power for eight years n– an american tragedy"