The United States’ racist history affects how people behave in the present, and this manifests in many unfortunate ways. And yet, the juxtaposition between this street sign’s reminder and the affluent, peaceful neighborhood in which it exists speaks to something even more unsettling-namely, that society tends to overlook or even approve of the most glaring reminders that racism and bigotry are still very much alive in contemporary times. To the contrary, evidence of that history crops up wherever a person might look.
“Jim Crow Rd.” reminds viewers not only of the nation’s racist policies in the aftermath of slavery (policies that extended well into the 20th century), but also that contemporary America isn’t cut off or insulated from its problematic history. Calling attention to this picture, Rankine accentuates the troubling fact that the vestiges of the United States’ racist history still exist in the present-indeed, the country’s dark past is woven throughout the very structures of daily life. In the foreground, though, a sign indicates that an adjacent street is called Jim Crow Road, in reference to the racist Jim Crow laws that enforced segregation in the U.S.
The picture is of a seemingly upper-middle class suburban neighborhood with clean driveways and tidy white houses in the background. On the second page, she presents “Jim Crow Rd.,” a photograph by the artist Michael David Murphy. By directing attention to this fraught dynamic, Rankine condemns ahistorical attitudes about race, indicating that this kind of ignorance exacerbates the discrimination and injustice that black people still face today.Įarly in Citizen, Rankine reminds readers of the inarguable fact that places like the United States have been built upon a history of racism and injustice. In addition, Rankine also considers how society’s eagerness to disregard history influences people of color on a personal level, forcing them to endure a “daily diminishment,” one that develops over time and “blossoms out of history.” While society at large erases the past, then, people of color are left to grapple with an entire history of racism that thoroughly impacts their own lives. This ahistorical perspective ignores that the present is directly linked to past injustices, as they inform the way people of color are treated in contemporary times. Considering what she calls the “social death of history,” Rankine suggests that contemporary culture has largely adopted an ahistorical perspective, one that fails to recognize the lasting effects of bigotry. Claudia Rankine’s Citizen provides a nuanced look at the many ways in which humanity’s racist history brings itself to bear on the present.
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