Black Culture and Black Consciousness in Transition Essay

Negative ConstructionFrench Marxist thinker, Louis Althusser, establish a crucial theory which illuminates how and why myths and ideologies argon constructed end-to-end magazine and history. In his celebrated essay, political theory and Ideological State Apparatuses, Althusser makes a convince argu custodyt in concerns with ideology and its influence on individuals or orbit which are created through specialized institutions (i.e. religious, educational, political, and family, trade union, communication, et al.). Althusser aptly declares that, Ideology is a representation of the imaginary relationship of individuals to their real conditions of founding (Althusser, 1994). In addition, Althusser wants to elucidate the significance of ideologies imposed on individualsIdeology is conceived as a double-dyed(a) illusion, a pure dream, i.e. as nothingness. All its reality is external to it. Ideology is thus thought as an imaginary construction whose status is but like the theoretica l status of the dream among writers before FreudThere is a cause for the imaginary transposition of the real conditions of existence that cause is the existence of a small number of cynical men who base their supremacy and exploitation of the quite a little on a falsified representation of the world which they watch imagined in order to enslave other minds by dominating their imaginations (1496, 1499). directly take Althusserians notion on the construction of ideology and halt it to the myth of the the Statesn dream. Within the socio-historical place setting of the American dream, the idea that people can start with little more than determination and cunning and earmark a legacy of wealth and accomplishment is perhaps the nigh haunting hope for Americans. As an ideology constructed over history, the subjective/cultural/ mixer construct of the American dream shapes how many Americans see their successes or failures and, evenly significant, demonstrates the many contours of U.S. golf-club. For African-Americans (including women and ethnic groups), however, were not fully assimilated into every aspect of American parliamentary procedure, especially since the American dream ideology specifically referred or pitch towards white males, for several reasons.If we look at American history, blacknesss (like women and other minorities) had dreams of obtaining cost rights and independence that was privileged to the common man. The slaves were constantly being told to postpone or wait-for their freedom would come. Even the declaration of independence states all men are created equalendowed by their creator with certain inalienable rightsamong those life, shore leave and the pursuit of happiness, but the slaves of this time were disappointed because this defining of all men excluded blacks. In fact, it excluded pretty much everyone, except white men with land.In this postponing of freedom, slavery, discrimination, racism, Jim Crow laws, sharecropping, riots and so on. Thus the American dream, to quote from Langston Hughes, has been deferred. Deferred because blacks had to wait, delegate to others who could instigate change. Since most minorities were not fully integrated into American life, some managed to successfully caput by at heart the rigid structure of federation. Case in point, macon stillborn and rapper Shawn Carter (aka Jay-Z) should be interpreted as accultrationist preferably than assimilationist with respect to the American dream for several reasons.First and foremost, the term absorption machineries three definitions it is seen as the process of assimilating new ideas into an existing cognitive structure, all the knowledge and values shared by a society and, lastly, the adoption of the behavior patterns of the surrounding elaboration. Ultimately, acculturation is the obtainment of culture by an individual or a group of people. The latter two definitions, however, bear greater insight into Macon Deads characteri stic as an acculturationist.Living in an unjust capitalist system, resides in an era where most Americans failed to acknowledge the presence of blacks (and other minorities) by deliberately and blatantly pass frivolous laws and regulations. Macon Dead, as a patriarch/hard-nosed businessman, is be as an individual of substance who has acquired property in which he rents to black underclass tenants. Consequently Macon Dead is described in the context of trying to emulate and adopt similar behavior patterns from white society considering America excluded blacks (and other minorities) in every conceivable way (i.e. socially, politically, cultural, etc). For instance, Morrison cautiously describes Macons appreciation for materialistic possessions in another survey when the rest of his family takes an excursion on not Doctor StreetThese rides that the family took on Sunday afternoons had become rituals and much too important for Macon to enjoy. For him it was a way to satisfy himself th at he was indeed a successful manMacon Deads Packard rolled slowly down Not Doctor Street, through the rough part of town (later known as the Blood Bank because blood flowed so freely there), over the beltway downtown, and headed for the wealthy white neighborhoods. Some of the black people who saw the car passing by sighed with good-humored envy at the classiness, the dignity of it (Morrison, 32).This blastoff illustrates Macons ability to purchase a wealthy fomite (i.e. Packard) which functions as a means of communicating, achievement and opulence to the public. Therefore in order to achieve this myth/ideology/concept of the American dream, Macon Dead truly has to abandon himself and, equally significant, his true identity by emulating the hated white people of America around that time. Macon Dead is less sympathetic to his own culture by taking a white mans role (i.e. dominant culture) as a cutthroat businessman which also solidifies his reputation as an outsider indoors the b lack community.In the contemporary context, Jay-Z is the postmodern version of what constitutes an acculturationist by law of the hip-hop aesthetics (whereas John Coltrane, Miles Davis or any black crawl in musician can be defined as the modernist version of accultrationist). William Eric Perkins, germ of the rap attack, details the influence of hip-hop culture and its signification towards inner-city teens and America (in particular, African-American and Latino kids) Rap music and hip hop cultures ongoing bewildering love/hate relationship with American society requires a fresh evaluation of the role street culture plays in the continuing evolution of American popular culture (Perkins, 1).As Jay-Z was raised(a) from the underprivileged neighborhoods of Brooklyn, especially at a time where hip-hop (as an urban phenomenon) reached its second wave of talented MCs from the inner-city neighborhoods of South Bronx, Harlem, and throughout NYC (with the likes of LL Cool J, Kool Moe Doe , Big Daddy Kane, Eric B and Rakim, KRS-One, A Tribe Called Quest, De La Soul, Ultramagnetic MCs, to name a few), Jay-Z understood the integral relationship amidst hip-hop and street life by adopting certain behavior patterns within the musical genre.