Subtle Racism in Black Like Me

In my opinion, some of the most powerful scenes in Black Like Meoccured not when Griffin encountered overt racism, but rather his privatemental struggles with being a Negro. These vignettes tell much more about the social system of racism in America than the moments when he actually reflects on his experiences. The first of these scences is at the very beginning of the book when he has just shaved his head and is about to look at himself for the first time as a ‘black’ man. He writes “In the flood of light against white tile, the face and shoulders of a stranger-a fierce, bald, very dark Negro-glared at me from the glass. He in no way resembled me.” To me, Griffin’s word choice in these two sentences speak volumes about the way whites viewed Negros at the time. ‘Stranger’, ‘fierce’ and ‘glared’ are each extremely powerful words, full of connotations that, in this case, seem to be negative and evoke images of a violent, unfamilar being. Though most likely unintentional, these words were his first reaction to his new identity, and play into the very idea of the stereotypical Negro that he fights so hard to destroy.

Another theme that seemed to run throughout the entire book was ‘lonliness’. It first appears in his second diary entry and recurrs continuously. I think Griffin traces this lonliness back to the fact that he is unable to contact his wife and family, which is evident from the scene when he is trying to write his wife a letter. However it can also be used as a metaphor for how Negro’s were constantly treated and how they felt at the time. In depriving them of social, political and economic freedom, whites were essentially cutting them out of the  American identity. Thus Griffins lonliness parallels the Negros lonliness, which stems from their displacement.