Stamped: Racism, Antiracism, and You

1. antiracist (adjective):

characterized by an opposition to racism and a promotion of equality

“A racist idea is any idea that suggests something is wrong or right, superior or inferior, better or worse about a racial group. An antiracist idea is any idea that suggests that racial groups are equal.” (Introduction, Page xi)

2. segregationist (noun):

an individual who believes in a policy that enforces the separation of racial groups

“Segregationists are haters. Like real haters. People who hate you for not being like them.” (Chapter 1, Page 3)

3. assimilationist (noun):

an individual who believes racial or cultural out-groups should adopt the cultural traditions and attitudes of a dominant in-group

“Assimilationists are people who like you, but only with quotation marks. Like…‘like’ you. Meaning, they ‘like’ you because you’re like them.” (Chapter 1, Page 3)

4. benevolent (adjective):

well-meaning and marked by a sense of goodwill

“It’s like saying, ‘I look at my dog like I look at my children, even though I’ve trained by dog to fetch my paper by beating it and yanking its leash.’ But the idea of it all let the new enslavers off the emotional hook and portrayed them as benevolent do-gooders ‘cleaning up’ the Africans.” (Chapter 2, Page 14)

5. voluntary (adjective):

done by a person’s own free will

“He even said there were ‘voluntary slaves,’ as in Africans who wanted to be slaves so that they could be baptized. (Voluntary slaves? Richard Baxter was clearly out of his mind).” (Chapter 3, Page 22)

6. discrimination (noun):

the act of treating groups of people differently from others, often on the basis of race or gender

“And while all this was going on—all this systemic knife turning, all this racist political play, all the violence and discrimination—Cotton Mather, all high and mighty, was still trying to convince people that the only thing necessary, the only mission of slavery, had to be to save the souls of the slaves, because through that salvation the enslaved would in turn be whitened.” (Chapter 4, Page 35)

7. enlightened (adjective):

having a rational, modern perspective

“But to be enlightened just means to informed. To be free from ignorance. So, this new movement, the Enlightenment, was megaphoning the fact that there was a new generation, a new era that knew more.” (Chapter 5, Page 41)

8. contradiction (noun):

a combination of two or more ideas that oppose each other

“When it came to Black people, Jefferson’s whole life was one big contradiction, as if he were struggling with what he knew was true and what was supposed to be true.” (Chapter 8, Page 58)

9. suasion (noun):

the act of urging someone to do or believe a particular thing

“If Black people behaved ‘admirably,’ they could prove all the stereotypes about them were wrong. This strategy was called uplift suasion.” (Chapter 9, Page 65)

10. insurrection (noun):

an uprising or revolt against an established authority

“Especially as slaves, many of whom were still inspired by the Haitian Revolution, were continuing to attempt insurrection.” (Chapter, 10, Page 69)

11. incremental (adjective):

describing a small positive or negative change

“Meaning, he used to believe that freedom was incremental. A little bit at a time. A slow walk. Now he believed that freedom should be instant.” (Chapter 11, Page 87)

12. pamphlet (noun):

a small booklet usually containing information about a single topic

“At the annual meeting of the AASS in May 1835, members decided to rely on the new technology of mass printing and an efficient postal service to overwhelm the nation with twenty to fifty thousand pamphlets a week.” (Chapter 11, Page 90)

13. docile (noun):

ready to submit to someone else’s control or will

“Moral of the story: We all must be slaves... to God. And since docile Black people made the best slaves (to man), they made the best Christians.” (Chapter 12, Page 96)

14. emancipation (noun):

freedom from slavery or other extreme social and legal restrictions

“His name was Andrew Johnson, and he basically reversed a lot of Lincoln’s promises, allowing Confederate states to bar Blacks from voting, and making sure their emancipation was upheld only if Black people didn’t break laws.” (Chapter 14, Page 107)

15. maliciously (adverb):

performed with the intent to do harm

“But the accusation of rape could make it easier for Southern White men to puff up and act maliciously, all in the name of defending the honor of White women.” (Chapter 15, Page 121)

16. stereotype (noun):

a widely held view of a group that is false and overly generalized

“But during this time, allegations of rape were often used as an excuse to lynch Black men, rooted in the stereotype of the savagery of the Black man and the preciousness of the White Woman.” (Chapter 17, Page 136)

17. colonialism (noun):

the practice of invading and occupying another country for an extended period of time

“Black people from the South were headed to Chicago. To Detroit. To New York. Some even came from the Caribbean to escape colonialism.” (Chapter 18, Page 139)

18. hierarchy (noun):

a system in which groups or people are ranked as superior or inferior to each other

“There were new versions of the racial hierarchy, which weren’t that new because Black people still existed at the bottom.” (Chapter 18, Page 141)

19. ad nauseam (adverb):

done so many times that it becomes annoying or frustrating

“Ultimately, he was arguing what he’d been arguing in various ways, and what Frederick Douglass, Sojourner Truth, Booker T. Washington, Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Marcus Garvey, and many others before him had argued ad nauseam: that Black people were human.” (Chapter 19, Page 150)

20. fascism (noun):

a political philosophy which rose to prominence in the first half of the 20th century; it elevates the nation and its leader above individual rights and often uses violence against real or imagined enemies

“After the United States entered World War II in 1942, Du Bois felt energized by Black America’s ‘Double V Campaign’: victory against racism at home and victory against fascism abroad.” (Chapter 20, Page 155)