This Cruel Sickness
Assalamu alaikum, from the Sunni Sister Blog, Mashallah, I agree with this post wholeheartedly. I had to read the first paragraph twice to make sure I read the story she recounts correctly! Subhanallah, I’m speechless…
Iggie’s House
Assalamu alaikum, this was the book that, well, sorta kinda introduced me to the issue of race/color in America. I was in the third grade? I think, and the book was read to me in class, and a couple things stand out for me in my mind. One, that black people were called “Negroes” still (I can’t remember if this was the case in the book, but one of the teachers’ aids who read it to me referred to black people as “Negro”) and secondly that as we were starting to read the book, we had this discussion about what the book was about and we all went around the room noting the different “races” present in the room. I say “races” because out of the mostly white class, I think there was a couple of black students and a kid who was albino (racially white, though this was not pointed out to me at the time, I actually thought for the next couple years that “albino” was another race altogether). And I remember being told, or having it affirmed to me that I was “white”. And I remember feeling confused about the whole thing, i.e., “why are we having this discussion” “why is it a big deal what color people are” “sighted people are just so stupid and picky and trifling” (sorry but I did think that) Etc., etc. meaning, a lot of other flashes of thoughts that I can’t quite put into words, but something along the lines of white people having issues, and that I was going to do my best not to have those same issues, and well, let’s just get on with the book…
That book had a huge impact on me, and I wish I could find it in some sort of an accessible format and read it again, though being that the book was published in 1970, it was sure dated in 1984 or so, when we read it… And I didn’t realize that it had been written by Judy Blume, I’d read a few of her books as a child, the only one I can remember now being “Are YOU There, God, It’s Me, Margaret”. That one I read in like one night, after everyone had gone to bed when I was supposed to be sleeping. It was a good book if I remember right.
Anyway, just thought I should actually post something other than a bunch of articles.
