ideas into a simple and manageable form. He thinks that racial stereotyping is to perpetuate an artificial sense of difference between ‘self’ and ‘other’.
Loomba 1998: 113 thinks that such racial stereotyping is in accordance with the aim of colonial rules. She figures that the ideology merely reflects
economic and material factors. Moreover, she tries to underline about the enslavement of the immigrant from Africa, which is supported with racist
stereotypes which were obsessed with colour. Thus, these kinds of stereotypes provide an ideological justification as a tool to exploit and dominate. For instance,
the practice of slavery in the American South can be mentioned as a tool to gain benefits on economical needs. Vividly, it was also marked as a tool to dominate
other races too. Furthermore, racial stereotyping marks a racial domination too. In a colonial world, a society with racial domination built into it has worked an ideal
of racism into many ways of individual lives along with racial apartheid in many areas of life such as education, politics, and religion, bars on advancement upon
members of nonwhite races Foot inBulmer Solomos, 1999: 134.
A. Ku Klux Klan as a Racist Organization
Ku Klux Klan is a racial organization that is famous in the US. This organization violated people based on their skin color and race. Even worse, Ku
Klux Klan tried to vanish black people from the land because of their personal belief. According to Newton 2010: 73, the Klan’s belief is based on the
Protestant Christian. This organization consists of white people. Nolan in Newton, 2010: 73 states that the goal of the Klan are four sides, advancement of
pure white, native born Anglo-Saxon Protestants; white supremacy; separation of Church and State; and the upholding of womanhood.
The very first emerging of Ku Klux Klan was after the end of the American Civil War. The Klan was founded by veterans of the Confederate Army Newton,
2010: 3. The Klansmen adopted the violence in their action. There are three waves of incarnation founded in the Klan. The first is to create reconstruction.
The second is to preach about racism, anti-Semitism, anti-Catholicism to the local group in or order to take part in lynching and other violence activities. The third is
to stand against Civil Right Movement and desegregation. KKK is a powerful and holly organization. The identity describing KKK is
only a persona or a mask or camouflage to hide their fear of black consciousness of their power and also from the intimidation of white people’s changing
perception. The Klan tries to convince people of the identity as a dominant organization through the costume, the flag, and also the activities whichwere
toprove that they werethe destroyer of evil.
B. Fanon’s Postcolonialism
Franz Fanon is a psychiatrist, who is strongly influenced by Karl Marx Bulmer, 1999: 119. As a Marxist, he is also a historical materialist, and
afollower of the dialetical view of historical changes. He applies the method of analysis postulated by Marx to his particular time and circumstances. Similar to
Marx, he also shares Marx’s abiding prejudices: opposition to the exploitation of man by man Smith, 1973: 1.
He underlines the nature of pre-capitalist society, which is well explained by Marx, to be considered again. He urges Marxist analysis should be employed
every time people deal with the colonial problem. In analyzing the consequences of colonialism, he uses a psycho-social analysis while Marx uses socio-
economics. Marx is a Euro-centric, while Fanon is an African-centric. Thus, Marx concerns with the liberation of European proletariat. Fanon addresses himself to
the liberation of non-Western colonials. Marx’s focus is on class conflict, while Fanon is on the dual questions of class and race conflicts Smith, 1973: 2.
The matter of colonialism is the objective historical condition and human attitude based on that condition. In his book entitled Black Skin White Masks,
Fanon 2008: 62 figures that colonialism deals with the relation among the society within a region. He underlines that the problem of the black people is not
because of living among white men, but because they were exploited, enlsaved, and despised by a colonialist, capitalist society that is only accidentally white
Fanon, 2008: 157. Furthermore, he states that the black people were alienated not only because of their skin color and community, but also because of the
dynamics of racism caused by colonialization. Using Fanon’s Black Skin White Masks, the researcher tries to identify how
racism shown in the southern American society by using two main ideas taken from the book. The first is about the relation between Blacks and language. This is
based on the first chapter of the book entitled “The Negro and Language”. The second idea is about the Blacks and discrimination. The idea is referred from
threechapters entitled “The Negro and Psychopathology”, “Black and Recognition” and “The Fact of Blackness”. The two aspects are explained below.
1. The Use of Language
Language is a part of cultures. Language and culture are actually two things connected to each other. Fanon believes that language is a component of culture,
the most important among others. With language, the contact and the social intercourse between cultures becomes possible.In colonial society, languageplays
its part as a communication breakdown between the Blacks and the Whites. Fanon believes that the black people have double dimension. It means that
they have two dimensions in language terms. A black man will speak differently to a white man and to another black man. Fanon calls that a self-division as
theeffect of colonialist subjugation 2008:8. Furthermore, he adds that language supports the weight of a civilization, so that to speak means to be in a position
where a speaker uses a certain syntax to grasp the morphology of some languages Fanon, 2008:8.
A man who has a language possesses the world expressed and implied by that language. Fluently speaking ofthe language brings remarkable power. However,
using this power is employed by the colonizer in order to make their position as the fluent speaker of the language is superior than the colonized. Hence, for the
Blacks, by being able to speak the language of the colonizer is considered as the card of entry to the more cultural life among the Whites. It will be like this: a
black man who masters French language becomes more French, more white, and less black. Thus, the black peoplewould tend to think that the native language is
somewhat below standard. Dealing with language, Fanon 2008: 19 believes that theblack people always
encounter problems. He states the colonial environment product is a thing called ‘arsenal of complexes’. It is such as how Whites behaves to Blacks. Whites
always make the Blacks talk in their own language, as the white people call it ‘to make the Blacks look good’. Fanon 2008: 22 thinks to make the Blacks talk
pidgin is to fasten him to effigy of him, to snare him, and to imprison him. The language of the colonizer is a parameter of civilization, unlike the
colonized ones. The colonizer does not want the Black to fluently speak their language, so the colonizer treats them merely as foreigners and surely the standard
must be different. A black man who is able to quote a scholar’s saying should be watched. It means that having a smart black man in a colonized area means it is a
threat to the colonizer. Finding a well educated black man with a proper education harms the fixed concept created by the colonizer: the fixed concept is that the
Blacks must be uneducated no other than that. “They are the instances in which the educated Negro suddenly discovers that he is rejected by a civilization which
he has none the less assimilated.” Fanon, 2008: 69. It becomes a pressure for the Blacks to acquire the language of civilization
because they feel that talking in their own language means they are degrading into a lower level. Thus, the use of the colonized language for them means to be equal
with the Whites Fanon, 2008: 14. In contrast, their struggle only leads to another
matter. For the Whites, the Blacks must remain on the mindset that they are nothing, and they need to put an end to the narcissism on which they rely in order
to imagine that they are different from the other Blacks Fanon, 2008: 12. A black is forever on the dignity as a slave of her or his own appearance, and
acquiring the language of the colonized only showing inferiority. A black man who adopts a language different from that of the group into which he was born is
an evidence of dislocation, a separation Fanon, 2008: 14. He views that the change of the use of language is a personality change. However, this also brings
the rejection from his own group. In a colonized region, there is always a Black who talks politely to a white
man, and the white man answers him rudely. “A White man addressing a Negro behaves exactly like an adult with a child and starts smirking, whispering,
patronizing, cozening” Fanon, 2008: 19. The Whites figure the Blacks as a group of people having no civilization and deserve no respect. It seems to be a
legimitation of Whites’ conduct towards Blacks from years. Fanon 2008: 18 also provides a reference from New Testatement says “We
are the chosen people-look at the color of our skins. The others are black or yellow: That is because of their sins”. He believes that religion also takes part in
giving a level of people based on race and all the separation. This is believed as the written-source of a legitimation treatment of the Whites towards the Blacks.
2. Discrimination Towards Blacks
The Whites treat the Blacks as the object to get their needs fully satisfied. By creating some standards the Whites start to subjugate the Blacks to a lower
position. The Whites, as the colonizers, treat the Blacks as what they want. They need to rule the Blacks’ life so that they make the Blacks as if they were
uncivilized and inferior. In order to make the Blacks become inferior, the Blacks’ voice is sealed up.
The Whites grow fixed status between Blacks. Whenever the Blacks have felt inferior, the Whites continue to press the Blacks. Although the Blacks realize that
they can rule themselves, the standards created by the Whites have made them become less superior even to themselves. Their own desire is locked down. Blacks
need to pay attention to the Whites’ standards. The Whites, according to Fanon 2008: 82, view that the Blacks among their
own have no occasion, except in minor internal conflicts, to experience their being through others. The Blacks have no ontological resistance in The Whites’ eyes.
The initial identities from the Blacks such as their metaphysics, customs, and sources were all deleted because they were in conflict with a civilization that they
did not know. In other words, the Blacks were forced to leave their identity and theywere faced with new cultures from the Whites. The Blacks become desperate
to discover the meaning of black identity as the Whites’ civilization and European culture force an existential deviation on the negro.
There is a kind of difficulty for the Blacks whenever they face the Whites. For years, the Whites start to portray the Blacks as an object in their anecdotes, and
stories. By doing it, the Whites create the Blacks’ frightening persona. This image is actually violation of the Blacks. As Fanon 2008: 84 states:
“I could no longer laugh, because I already knew that there were legends, stories, history, and above all historicity...”
Fanon believes that the so-called myth created by the Whites about the Blacks is not all historically true. The Whites create a misconception about the Blacks’
history. However, this is viewed as a means for the Whites to conquer the Blacks’ life. Furthermore, Fanon views that it is not just the difference that is constructed
based on history. He adds that the social signifieds, the system of devaluation, are associated with that difference. The poor material associated to the black body is
merely a “historico-racial schema”. It is not based on the inferiority status. Based on this schema, the standard created by the Whites points out with that narratives
of the blackness. The Blacks are responsible for themselves, for their race, and their ancestors.
They start to discover, examine about their blackness, and ethnic characteristics. They reject all immunization of the emotions. Black people want to be men,
nothing but the men that they desire to be. They realized that one of their ancestors had been lynched or enslaved, but they accept it. Still, the white world
really hugged them into a cage. A man is expected to behave like a man. Whenever a black man tries to do that, the society vanished him out of the place
Fanon, 2008: 125. It is hard for the Blacks to be their own whenever it comes to face the white
world. There is a bound for the Blacks to act like what they want to do. This bound is created by the Whites to limit them of course. While for the white people
to follow their own desire is a freedom. A white man can go everywhere unnoticed because they come from the race who since at the beginning of time
hasnever known cannibalism. Fanon thinks that there is just a solution for the Blacks since the Whites started to hesitate recognizing them: to be known.
“I resolved, since it was impossible for me to get away from an inborn complex, to assert myself as a BLACK MAN. Since the other
hesitated to recognize me, there remained only one solution: to make myself known.” Fanon, 2008: 87
Fanon 2008: 163 thinksthat being black iscomparison.That is the truth. A black man is comparison: that the Blacks are constantly preoccupied with self-
evaluation and with the ego-ideal. Thus, whenever there is a contact to the Whites, the question of value, of merit, arises.
For a Black man living in a racist society, according to Fanon 2008: viii there will be much pressure to the black’s identity. There is a tendency, that the
black will be like the colonilizer. Society is created by values of man. Fanon 2008: 4 views a Black man living in the racist society will be ignored and the
black will resent on the identity. Fanon continues, if a black man is overwhelmed by the wish to be white, it is because he lives in a society that makes his
inferiority complex possible, in a society that proclaims the superiority of one race.
C. Racism
Racism is the belief in a hierarchy between groups. Fredrickson 1981, xii claims that racism offers a particular explanation for a fact that population groups
can be distinguished by culture, status, and power. The concept of racism was
strenghtened by the claim of such differences such asimmutable genetic factors but not environmental or even historical circumstances.
The concept of racism is crucial to describe the trend in Western between the late eighteenth and the twentieth century that has shown one kind of rationale for
racially repressive social systems. At times, nonwhites have been treated as inferior in the United States. It is commonly used as a blanket term for all
discriminated actions or policies directed at groups thought to be physically distinct from a dominantor major element.
While according to Fanon, racism is an organizing principle of society. It is not merely a superstructural effect of a determinant economic base. Fanon thinks
class and race gain meaning from one another, both of which are co-constituted as opposed to causally related. Neither class nor race predeterminesis a consequence
of the other; rather, each is dialectically co-produced Kane, 2007: 4. Fanon’s race and class co-constitute one another through processes of
differentiation that form specific kinds of spatial barrier between poor people of color and rich white people. The borders within colonized regions, according to
Fanon, not only divide the richand the poor, but also produce clearly demarcated racial formations. He views that the world of the colonized is not a world of white
folks, but a world whose “belly is permanently full of good things” 2004:4. In a different side,the black’s world is a “sector of niggers, a sector of towelheads”
that is hungry for bread, meat, shoes, coal and light 2004: 4-5. As an ideology, racism is unconscious of its own meaning. Racism cannot be
seen as a simple stereotyping or doctrine as the theory and practice cannot reflect
the whole field of racism Guilaumin: 29. History proves the evidence of racism, starting from slavery, Greek concept of barbarian people, the status of foreign
people in ancient societies, up to the status of the Jews in Europe and Arab world. Since the European expansion into the other parts of the globe, the scholars have
started to pay attention to the rise of the racism. Basically all those facts resemble one characteristic in which there is a widespread tendency to reserve the
attribution of human status to one’s own group national, religious, or social. Furthermore, it was in the US after abolition of slaveryas the place of scientific
racism and the empirical investigation of psychological race differences were enthusiastically examined Augoustinos and Reynolds, 2001: 5.
The tendency to use the word prejudice and racism happens in literature. Prejudice tends to be believed as an individual phenomenon, while racism is a
broader construct that links individual beliefs and practices to wider social and institutional norms and practices Jones in Augoustinos and Reynolds, 2001: 3.
Another difference between them is whenever it relates to power. While racial prejudice is displayed by an individual to an individual or to a group, racism is
shown by a group over other groups. Racism is often referred as stereotype. Pearson 1985: 45 says stereotyping is
a process of assigning people, groups, events, or issues to a particular, conventional category. Although stereotyping is undoubtedly often associated
with racism, it is not with racism alone, so to that extent, it cannot be regarded as the same as racism in its specifity. Stereotyping is a marginal aspect of racism and
not even specific to it. Fredrickson 1999: 70 adds that racism is a matter of
conscious belief and ideology and can be distinguished from prejudice, which is a matter of attitude or feeling, and discrimination, which is a description of
behavior. Racism is a universe of signs which connects the social practice of western
society as it became industrialized. This practice is actually far more extensive than just a manifestation of theory, as it was crystallized in the course in the
nineteenth century Guillaumin, 1995: 35. The theory that underlines human differences and inequalities and also affirms the superiority and inferiority of
group of people makes a connection between the mental and physical facts. This facts are deducted into theories to rationalize the differences Guillaumin, 1995:
35. As a concept, racism is really connected to the concept of race and as a
reminder where members of society make distinctions between different racial groups, some members are likely to behave in ways which give rise to racism as a
behavioral consequence of making racial distinctions Foot in Bulmer and Solomos, 1999: 5. Thus, the concept of racism can be divided into contemporary
racism and old racism according to Augoustinos and Reynolds 2001: 3. Old racism is about beliefs in biological superiority and inferiority of groups, while
contemporary racism is a belief about cultural hierarchy. Old racism happened between 1950s and 1960s prior to the American civil rights era. The racism in that
era was blunt, hostile, and supremacist.
D. Southern Life in 20th Century
