Baldwin’s vision of Black life begins with abundance, not deficit

Evidence

Typically, the whole of the discussion of black Americans always began—and begins—with a deficit, with the idea that there is something not present that needs remedying. Baldwin doesn’t begin with deficit. There was nothing to be ashamed of here. No need to approach the beauty of black life as somehow a tangle of pathology or simply a response to the doings of white folk. Instead, their extraordinary effort to live amid the ways of white folk constituted the raw stuff of art. — Eddie S. Glaude Jr., Begin Again, 157

Categorization

• XREF: Contradicts deficit-based frameworks in sociology and psychology of Black life; connects to standpoint/epistemology arguments.
• SEED: Angle: a corrective essay pairing Baldwin’s no-deficit gaze with modern narratives that still frame Black life as pathology.