Black athletes occupy a contradictory position scorned by racists and diminished by liberals

Evidence

During the past century or so sport has been an important arena for racial performance, and a revealing site for the articulation of racist ideologies about the black body. Douglas Hartmann suggests that the image of African-American athletes and sports personalities is representative of “golden ghettos.” Scorned by racists for being black, African-American athletes are diminished by liberals for being involved with sport. Hartmann is concerned to reveal the critical importance of black sports personalities in public life in the USA, and increasingly in Europe, despite the fact that so little critical literature has been developed about the subject. — David Theo Goldberg, John Solomos, A Companion to Racial and Ethnic Studies, 2605

Categorization

• SEED: The ‘golden ghettos’ framing could seed an essay on how admiration of black excellence and policing of its boundaries coexist — the double bind of celebrated-but-contained visibility.
• XREF: Connects to the ‘immodesty’ article’s theme of how a marked group’s participation in a mainstream arena is simultaneously valorized and policed.