Forcing pidgin on black people imprisons them in a white-defined essence

Evidence

Yes, the black man is supposed to be a good nigger; once this has been laid down, the rest follows of itself. To make him talk pidgin is to fasten him to the effigy of him, to snare him, to imprison him, the eternal victim of an essence, of an appearance for which he is not responsible. And naturally, just as a Jew who spends money without thinking about it is suspect, a black man who quotes Montesquieu had better be watched. Please understand me: watched in the sense that he is starting something. Certainly I do not contend that the black student is suspect to his fellows or to his teachers. But outside university circles there is an army of fools: What is important is not to educate them, but to teach the Negro not to be the slave of their archetypes. — Frantz Fanon, Constance Farrington, Black skin, white masks, 132

Categorization

• XREF: Connects to Fanon’s broader thesis and to the reader’s question about how external education triggers suspicion from whites. — connects to: The indifference behind pidgin speech angers blacks more than hostility would; The black subject should act on social structures, not keep his place; The black man becomes black only in relation to the white man (+2 more)

Related

• The indifference behind pidgin speech angers blacks more than hostility would (similarity 0.88)
• The black subject should act on social structures, not keep his place (similarity 0.85)
• The black man becomes black only in relation to the white man (similarity 0.79)
• Speaking pidgin to blacks expresses the demand that they keep their place. (similarity 0.78)