short introduction but first i want to thank the of staff that roosevelt house in particular those who have worked tirelessly to make sure that we have first-rate programming here at this institution. tonight we have a special guest margo jefferson who was speaking in conversation with terence hunter and this is part of the fall program series for coach michael jefferson is a pulitzer prize winner and her reviews and essays have appeared in "new york" magazine, of bogan "harper's" and many other publications were other book titles on michael jackson was published 2006.

as a sociologist who studies race are wanted to brief the offer conceptualization on the book produce beautifully written and a contribution to the relative medea of serious reading of the black upper class. media attention have almost exclusively focused its attention on the experiences of the black poor and working-class at the expense of the upper class. and a class that has existed at least since the mid-1800s the early upperclassmen service is the community as lawyers and doctors and entrepreneurs during the period of slavery and jim crow and in the north persisting defacto segregation.

those that have a history of organizations and activities that distinguish from any other class is within the black community as well as the white upperclass but contrary to understanding the black community always has been differentiated a round of lines of class and social status. i saw of this book with a number of african-american writers many of whom are referenced in the book including did you e.b. day bourse and the interpretation and the black bourgeoisie and baldwin's ratings and most recently sag harbor but they all the

engaged around aspiration and ambition and achievement and anxiety is will sessions of responsibility it without controversy issues with the 80 at a time in contentious the members are a success story with a cause a better race relations to be praised and admired especially in the early 20th century representing the best and brightest of the race as well as a class that could develop relations with whites especially since the

30's book police education of the negro the black bourgeoisie was a favorite target of malcolm x and to a question the rights of appropriate blackness as professor jefferson has mentioned in the book the black consciousness movement challenged ideas regarding the conceptualization of appropriate practice in inherent denigration. they are addressed by professor jefferson is the book with astonishing candor and wit to dismiss the five and a spell to romanticize the conception of black upper-class life in leslie givens the racial conflagration respectability politics on opprobrium middle-class behavior has re-emerged as a behavior in

the black community this gives is ample reason for caution. tonight's program will be an interview format with a professor of department of film and media studies here of a college a journalist in radio host and author of many books. professor hunter will ask questions roughly 35 minutes by a question and answer period we ask you do come directly to your question during that particular period. [laughter] [applause] wade to hurry up. thank you so much. also ms. jefferson and i

have read the book. good evening. i wanted 84 writing the book i struggled as a black woman reading from the historical passages reading your poignant and honest depictions of your life called negro land and is part to conversation with myself that we will have tonight but i want to start why negro rand? you say i called that because i find the growth a word of wonders for runaway slave posters in social construct, a tone of language whose meaning shift

upon setting and context chefs with the advancements to stagnate as letters appear to enhance dignity and other nomenclatures arise. i called the negro land because negro dominated our history for so long because i live with the meaning and connotations because it was to my first discovery of what recent or how was race constructed. this is so lyrical. it is like poetry but first of all, why did you write this book? >> i say a little later i am a chronicler a defender of all of the above.

i was born 1947. my mother died last year at 98. i really wanted to record a particular way of living as a person of color and to take great pride as another said upper-class because someone had asked me. she said we are considered upper class negros we're upper middle-class americans and in the white people just consider us negro's proposal are wanted to capture all of those distinctions and negotiations and uncertainties at the same time that were going on everywhere.

to be confronted and confounded of a world that still exist but not in the same way that israel had to use the word by buying and i mean it literally did geographical boundaries that we know perfectly well in the city, and middle-class, ethnicity, race but also we were bordered on one side by blacks in on the other side white people some of whom we knew in most we didn't. anyone who has had to leave their homeland. in your heart and in your brain to shape your unconscious swear wanted

that as well. >>host: i got a sense you open the window that very few people get to peak in to and i felt the you were telling stories that were secrets to a mainstream audience many people have never been to negro plant -- why are you telling so many secrets about what is going on in our culture and community? >> i am not the first lady with the novel the short stories but i did have to struggle with that but then i thought this isn't just the way i grew up but to belong to a group that is discriminated against with the value always being debated to be black, a woman

coming to protect your reputation is always there. your ou's contemplating how stereotype they jump up where how you may embody a stereotype for grossi you are taught to be very careful about saying or doing anything that would give prejudice to give the bigoted people ammunition and you don't tell family secrets that are flattering but i thought as a writer that could be interesting for a memoir because i was interested in what it could

do that is almost in conflict i am telling my story. the subtitle is almost cultural because it is the story of a culture of an individual or a personality within that. absolutely, in this dramatized and reflected upon context. >> that was my struggle as i read it because you took us through a historical depiction of negroland and you talk about black slaves owning slaves, which we have seen it-- >> that wonderful novel. >> and i struggled with that book, to be honest with you.

so, i'm going through this and i'm going through divorce his talented 10-- >> and later his critique a. >> and evolution out of this notion that there could be somehow this grand group of people who could oversee the rest of black folk to teach us how to be. so, take us through the work that you put into making sure that we had historical references and how you discover them because there were some things have been there i had never heard of before and i read a lot. >> i had a huge shelf of books, the most direct were several historical and several books of history on so-called black elite. they had various titles. i had book on chicago history. i went back to, i think it was an ira berlin book on i think it was called masters without slaves. it's about blacks in south carolina, the privileged class,

many of whom were-- not many of whom, but some of whom were slaveowners. general black history, sociology, there were certain texts i knew i had to take up. of course, you have to take up to boys, the devil devil, justice and the talented 10, so there are certain sociological text that to take up a franklin frazier, black sociology i read etiquette books, manners books to remind myself of these rules and regulations. i read about housing or read at books on housing. you have to cast you know, your eye in many many many directions and it make sure anxious because on thoughtful i have a scholarly, but i am not a formal

scholar. my training as a critic helped because i'm used to going in a lot of directions, but that chapter took a long time because i wanted it to be dynamic, but not drab, but not simplistic. >> i thought it was fascinating how you went from first person to third person so many ways you're going in and out as a writer taking us through this journey. >> sometimes on the foldable character and that also interested me in terms of memoir, the form of that, how many personae are populating the page, but also it seemed honest with the devil and sometimes triple identities that i was confronting. i keep using the word negotiations and there is that cryptic also of class, race and

gender. you just have to change your position and your tone and your literary strategy. >> tell us the first time little margot understood that there might be something different about her family dynamic or her family culture as it relates to other blacks when there was that position of the negroland at the jefferson looting and perhaps the rest of like america? >> well, two things that really stay my mind, the neighborhood that we lived in for a good part of my childhood. i was increasingly-- >> in chicago? >> yes, in chicago. i was increasingly aware of what i wasn't calling what was the path of the block that was very quote respectable and the other

half at the block that was starting to as my parents thought it slip down. i write in the book about being very interested in the girls at the downward side of the block and went into play double dutch with them and these little complex and event after a little fight with them overhearing my parents say i think we are going have to move this neighborhood is going down, that kind of thing. also, this is not a pleasant memory, but i registered it often when we all took trains in the 50s. we would take trains. i remember at the train station, the red caps, many of them were children that were among my father's patients, so they would say hello, doctor ushered doctor jefferson. yes, my father was being

gracious and they were being maybe a little deferential. >> a chasm? >> i didn't see it as a cow has him at that moment because it was not unpleasant, but i knew there were distinctions. >> how did that make you feel? >> it depends entirely on the tone. my grandmother owns several buildings and they were hard-won. my mother's mother, and she would collected the rent herself. i once went with her, and she was very preemptory with one of the tenants. i don't have the rent this week. >> i'm really not interested in what you don't have. so, oh, my gosh and then i had to go home and take to my mother -- i do it my grandmother. >> you had never seen that side of her.

>> margo jefferson, come back here. she's my grandmother. and my mother acknowledge that, to her credit. she said yes, i had seen that and it's uncomfortable. it's unpleasant, but then we didn't go any further. >> there's a lot of distinctions made, not just class, but complexion, hair texture, body shape, nose shape in this book that some of us reading it who aren't from the community may not understand that there are these distinctions made and you deal with them in a very-- just a matter fact. you list characteristics in a way that doesn't put us in a position to have to judge, but you do kind of walk away with somewhat of a judgment. at least i did. >> i wanted it to be laid out

very clinically, so you had a look at the data and evidence, even if that moments there were certain gallows. >> >> for those who haven't read the book.- it is called "negroland" by the way, what are some of the characteristics of people who live in "negroland"? >> you know desired physical --t >> desired physical. >> this is particularly important in, you know, something to be insisted upon most particularly if your girl,s growing up girl. and these are traits, exaggerations and intense if iifications of things that i think a lot of women in any group will recognize in terms of fashion magazines and you know, hairstyles and pretty little noses and what.es but if you were white, you knowb you were still white, even if you didn't have the exact nose. we were taking it for granted in

some way this was your world. so the backdrop of thegran appropriate look was, you t belonged to a people who many op whom, hope, hopelessly, beyond, without this appropriate look. at any moment you're constantly working to strive to not, not to have that look. so, and at any moment, something about your looks, your face, your body might slip back into that. undesirable character. it was all very specific. at best, you looked essentially like a lost. there were also-- there was a lot of room for the kind of mediterranean. perhaps mexican or latin

american, that kind of look. that meant you could have curly hair if it was-- sort of like jane russell's hair. there is a reference that some people still get. that was a very good look, but it's even nicer if you looked kind of like grace kelly. then your lips should not be-- the lips we now see that our soap popular, the collagen, no, those first came in with french movies. a nigro with full lips, which were always called thick, out of the question. a broad nose. of course, i am a respectable light brown, but i went brown. then, there are many shades

below. my sister was shot-- several shades browner and we were both extremely where. though, this is not something my parents in particular were upset about, but you cannot not be aware and again geographical distinctions. my sister would swear that my parents friends who were-- would come to chicago from southern states like south carolina or virginia, they were the went who she was quite sure were a little nicer to me. i don't think she was necessarily wrong. >> did it shape your choices of mates? your sister dated a white man. >> that was quite a little narrative. actually, mostly dated black men, married black men, divorced him and as a young divorcee in new york, began to date from a wide range.

also, we had hit the 70s and-- >> free love, but the question i'm asking, where the conversations in your home about when you bring abdomen home, he's too dark or his lips are too thick or does he come from the right family? >> there were always comments in my home. there was always assessments being made in my home and other homes. this is partly, it seems to me, this is-- call it a middle class and upper middle-class and upper-class, in some way it is always policing itself. policing its boundaries and borders, however those doctrines are passed on. they might be done very tastefully and suddenly or they might be quite bold if that is the definition of class

privilege. so, those were the forms it took, everything from who are his parents to, well, he's not very attractive meaning-- but, he's doing, you know, he's doing well in school. >> were there things that could get you into negroland if you didn't possess the physical attributes? >> men always had it easier if they were achieving. you could be very brown and you could acquire, this is the male story and much lighter wife and actually accomplishment, education, a certain amount of money, good manners. >> you describes harry davis junior-- >> when i'm watching him on tv. >> and the commentary because there is always commentary when there are black people on television in your home. >> yes, everyone would hover

around. >> it was not about the talent. it was always about here-- >> it was all about how they carry to themselves. were they being suitably dignified or at least displaying their talent in a way that was not clownish. but, also there weren't that many blacks in the 50s on tv, so it was also a mark up, where we going in the larger world, how are we-- we got to see ourselves on the larger stage of the american culture. >> who was it an embarrassment back then to negroland? >> certainly people like the old-time movie people. hattie mcdaniels, tricky. you could laugh, but it was very very tricky.

damaged a visit junior was an embarrassment because when he was playing around with dean and frank sinatra and the boys he could get very ingratiating. they would pick him up and tell strange little race jokes and it was all full of calm lottery, but he was more often the butt of the jokes and he needed them. he always laughed harder than everyone else, you know. >> as i'm reading negroland, i'm thinking about rosewood, florida , and greenwood, tulsa oklahoma, places that would absolutely pass muster with negroland, but despite all of the wealth and success in those places and there were dozens of them throughout the country, towns, hold towns completely full of folk that you write about in this book, they did not

escape the horrors of racism. >> those towns made them targets in a way because that towns were so easy to attack and so easy to get angry at. >> how do you reconcile that as we fast board today? we saw last week james at blake, tennis player, harvard graduate, well spoken, great family. i think his mom is white and he is definitely part of negroland, waiting in front of a wealthy hotel minding his business and he ends up on the concrete in handcuffs. we go back a couple years to skip gate, professor, definitely part of negroland and he's married to a white woman trying to get into his own home and he's arrested and that becomes the thing where the president has a beer with the police officer. >> yes. >> clearly, with all of this insulation and on the upward

mobility and aspirations to be accepted, at the end of the day you were just negros still. >> you know, my shoe are in a protected space you are .. not so different from what i was saying a few minutes ago, about, appearance at any moment, something about your appearance could signal to someone, who, didn't like black people. oh. you know, no. get them away. this, if i, but this person looks like this means that so, you know, it is very much the same thing in a political and social and economic frame.s

and it happens to women too andd girls, not just twice. >> no doubt. but is the goal of "negroland," to denegrofy the negro? unnegro the negro? as i'm reading there are conversations about blacks owning slaves and the way in which the relationship was, and then you talk about having, lacw of a better word, a made. but you called her -- what we said was a cleaning woman. she came twice a week. >> came in through the front door? >> actually, she did. >> these are important distinctions. >> theyhe are, absolutely.o >> 1/2 -- navigation of that space for people who domestic b work only thing blacks could do at certain points in our history to now have a domestic worker in your home. >> yes. >> and to not treat that

domestic -- and there is a chasm economically. >> absolutely. culturally there are distinct schuss, absolutely. >> how do you navigate that space? >> how do i navigate? >> how did you do it as young girl and now as an adult. >> my mother and father instructed us, more my mother because my father was at the office but they instructed us basically in the navigation, there are rules. we, denise and i as children -- >> your sister. >> we had too make up our own beds. all we were not allowed. mrs. blake was not allowed to make up our beds. >> what's the point? make my bed, she is still in the house doing the. >> i know, still eating her lunch in the kitchen. in my mother's mind it was partly an acknowledgement she had grandparents who had been in service in st. louis to whiteeni families but she said to me

once, i loved those women dearly. so she, a certain kind of, certain degree of politeness to her was a way of not betraying them. you know that, it is a small thing. it is better than nothing, but i wanted to by exposing, documenting, analyzing, the contradictions and theosin discomforts but also, the little, the satisfactions and pleasures. i'm not, you know, a heroine. i do some terribly snobbish things in this book. i do. >> read it for yourself. i'm not here to expose you. >> i wanted to explore and expose, and you know, look at all of the, i wanted to really look at all of the, all the intricacies of privilege, especially privilege that is, it is asserting itself. i mean "negroland" privilege,

yet it is provisional. that also seems to me very american. >> it is. >> even though i'm speak about a very particular background, it seems to me a very american set of negotiations. >> that is what was actually refreshing. >> contradictions always. >> always. >> yeah. >> we live in a culture right now where race is unfortunately at forefront of a lot of our conversations -- >> but class is huge. >> classer is probably more important to have a conversation about than race. race i think is a red herring. what you have done with "negroland" -- >> most of it is. >> is a red hertog keep people divided for the economic purposes. >> you're going into marxist analysis here. >> you know, as i'm getting into "negroland," what strikes me it is, if you took away the race, i it is just how people with money behave most of the time youw pe know. so itne is really about money,

privilege. we talk about white privilege but privilege is privilege. >> even when there is not that much money involved it is about all of the a cuetriments of privilege. you have good manners. you come from a distinguished old family that has fallen one o hard times. there is always some way to define it, to claim it, to insist on it, to display it. and that, you know, that is alphas nating to me. and how that lives on inside you as your circumstances change and how astrology gel with it or what parts of it you know are kind of content to live with. i wanted that series of dramas.t >> as a person that ran away from "negroland," i escaped, don't tellt on me, but as a

person i ran away, what struck me as you know, you build this segregated fortress that youfo hope insulates you from the larger mainstream society and you still built, like everybody desires to be better than somebody, and that seems to be the quest. whether it is american quest. i don't know how other countries do it. i'm sure that is the goal to get to the top of the food chain by any means necessary. >> the food chain, yes. to make clear you have the possessions, internal and external necessary to get that recognition, that the perks, the respect and you know, for us, there is this vast spectrum. you want perks. you want to be treated nicely iw a restaurant. you want the sales woman, whether white or black, to be de deeply referential.

you want to be treated like a first class citizen. you want just and honorable things as well. you want not to be closed out of a university pause you're black. you want, you want, if you're a responsible, political person, and there were those in "negroland," you want better things, more social justice fors blacks as a whole.ings so you know, it runs from large and worthy things to petty and snobbish things. yeah. >> i want to talkan about that n a second as it relates to wb dubois with i you eloquently talk about. th i think race is irrelevant. in this book you talk about so many people who literally walked away from being black. >> the ones who passed. >>al passing, right? and your uncle, walked away from being black and came back.d th >> my great kunkel. >> talk about your uncle that walked away from blackness.ou s

great-uncle lucius. >> great-uncle lucius, that's right. great-uncle lucius i really very little about. in fact i knew nothing about him until i was in fifth grade. in t nothing about him until i was in 5th grade. my parents,parents, at that point i was at a mostly white school. a cluster of blacks, but i was already having a little trouble negotiating because one of my classmates was white. i suddenly realized when she and her parents showed up at the same events that my parents went to a knew their world. i was working this through. my parents suddenly announced are great uncle them on my father's side, coming over to dinner and then they had to tell us that he had been living passing is a white man all

these years. well, why was he coming back? and i don't know that the story all emerged at the same time because we were very polite. all right. high. very nice to meet you. it turned out he had retired from his job. >> he had retired from being a white man. >> that was a lot of work. >> i need a rest. i need a rest. so he moved back into a black neighborhood. over the years periodically he had seen my father, and the negotiation was always my cousin, their cousin million who is very fair, uncle lucius would get in touch with her, and they would meet at a white restaurant, then she would call the dr. member of the family and say, someone would like to come visit you. lucius is in town.

or we will come by the house. so he came back. we had dinner with him. i really don't remember much else. i think we saw him a few more times. a few years later my father said, uncle lucius has gotten so difficult. he is always calling and accusing all of his black relatives of neglecting him. if you know anything about psychoanalysis, it's kind of sublime. please neglecting? so i don't really. i did not do this in the book, but the fact is, i don't really know when he died or any such thing. there are a few pictures of him. but i don't remember much. what i do remember is the premise and passing which

was accepted by these older generations, the premise was, you are doing this because you are going to find more opportunities. you are -- in many practical ways you will have a better life. whether you are my uncle, cousin, twin brother. yes, they're could be that. i'm not going to tell. i am proud of you in some way. i have mixed feelings. whiteness, pretty ridiculous. my parents were a little disdainful. and here is where it comes in. in essence they said, if you're going to bother to that, he had been a traveling salesman. he certainly needs to be doing better. you know, again, they did

not have that. i'm a dr.. my brothers are judges. living as a white man. what a waste of your time. so all of this is always going on. another cousin who had risen higher in the world. i just use initials in the book. >> yes, you do. >> john eddie had been his southern name. i'm sure when he moved into business in the north he became john edward no doubt. >> and that is what i think ultimately when i walked awayi walked away and is trying to understand what is it you want to leave us with , i was left with this notion that is really just about wanting to be better than and wanting to have the most that you can get out of this american dream by any means necessary.

if it means sectioning yourself off and creating a whole subculture within a culture that puts you at the top of the food chain, so be it. is that the message you want to leave us with? >> that is part of really the examining of, you know, the structures of, i hope, race, class, gender. but i also wanted to look at how an individual, how a particular life -- it's mine, bs bringing that particular life. here it is on this, you know, elaborate cultural, social, political map. how is one shaped? how are you made? how much freedom do you have to make yourself? to leave some of it behind? i wanted that, what is it

like? you know, for a single psychic to engage with all of this, you know, and yes, you are solitary come on your own, but the world is constantly making you, your family, your larger group, your race, ethnicity, class, gender, how are you being made in the made and remade and what is the cost? now everybody has but that woos key, yeah. >> and responsibility. wb dubois, talks about the talented 10 in the way that is the responsibility of theil talented 10. >> every race he says, has in. essence its superior class. no race is without its first rate leaders. basically the one, the race stakes it or the nation stakesra its reputation on. and you know, we too, we blacks

too. he is writing this at the start of the 20th century. we have our, talented 10. they are supposed to both exemplify intellectual, social, accomplishment, moral, because he was a victorrian. and, they are supposed to by example but also through action lead the race forward. many years later he delivered a speech to a posh blackty fraternity which was a severe critique of this. he said, you know, i didn't really fully realize but ionde wondered how easily these accomplishments, this privilege, this status i'm talking about could turn inward and become narcissistic and basically become a question of, of self-congratulations and

self-satisfied advancement, only for one's own.only >> so, did the talented 10th drop the ball? >> some of them did. not all of them. julian bond died recently. >> thurgood marshall.e of >> i could do the good examples, but you know, as a class there is, there is much to bes criticized. and you know, yeah, as i say, i is, there are things in that world that i love dearly and that it gave me. i can't lie about that. and be virtuous. at the cost of honesty, but yes, in crucial ways they dropped ball or turned away from the ball to pursue their own life. >> you write, that i'm obsessed with james weldon johnson's 1933 diagnosis of this condition and the condition that you write about i want you to talk about, and it deserves repeating. awaiting each colored child are cramping limitations and

buttressed obstacles in addition to those that must be met byping youth in general.tion how judicious he is, you write. talk to us about the impact of james weldon johnson's writing. >> i found that as an adult ofeo course but it resonated with me,. the passage goes on to talk to about how the parents, again, this is something that spreads out to you know, any family in which older generations have had great, great suffering, real burden of historical oppression, suffering, how does it passn, itself on to the child and what, and often its unconscious but every parent james weldon johnson said has to think about how much you spare the negro child, the full knowledge of the

burdens of discrimination,dens oppression, hatred. and how much you prepare them. and he said, either course, chosen badly, can lead to, he uses the phrase spiritual disaster for the child.ses and i, there are, there are so many of us and i don't only mean blacks, though that is what i'm writing about in this book. >> right. >> wit mh these, these historicl legacies. >> burdens. burdens that our parents have perhaps imposed too much on a us. no the parent that talks. believe me, this is what these people will do. no. i had a friend, child of holocaust survivors who's mother to used to lock herself in their bathroom and threaten to killha herself regularly. what do you do ofel these thing? what do you make of them? what do they make of you?

but the other thing is, you know, how do the parents, the parents have had to, they have inherited that from theirhe parents. so they are negotiating are constantly with the legacies ant with the possibility as they ses you navigating a spiritual disaster for themselves too.s, so it's very complicated and kind of heart-breaking. i'm thinking less about myself at that moment than about my parents. >> there was a recent study of m holocaust survivors that showed trauma actually is passed down genetically. >> absolutely. >> as i was reading that, i was thinking about that, the trauma that was passed down, and i just, it was a short period of time of i time from the native - no, i'm saying -- >> [inaudible] >> no, time, time.o, t in terms of years. 10 years versus, and not a

comparison. >> of course. >> the. larger point is, thatge historically, you know, whatever trauma happens to people, it does get passed down, whether you speak it to your children or not, it is in their dna. >> exactly. >> the responsibility for the parent to prepare that child for what is going on inside themselves they probably can't even express. >> itse is the parent, even if e parent has been relatively sheltered, if they know the history of their people, then that is there.pe also where is the child growing up? where, how are the threats constituting themselves even -- as long as your status, your protections are not secure, that, that burden, that trauma. i'm aphrased, that that hasn't. i think more psychoanalysts maybe have been working on that than we think. i'm amazed that hasn't been mo talked about much more in termsg of, you know, the history of

oppressed groups. >> you have covered an awful lot. i could literally talk to you all evening. i spent a lot of time with you and it has been a pleasure but i want to make sure we get people who have questions involved in asking marge grow jefferson. >> we have about 20 minutes? >> i don't know. i'm not the timekeeper. my watch broke. >> we should know, yeah? >>pe who is facilitating? i will give up my mic? okay. yeah, absolutely. the man in the wonderful redhirt shirt. >> i wouldn't have are worn it had i remembered i would be here. >> beautiful shirt. >> how much connection is there between "negroland" and non-"negroland" dealing with something like the james blake situation last week? i'm wondering if a child of "negroland" is, better, is lessi able to comprehend that, than

say, and i will never pronounce his name right? -- his son, would be able to deal with that and understand that? >> you know, again, it is a good question to ask coming out of the james weldon johnson quote and what we were just talking about, this complex balance of protection and preparation. warning. james blake, i can't, i can't address. you know interesting to me, the newspapers were identifying him as, biracial, which he is. that is quite recent they havetm been using this identification. he has been described as black before, african-american. that is a small thing. i don't know what he was taught or not. once you become a celebrity you are living in a very sheltered world. so, hard to say. very, very hard to say.

it is going to be more of ary h shock the more protections you've had, you know, the more shocking it is going to be, because some part i of you, whatever you're being taught, you know, in school, by your parents, some part of you there is the child in you that is always been protected. and some part of you is going to think, surely this will not stop? and that is that is not criticim of james blake. it is just, what? i know i would still have that reaction. some part of me would be saying, look at me. what? would you listen to how -- what? >> but it was calm though. i think of james blake, not frol "negroland," it would have ended a lot more horrifically. i think his, like incredulous, like am i actually on the grounr being handcuffed? whereas somebody that experienced this on a regular

basis or, might have ended up o because this guy came out of know where. didn't identify himself. of didn't is a question. might have ended in a fight ordd death or god forbid something of that nature. >> so he has -- >> "negroland" pry teched him. he couldn't believe, took him that long to figure out i'm on the ground. >> easily protections inwa addition to, look how i'm talking and look. >> right. >> his fame protected him too. you know, good for him.d he had his, after a few minutes, it protected him. he said that himself because he. said, he could make the phone call. some t officer, someone stayed, oh, wait a minute it is tennis star, said the policeman. he has been very good about making clear, yeah it is good it happened to me because it is calling attention to people who don't have my resources.t it happens to them. >> okay.

wonderful lady. we're going to bring a mic to you so there can be loud -- >> so the -- >> to the gentleman in the bright red surety but i will sat that he said that his sons being african-american in america is a lot more mild than tanahesi was because he is protected by class, by education, with access. >> yes. that is a good point. >> with the same question, miss jefferson -- >> yes. >> how has your experience in "negroland" differed from your parents? in what ways are you more innocent and protected and -- >> very goodmo question. >> more wiley, more experienced? >> all right.n. my parents put me in a progressive, very good, largely, but not wholly, white school in, when i was in kindergarten, in a certain way, it was, within, its

limitations progressive. they didn't suddenly send me to the equivalent of the military academy. there was a space in that school, and there was a space in that school where four and five-year-olds were making friends. you know, there were moments. my book is partly about those disconnects and dissew denses,bt but there was some space forall something i would call taking each other for granted as personalities. we all knew we were very smart.y we all knew we were being treated well because of that. and trained and in that way pampered. that was a certain ground of privilege we shared but naturalness is what i would say when you can start very early in as, in as, generous an

environment as society willll p permit at that point. that, that already, and that was something my parents chose, gave me a comfort level which is form of wileyness. you know he, to move into the world with. i you know, they made sure that we, you know, got all of the cultural pleasures and rewards. and duties, you know. every child doesn't want to take ballet lessons, you know, whatever but, they wanted all of this to feel like, you know, like part of our world.and and our lynn kneage. they wanted to make sure we got enough black history. we'll see the catherine dunham troupe and the royal ballet. they had their own.

they were much more suspiciouse of wide individual people with good reason.. their history had been different. but they also, my parents, there were things that they just loved. my mother, probably could have been a writer you know. she read to me all the time and all about books and love literature. my father had been a jazz musician and in college and grad school.e so these, jazz was my legacy. going to the symphony was my legacy too.he i'm simplifying it and pretty filing a little bit. they made sure we had thosere things. they had both grown up with lesp money and less access. their parent were very ambitious. both of my grandmothers had gone to a little black school in the south everything was much moreyi difficult and they sheltered us

and prepared us in the best way. i will tell you a funny, it is a gender story, from my father. shows you the meticulousness. he told me at one point, toldat this to my mother years later,we it is important that we make sure and take the girls out regularly to very nice restaurants because when they are old enough to have o boyfriends and suitors, i don't want them being so naive that they're blown off their feet,ant when some feckless, not particularly worthwhile man takes them to a nice restaurant. so every little detail was tended to and in that you take what you take for granted makes you wiley, doesn't it? even can make you somewhat naive and somewhat spoiled. i was not exempt from both those things. also the insistence we achieve did help somewhat. didn't stop us from being total

brats i think. >> beautiful lady in the shirt with her hand up. >> thank you. the >> thank you for that, two beautiful ladies up there. thank youti so much for and speaking with us. i'm finding this fascinating. i would like to know, given thew title of your book, why your audience is lacking in major numbers of african-americans? >> well my audience tonight, i don't know.n't >> this is roosevelt house. this is the basic demographic of the roosevelt house? isn't this normal? pretty normal.pret been here couple times.imes this is who shows up. >> i think it depends -- >> what we're going to get. >> i think it depends where one appears. i mean i've been getting -- now i'm starting to sound a little defensive. i've been getting a lot of emails and responses and whatevers from all manner black

and people of color but, you know, i think this is probably the roosevelt house is constituency. you know he, i want the book to connect to everybody. people other than my group of black people. >> isn't it on the best-seller's list? didn't we find that out. t >> it is number 20, which is on the extended. [applause] >> that's good. get this handsome man here with the glass. >> first of all, i'm a marketing consultant and i want to congratulate you on a great book cover. >> thank you. i like it a lot too. >> i think it is fabulous. question about income inequality. it is buzzword and they're qu probably talking about it right now on cnn. h what has happened to "negroland" as a percentage of the

population from 20 years ago to where we are today and what do you think it will be like 20 years from now? >> well we could be heading in this country and politically foc just major come 20 years i can't say. what happened, "negroland"grea integrated a great deal. that suddenly started in late '60s, when suddenly job opportunities and training programs opened up for particularly blacks, privileged blacks. so, there could be a citizen ofk "negroland" who is the head of american express or blah, blah. you know, it is really expandeds its reach in terms of being a portion, a population, a world within what one might call white land. >> with jay-z and beyonce --

>> jay-z and beyonce are what we use to call cafe society. >> oh, okay. >> showbusiness people. >> okay. >> michelle obama before the white house? >> no. no, no, wait, i take that back.. michelle obama, when she was growing up, in what was a very solid working class, lower middle class family, no. but you know, the world be what it is, we know perfectly well once michelle and her brother got to princeton things, and once she got very good jobs in chicago -- >> got grafted in. >> access was granted. >> wait for the microphone. wonderful person here, yes. >> hello, i'm curious, and i haven't read the book yet, maybr

you covered this already, how much explicit preparation did your family give for interacting with whiteci folks?ive or was there assumption from -- "negroland" was there some assumption you would be treated better? >> are you saying once i was going to school with or larger more hostile world of white people? >> either/or. >> we were given particularly as we got older each year, particularly as ad less sense approached given talks, warnings. some of them took the form, of you know, white people will always think, therefore you must behave well. piano teacher who entered five of us into some national piano teachers contest. you must play very well because the teachers expect nothing of you. you're getting that. you're also overhearing these

talks. so it is a combination of all of the things you are taught, and, being urgency of them, then those turn into specific warnings. then as adolescence comes, as everyone is worried about interracial and sometimes intrareligious dating. i think all parents of everyone at my school, certainly not the least the black parents were sending out intense warnings, bs careful, keep your distance, you know. >> did you feel adequately prepared? >> for my life? no. i mean, my parents started to do raise me as raceless human beina in a white neighborhood. >> i'm sorry? >> raised me as a raceless humaa being in a white neighborhood.. and it didn't work out so well. >> raceless, well, you're much young ir. >> for me i felt completely unprepared, because i thought i was a person and got to school,

kids were calling me the "n-word" and had to ask my dad what it meant? always curious about parents growing up in "negroland" and haveut moments like that they're shocked. >> most things, you are. constantly being prepared but some of ith is not spoke r spoken. it is just the intensity of youu manners and demands placed on you. this is part of a many littleook shocks. not all huge but to a child, they are. not the "n-word", subtler things because of particular protection. there were always a series of shocks. >> great question. >> how much do you tell your parents or when do you decide to hide that yourself and grapple. >> any other questions? >> piggybacking on that you were raised with two sisters. >> two sisters, yes.eren

>> would the script be different if you had a brother? they would be more frightened for him. the. also be more frightened of him in the white world and more frightened that i might beo tempted by, unsuccessful jay-z. by the glamour. this is how they would have put it. by the glamour of the ghetto and start --r. t >> the way you wanted to playglm double dutch down the street? >> in a tiny, tiny way. boys had more license. be afraid both of his possible actions and perceptions. >> any other questions? yes. we'll get to you. we'll get a mic over to you. hold on. this is wonderful person right here, yes. i hope this -- >> i hope this is okay to ask because i want to. i want to ask you something personal about the voice intonation of "negroland."

you heard me speak for two seconds. i'm an english professor, and when i speak i sound like a person from queens.i a i do not have, i do not have an upper class accent. and your accent, like we're both professors. i have an accent that marks me w as not an upper class person,s e like a out of borough person. and you have a patrician accent. it is almost, like, not spokent now. so what happens to the language of your, like your grandparents who spoke southern, or your parents probably did not have this patrician accent and your accent is so upper classass patrician almost sounds like a contrary eleanor roosevelt to me >> [applause] >> no, that is interesting question. i will get to it. you wanted to say something? >> i want to say that i struckua

by difference, i was struck by the differences in your speech in the two of you. you say, that you are -- >> i'm on purpose. >> i know that, i gathered. i gathered. and i wondered why.diff because as, as a person who grew up in "negroland" i would nevere have been allowed to talk like p that. >> exactly. g >> o r play with people whose grammar was bad., >> neither was i. gra my grandma did that all the time on purpose. i wasme raised and rebelled. i've been rebelling my entire life. i reject all of that. so that -- more fun. >> i heard that exactly. that perfect -- >> having more fun. >> this was something that wewa all grappled with because of course we also wanted to have black voices. my friends and i wanted to have black voices too. so we would practice them. they don't go over terribly well

withac my parents but chicago dd have a range. my mother spoke a lot like i do though i had a little career in the theater so that may have --e but she could, she could, she had a wonderful ear. she could bring a kind of genteel southernness into it. my father had a slight, justss. easy southern accent. chicago is full of people who emigrated from all manner of places so you get, you get a lot. i would say my parents, having grown up much more in the blacki world were much better at moving between black vernacular, than standardized english than my sister or i. it was the way we were brought up. so-called standardized english was what we spoke. it wasn't surprising to me. >> okay. i'm getting a wrap sign, you

want to see debate? okay, let's take that, we'll take two more and, beautiful woman in the back, yes.utif >> you mentioned in the beginning that you grew up in terms of class and structure in class, middle class, upper class, lower class.ass, are you surprised that today most, we still live in that manner especially with a, a lot of gentrification going on now? >> no i would -- no, no. america is so riddled with, and it is not just america, but my god, it has always been, hierarchal class-based though always pretending not to be. a america is so strange. you can become donald trump but you know, you need to move -- >> why? >> n right. the need to move up, you know, to prove yourself, to dominate. whether it's money or other

kinds of power. no. o that, that's what this countryai is. so you t know, i'm not surprised at all. and there isn't any group, somet of whose members have a grasp for that, found it don't use it. >> well, and i know a lot of you have questions but the beauty oo this event, miss margo jefferson will be signing books and you get to talk to her one-on-one. f she is not going anywhere. i want to thank each and everyone of you for your wonderful questions. thank you, marge grow jefferson, for this book. -- marge grow jefferson, for this book. have a good evening. [applause] >> every weekend booktv offers programing focused on non-fiction authors and books. keep watching more on c-span2. watch any of our past programs

online on booktv.org. >> political science prefer martha kumar is next on booktv interview program add wards. . .

>> >> where they had had the traditional coffee for the president-elect and the first