On Ethnic Writing

Here is a recent high-brow take on ethnic writing:

"First-generation American writers often have two stories to tell. There's the story of their inspiration and the quest for a discipline to give form to their imaginings. Then there's a more constricted tale: the arrival myth. How did my parents get here from Hungary or Nigeria or China, say, and at what cost? The children of immigrants sometimes feel a kind of moral responsibility to address their parents' struggle. And that sense of duty can saddle the work with a reverence that makes it feel ponderous or didactic, drained of the very thing that moved them to write in the first place: imagination. So it's especially exciting to find first-generation American artists who don't traffic in guilt or remorse, and who can laugh ..."*

Let's unpack: According to this piece, the immigrant past stifles the creativity of an "ethnic writer." The experience of family functions as a constraining, albeit moral force, bogging down ethnic writers. The excerpt above creates a normative category, ethnic writing, frames it as a handicap, and then proceeds to praise an exception that the author discovers.

But this approach hides more than it reveals. The fact that "ethnic writers" are fundamentally frustrated by the dominant society's label of them as authentic bearers of ethnicity and therefore are seen as uniquely qualified to write about it (and only about it) is never acknowledged in the above excerpt. (see, katpaintsair.blogspot.com/2009/11/ethnicity-writing.html)

In other words, what is a mainstream expectation is diagnosed as an ethnic problem, which in turn is criticized as a symptom of its own making. The fact that ethnic writers often imaginatively deal with their immigrant past is not given due credit.

There is nothing new in this formulation, ethnic writing is routinely devalued as lesser than "mainstream" American literature. Ethnic arts are labeled inferior to national arts because of the former's ethnographic obligation to entangle the past. Painful immigrant memories demand a voice that compromises artistic freedom. Ethnic writers are "condemned," held liable for compulsively visiting this past (and criticizing the dominant society, one might add).

Such framing of ethnic writing is an artificially fragile (and ideologically suspect) category. This becomes clear once we probe any realist national narrative that takes as its subject the narrator's difficult past. Are there no examples in American art where the narrator or the artist delve into their ("non-ethnic") family's economic hardships, injustices, dislocation, eviction, despair, or displacement?

When "ethnic" writers write about a painful past are lesser artists. Does the same apply to "American" writers who feel the moral responsibility to explore their family's adversities?

To summarize in a manner that can easily be memorized, here is a template that could anchor any discussion on ethnic writing:

There is mediocre ethnic writing delving into the past and there is great ethnic writing delving into the past. There is mediocre national writing delving into the past and there is great national writing delving into the past.

And let us then proceed to interrogate the notion of an independent "ethnic arts" category, to investigate instead its permutations with American arts. For instance, is Jeffrey Eugenides's Middlesex, a novel organizing itself around the immigrant past, a Greek-American or an American work of art? And let us consider that this might be a misleading question, as this novel, like so many others, can be simultaneously claimed as ethnic and national, not solely one or the other. Let us view, in other words, American art as an experience of border crossing, not a pure category.

* Hilton Als. "Double Talk: Two Comedies of Miscommunication." The New Yorker, Nov. 7, 2011: 86.

Eyes on the Prize – Honoring the (Continuous) Struggle for Racial Equality

The documentary "Eyes on the Prize recounts the fight to end decades of discrimination and segregation. It is the story of the people – young and old, male and female, northern and southern – who, compelled by a meeting of conscience and circumstance, worked to eradicate a world where whites and blacks could not go to the same school, ride the same bus, vote in the same election, or participate equally in society. It was a world in which peaceful demonstrators were met with resistance and brutality – in short, a reality that is now nearly incomprehensible to many young Americans." For more see, pbs.org/wgbh/amex/eyesontheprize/about/index.html

Watch part one, Awakenings (1954-1956) at uk.video.yahoo.com/watch/3350286

Racial Profiling is Morally Wrong and Bad for America

Racial profiling refers to governmental surveillance directed at a suspect group on the basis of certain physical characteristics. This practice of selective targeting currently occupies center stage in debates over national security in post 9/11 America and the curbing of illegal immigration. Most recently, it is discussed in relation to the controversial Arizona immigration law. Hotly debated, the law allows police to check the immigration status of people who are lawfully stopped and deemed “reasonably suspicious” for being illegal. Physical characteristics, according to legal experts, enter as a factor in this process.

A section of the public supports racial profiling as a statistically effective tool to safeguard security and punish illegality. Critics on the other hand, have strongly argued that racial profiling cannot solve the nation’s problems. For example, the fact that Arab Americans and Muslims constitute a greatly diverse population (which includes “whites” and African Americans among others) makes racial profiling unenforceable. Regarding illegal immigration and terrorism, racial profiling is seen as a solution, yet it cannot take the place of systemic solutions to the crisis of porous borders.

Debates about racial profiling as a rational response to terrorism and illegality overlook an acute moral problem. In marking certain groups as a source of threat, racial profiling puts innocent citizens, residents, and immigrants under pervasive scrutiny. As a result it produces a sense of exclusion, alienation, and fear among members of the targeted group. It also diminishes the trust in law enforcement among law-abiding citizens.

In a fundamental sense, racial profiling defines certain Americans of the “wrong look” as not fully American. Or, to put it differently, it puts them on continuous trial. It is a menacing force, causing devastating psychological and physical harm to those targeted. It must be unequivocally rejected as morally wrong. Moreover, it is bad for America.

Feeding popular suspicions toward the targeted groups, racial profiling also involves the public, not only the government. It alerts otherwise well-meaning citizens that certain people who look or dress in particular ways are potential enemies. And it emboldens a race-centered harassment of immigrants and minorities. This exclusionary impulse is far from marginal in the country. The fact that a book advocating a racially homogeneous America–Peter Brimelow’s national bestseller Alien Nation: Common Sense about America’s Immigration Disaster (1995)–enjoyed such great popularity speaks volumes of the power nativist arguments have on the contemporary imagination even in groups that have suffered prejudice in the recent past.

Racial profiling intensifies, therefore, the monitoring, the fearing, and even despising of certain peoples in all aspects of public life. Lawful citizens who fit the profile are seen as not fully American, as aliens in their own neighborhood, schools, or workplace. No wonder innocent Muslim, Arab, or Hispanic Americans experience a profound sense of alienation. Stigmatization functions as a constant reminder of being considered second-class citizens, not fully belonging to the nation. The American decree of equal inclusion irrespectively of ancestry is violated, producing anger and humiliation.

Those who argue that lawful inhabitants of the country have nothing to fear trivialize the ways stigmatization damages the soul and offends one’s civil sensibilities. Individuals singled out because of their appearance offer testimonies of harrowing experiences. As reported in the media, books, as well as formal and informal discussions, they live in a state of siege, being closely watched while flying, subjected to constant suspicion and intrusive searches, showered by ethnic slurs, and being harassed in their own communities. Racial profiling holds a significant population of lawful individuals as hostages. Designating certain Americans as potentially hostile alien, it marks them as lesser Americans.

In addition to psychological horror, physical harm is integral to racial profiling. This is because racial profiling sanctions all kinds of extralegal violence. Having the “wrong look” could be a matter of life or death, particularly during times of crisis. In the months following the 9/11 terrorist attack for instance, over 1,000 incidents of hate crime were reported against individuals who “looked” in the eyes of the vigilantes as Middle Eastern and Muslim. The fact that some of the victims were Sikh, mistakenly thought to be Arabs, sent shock waves across a rainbow spectrum of Americans who looked “south Asian,” including Caribbean Americans. In the aftermath of the disaster many Americans of the “wrong look” feared to go to their work and send their children to school. “Non-whites” are a fair game in the “all seeing” and at the same time blind force of racial profiling.

Numerous examples of Greek immigrants victimized by racial profiling in the past bring this point close to home. In the infamous 1909 Omaha riot as well as the 1918 anti-Greek riots in Toronto, Greek residences and businesses were razed to the ground. No wonder communities scorched by racial profiling drape themselves in the American flag as the ultimate line of defense.

Supporters of racial profiling wrongly assure the public that racial profiling is not random; that it is based on behavioral cues legitimizing suspicions of illegality. This position entirely misses the point that “suspicion” is a socially constituted experience. It is well known that an innocent activity such as riding a bike in the white suburbs may raise suspicion if the biker is of a “certain look or color.” Or consider the horrifying incident in Pirtleville, Arizona, when Border Patrol Agents opened fire on thirteen-year old Rosita Gonzales. Rosita was playing in a tent set in the backyard of their house, when, startled by strange noises she heard, ran toward her home. The Agents fired, misrecognizing her as a fleeing illegal immigrant.

There is yet another moral dimension in racial profiling, an aspect rarely if ever explicitly acknowledged by the public. Racial profiling associates illegal aliens with non-whiteness. This is a false connection, obscuring two interrelated phenomena: The existence of undocumented European immigrants and the preferential treatment they have often received in relation to their Latin American counterparts.

Take the case of the thousands, as many as 30,000, of Irish who overstayed their visas remaining in the United States illegally. This was in the 1980s when, not unlike today, the nation was alarmed over an illegal immigration crisis. Yet those so-called “new Irish” were not subjected to the public hostility that is commonly reserved toward non-white undocumented aliens. The new Irish are “Illegal but not Alien” an article in The New York Times proclaimed. And Boston’s Mayor unflinchingly extended “the welcom[ing] mat,” creating an office to provide legal aid to this group.

I cite this example not to single out the Irish, obviously, but to illustrate that racial profiling creates hierarchies among illegal immigrants. This raises a deeper issue: Racial profiling grants unearned privileges to those who most closely approximate a “white phenotype.” This is morally wrong as it conflates illegality with non-white status. In this arrangement “non-white” Americans are called to keep proving their national belonging, a surveillance to which their white counterparts are for the most part spared.

Let us face it: Racial profiling divides the country into “good white” and potentially “bad brown” Americans.

Supporters of racial profiling would have the public believe that this practice entails an inconvenient interlude in otherwise normal lives. I have shown why this is not the case. Racial profiling forces millions of Americans to painfully adjust their everyday lives to address its pernicious effects. It is deeply harmful, extracting immense human cost. Racial profiling is bad for America.

The nation must collectively invest in strategies to combat terrorism and illegality without resort to racial discrimination.

Does SB1070 Entail Racial Profiling? Consider the Evidence

Arizona's new controversial immigration law (SB1070) was recently debated in the Greek American newspaper The National Herald (NH). The following, originally printed in the NH on June 25, 2010, is my contribution to the debate.

Arizona's new immigration law, SB1070, allows police to check the immigration status of people who are lawfully stopped and deemed “reasonably suspicious” for being illegal. The question of whether SB1070 can be enforced in a race-neutral way or will be used to profile Hispanics and Latinos is one of the most volatile issues raised by this law. This explosive issue is now debated in the National Herald. In a letter to the newspaper, a number of University professors and educators took issue with Constantine Scaros’ insistence on advancing one particular interpretation of the law while unreflectively dismissing rival interpretations. He keeps insisting, instead, that SB1070 is race-neutral. Just read the law, he urges the public, and the truth will shine: SB1070 has nothing to do with racial profiling.

This may appear to be the case, particularly in view of the last-minute amendment, section 5D, passed by the Arizona legislature. It says, “A law enforcement official or agency of this state or a county, city, town or other political subdivision of this state may not consider race, color or national origin in implementing the requirements of this [law] except to the extent permitted by the United States or Arizona Constitution.”

But what does the last phrase, “to the extent permitted by the United States or Arizona Constitution,” mean? As I am not a scholar of immigration law, I rely on an array of legal experts to understand the complexity of SB1070. In view of the debate in the National Herald, I would like to share with readers a particular interpretation offered by University of Arizona law professor Gabriel ‘Jack’ Chin. For Chin, the last phrase of the amendment constitutes a huge loophole, given the U.S. Supreme Court’s ruling in 1975, in a case called United States v. Brignoni-Ponce (422 U.S. 873, 886-887). “According to the Supreme Court, the U.S. Constitution allows race to be considered in immigration enforcement: ‘The likelihood that any given person of Mexican ancestry is an alien is high enough to make Mexican appearance a relevant factor’” in immigration law enforcement. Similarly, “The Arizona Supreme Court agrees that ‘enforcement of immigration laws often involves a relevant consideration of ethnic factors.’ State v. Graciano, 653 P.2d 683, 687 n.7 (Ariz. 1982) (citing State v. Becerra, 534 P.2d 743 (1975)).” (For the full complexity of SB1070 see, www.azdatapages.com/sb1070.html, which includes the full text of SB1070 and professor Chin’s annotations).

A thorough scholar, Chin offers a number of caveats. “There are many open questions,” he cautions. “Most of the cases allowing racial profiling involve Border Patrol officers enforcing federal immigration law. It is not clear that the U.S. Supreme Court or Arizona Supreme Court will extend these rulings to state officers enforcing state immigration law, or to state officers who have general law enforcement responsibilities.”

It is open, in other words, how the U.S. Supreme Court or the Arizona Supreme Court will proceed. Yet Chin is unequivocal regarding the link between the law as it stands and racial profiling. “I am deeply surprised,” he says, “that anyone construes this law to prohibit racial profiling. If it did, the legislature would have provided that the police ‘may not consider race, color or national origin in implementing the requirements of this subsection except to the extent permitted by the United States or Arizona Constitution.’ The fact that the last clause is part of the law invites profiling followed by legal tests of whether it is appropriate in particular cases. If the legislative and Governor in fact intended to forbid the use of race, color or national origin, they should delete the last clause. This would take race out of the law, and be a significant improvement—but given the vast discretion exercised under the reasonable suspicion standard race would remain in the air.” Obviously, we witness here a well-reasoned argument connecting SB1070 with racial profiling, not a “misplaced mass hysteria,” as Scaros charges of the critics of the law.

I refer to Chin’s interpretation in such detail because it helps us clarify a number of contested points in the debate. First, we realize that the mere reading of SB1070 does not provide access to a transparent truth, as Scaros would have us believe. There are rival interpretations of the law. Second, we come to recognize a crucial fact in the debate. This fact is that we have publically available an authoritative legal interpretation countering Scaros’ position. Moreover, this alternative interpretation is accepted as legitimate by numerous respected scholars and institutions.

This is precisely why the professors and educators took issue with Scaros for summarily dismissing the view that SB1070 entails racial profiling. “Throngs of protesters have condemned SB1070 as being an excuse for ‘racial profiling,’ as it will give police officers the excuse to harass anyone who looks Hispanic. Rarely have I observed such a high degree of collective fallacy,” Scaros wrote. The letter by educators called on Mr. Scaros and others to be as judiciously inclusive as possible in anticipating the effects of the new Arizona law, given the vast discretion it allows police to exercise, precisely because the law’s implementation may have politically and socially explosive consequences.

Finally, let me take a moment here to clarify the meaning of racial profiling so that the term will not be inappropriately used and confuse the discussion. We live in a racialized society where individuals are indeed classified in racial terms on the basis of certain physical markers. Recognizing certain individuals as African Americans or Asian Americans is called racialization, a practice distinct from racial profiling. Unlike everyday racialization, racial profiling is a practice of the state that entails state surveillance of a targeted group, the exercise of state force, and, often, political exclusion. In other words, asking a neighbor for her baklava recipe because she "looks Arabic" is different from law enforcement’s targeting her as a potential suspect because she "looks Arabic."

Αρχίζει το Ματς, Μέσα και οι Μετανάστες!

Οι διάφορες πτυχές στην σχέση μεταξύ μεταναστών και αθλητισμού διακρίνονται πιο καθαρά αν προσεγγίσει κανείς το θέμα σε συγκεκριμένα ιστορικά και πολιτιστικά πλαίσια.

Για τους Έλληνες μετανάστες στην Αμερική της δεκαετίας του 1950, παραδείγματος χάριν, η συμμετοχή (και μεγαλειώδης μάλιστα) του Aristotle George (Harry) Agganis στο μπέιζ μπολ, το εθνικό σπορ της Αμερικής, αντιπροσώπευε το όνειρο της ίσότιμης κοινωνικής συμμετοχής. «Δεν είμαστε πια ξένοι. Χάρη στον Harry είμαστε πάλι οι Χρυσοί Έλληνες,» δήλωνε χαρακτηριστικά η μητέρα του, δύο χρόνια μετά τον πρόωρο θάνατό του. Η ατομική επιτυχία σε εθνικό επίπεδο λειτουργούσε και σαν εισητήριο για την σεβαστή αποδοχή του εθνοτικού συνόλου.

Η προτίμηση για ένα ατομικό-επιθετικό άθλημα όπως η ξιφασκία, από την άλλη μεριά, έχει αποδοθεί (από την Olympia Dukakis για παράδειγμα) στον άγριο θυμό που φούντωνε στα παιδιά των μεταναστών που βίωναν εθνοτικές διακρίσεις. Δεν είναι δύσκολο να φανταστεί κανείς το σενάριο. Αντί να γίνεις φονιάς για να αντιπερασπιστείς την προσβολή του υποβιβασμού σου το ρίχνεις στην νόμιμη κατά μέτωπο επίθεση με το ξίφος. Αφήστε που σ΄αυτές τις καταστάσεις πέφταν βροχή και πραγματικές μπουνιές, σφαλιάρες και γενικά πλακώματα. Δεν θα εκπλαγόμουν από μια ανάλυση που θα συνέδεε το μποξ και την πάλη με αυτού του είδους τα βιώματα. Αν με μειώνεις εσύ καθημερινά, αν ποδοπατάς τους (μετανάστες) γονείς μου, έλα να τα πούμε στην αρρένα· κι αν σου τις βρέξω θα πάρω και βραβείο κιόλας. Να λοιπόν τι εξηγεί την μέθη των Ελλήνων μεταναστών τις δεκαετίες των ΄30 και ΄40 κάθε φορά που ο θρυλικός Christos Theofilou, ο επονομαζόμενος "Golden Greek" Jim Londos, ταπείνωνε τους αντιπάλους του (για ένα σχετικό σχόλιο και footage δέστε το ντοκιμαντέρ, thejourneygreekamericandream.org/)

Μια πρόσφατη καταχώρηση στη μπλογκόσφαιρα για το μουντιάλ προσθέτει άλλη μια διάσταση στο θέμα μας. Ο Κωστής Κουρέλης, στην καταχώρηση του οποίου αναφέρομαι, μας προσκαλεί να σκεφτούμε το ποδόσφαιρο όχι σαν ένα «ξένο» σπορ στην Αμερική αλλά σαν ένα σπορ του οποίου η σπονδυλική στήλη (οι παίκτες δηλαδή) είναι άμμεσα συνδεδεμένη με το φαινόμενο της μετανάστευσης, δηλαδή με το «ξένο» στην Αμερική που επαναπροσιορίζεται σαν εθνικό.

Ο Κωστής ανατρέχει στις οικογενειακές καταβολές των παικτών της εθνικής Αμερικής αναδεικνύοντας τις κατά κόρο μεταναστευτικές ρίζες ή εμπειρίες τους. Μαθαίνουμε ότι ο Benny Feilhaber γεννήθηκε στην Βραζιλία, ότι οι γονείς του Oguchi Onyewu προέρχονται από την Νιγηρία, ενώ ο Clint Dempsey έμαθε ποδόσφαιρο παίζοντας με Μεξικανούς μετανάστες στο Τέξας. Ας προσθέσουμε σε αυτήν την λίστα και μια παλαιότερη Ελληνομερικανική δόξα, τον πολύ Panayoti Alexander (Alexi) Lalas, ο οποίος ευδοκιμεί σαν ποδοσφαιρικός σχολιαστής στο ESPN και ABC.

Μια τέτοιου είδους ανάλυση της Αμερικανικής ομάδας σαν το «National Team of Immigrants» μπορεί να ξέφυγε των σχολιαστών του ESPN αλλά όχι και του Κουρέλη (kourelis.blogspot.com/).

Επιτρέψτε μου να αναφερθώ σε μια ακόμα καταχώρηση στην μπλογκόσφαιρα που φαινομενικά δεν έχει να κάνει τίποτα με το θέμα μας. Πρόκειται εδώ για μια καθημερινή σκηνή στην Αθήνα όπου κατά το πλείστον άρρενες μετανάστες και μη είναι προσηλωμένοι στα ματς του μουντιάλ. Ο γνωστός δημοσιογράφος και συγγραφέας Γκαζμέντ Καπλάνι, που συμμετέχει «αραγμένος» στην καφετερία Everest της γειτονιάς του, δεν έχει τα μάτια του κολλημένα αποκλειστικά στην οθόνη. Λειτουργεί εθνογραφικά, καταγράφοντας συμπεριφορές, στάσεις, και διαχωρισμούς στο μικρόκοσμο του δημόσιου ποδοσφαιρο-φεστιβάλ. Να πως καταγράφει «τις διαφορετικές χειρονομίες που συνοδεύουν τις ποδσφαιρικές φάσεις»: «Όταν χάνεται ένα γκολ, ελληνικά, συνοδεύεται με μούντζα ή σταυροκόπημα. Αλβανικά με μια κίνηση του χεριού που σημαίνει <Αϊ στον διάβολο>. Οι άραβες μετανάστες χτυπούν το μέτωπο ή το στήθος τους» (tanea.gr/default.asp?pid=10&ct=13&artID=4579742).*

Υπάρχει βέβαια μια οφθαλμοφανής διαφορά μεταξύ των δύο παραπάνω καταστάσεων. Στην πρώτη οι «μετανάστες» είναι μέσα στο γήπεδο, οι κεντρικοί ήρωες· ενώ στη δεύτερη είναι έξω, ούτε καν κομπάρσοι. Στην πρώτη οι «μετανάστες» είναι η εθνική, στην δεύτερη ίσως και να μη θεωρούνται καν μέλη του έθνους.

Το να συγκρίνουμε βέβαια αυτές τις καταστάσεις θα ήταν άτοπο χωρίς να λάβουμε υπ΄όψιν μας τις ριζικά διαφορετικές ιστορίες της μετανάστευσης σε Αμερική και Ελλάδα. Αλλά ποιός ξέρει. Με την αλλαγή της μεταναστευτικής πολιτικής στην Ελλάδα, είναι δυνατόν στο μέλλον ταλέντα με ονόματα όπως «Τζαμίλ» και «Ογκόυα–Σοφοκλής» να λαμπρύνουν την εθνική φανέλλα· να σκοράρουν σωρηδόν χωρίς άδικα να τους ελέγχει η κοινωνία–διαιτητής σαν οφφσάιντ. Αμήν γιατί και goal, και σκληρή δουλειά, και διακρίσεις χρειαζόμαστε.

Ο χρόνος θα δείξει.

* Για περαιτέρω σκέψεις για την γλώσσα των εκφράσεων και την μεταφορική σημασία του ποδοσφαίρου δέστε, opinionator.blogs.nytimes.com/2010/06/16/a-world-cup-mentality/?hp

Quotation: Narrating America–University Libraries Amidst Cornfields

From the point of view of Tony Judt, a Briton:

“America was thus intensely familiar–and completely unknown. Before coming here, I had read Steinbeck, Fitzgerald, and some of the extraordinary short-story writers of the South. Between this and a diet of 1940s-era film noir, I certainly had visual images of the United States. But nothing cohered. Moreover, born like most Europeans in a country I could cross on foot in a matter of days, I had absolutely no grasp of the sheer scale and variety of the place.

...

Since that first transcontinental drive I have crossed the cuntry seven times. Old established settlements–Cheyenne, Knoxville, Savannah–have continuity on their side. But who could love present-day Houston, Phoenix, or Charlotte? Desolate heaps of office buildings and intersections, they bustle misleadingly from nine to five before dying at dusk. Ozymandias-like, such exurbations will sink back into the marshland or desert whence they arose once the water runs out and gasoline prices them out of existence.

...

By far the best thing about America is its Universities. Not Harvard, Yale, e tutti quanti: though marvelous, they are not distinctively American–their roots reach across the ocean to Oxford, Heidelberg, and beyond. Nowhere else in the world, however, can boast such public universities. You drive for miles across a godforsaken midwestern scrubscape, pock-marked by billboards, Motel 6s, and a military parade of food chains, when–like some pedagogical mirage dreamed up by nineteenth-century English genleman–there appears…a library! And not just any library: at Bloomington, the University of Indiana boasts a 7.8-million-volume collection in more than nine hundred languages housed in a magnificent double-towred mausuleum of Indiana limestone.

A little over a hundred miles northwest across another empty cornscape there hoves into view the oasis of Champaigne-Urbana: an unprepossessing College town housing a library of over ten million volumes. Even the smallest of these land grant universities–the University of Vermont at Burlington, or Wyoming’s isolated campus at Laramie–can boast collections, resources, facilties, and ambitions that most ancient European establishments can only envy.

The contrast between the university libraries of Indiana or Illinois and the undulating fields almost visible from their windows illustrates the astonishing scale and variety of the American inland empire: something you cannot hope to grasp from afar. A few miles south of Bloomington’s cosmopolitan academic community lies the heartland of the old Ku Klux Klan, much as the peerless literary holdings of the University of Texas sit implausibly amidst the insularity and prejudice of the hill country that surrounds them. To the outsider, these are unsettling juxtapositions.

Americans take such paradoxes in their stride. It is hard to imagine a European university recruiting a professor–as I was once encouraged to consider a university near Atlanta–on the grounds that the nearby international airport would allow you to ‘escape’ with ease. A displaced European academic, beached in Aberystwyth, would avoid drawing attention to the fact. Thus, whereas Americans are shamellessly confessional–‘How on earth did I end up in Cheyenne State U.?’–a comparably isolated Brit would bleat mournfully of the sabbatical he spent at Oxford”

Tony Judt, 2010. “Voyage Home, ” The New York Review of Books Vol. LVII, No. 9:29–30.