Note:
Gunnar Myrdal died in 1987, less than 70 years ago.
Therefore, this work is protected by copyright,
restricting your legal rights to reproduce it.
However, you are welcome to view it on screen, as you do now.
Read more about copyright.
Full resolution (TIFF) - On this page / på denna sida - IX. Leadership and Concerted Action - 34. Accommodating Leadership - 5. Accommodating Leadership and Class
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
Below is the raw OCR text
from the above scanned image.
Do you see an error? Proofread the page now!
Här nedan syns maskintolkade texten från faksimilbilden ovan.
Ser du något fel? Korrekturläs sidan nu!
This page has never been proofread. / Denna sida har aldrig korrekturlästs.
728 An American Dilemma
tradition of a strong lower class preacher and lodge leader among Negroes.
Still, we believe that practically all upper class Negroes are leaders, some-
thing that is not true among whites. In order to understand this, several
other things must be considered.
For one thing, the Negro upper class is—^because of caste—such a small
proportion of the total Negro population* that the scarcity value of upper
class status becomes relatively high. In smaller communities only a handful
of persons have upper class status 5
in all communities they are few enough
to be in close contact with each other.
The upper class Negro is, furthermore, culturally most like the group
of whites who have social power. Under a long-range view, the social
classes represent various degrees of acculturation to dominant American
culture patterns or gradations of lag in the assimilation process.^ During
this process standards of living have been raised, illiteracy and mortality
rates have declined, the patriarchal type of family organization has made
its influence felt, and, generally, white American middle class norms and
standards have been filtering downward in the Negro people. The upper
class represents the most assimilated group of Negroes. In part, they have
status in the Negro community for the very reason that they are culturally
most like upper class whites. It is natural also that upper and middle class
whites feel most closely akin to this group of Negroes.
The attitude of whites in the Old South was, on the contrary, that the
lowly ‘‘darky” was the favored and trusted Negro, while the educated,
socially rising “Negro gentleman” was to be suspected and disliked. When
a social stratification in the Negro people first appeared during slavery, the
whole complex of legislation to suppress the free Negroes, to hinder the
education of slaves, and to check the meetings of Negroes was expressly
intended to prevent Negro individuals of a higher status from leading the
Negro masses, and, indeed, to prevent the formation of a Negro upper
class. The inclinations of white people remained much the same after the
Civil War.*^ The Jim Crow legislation followed a similar tendency."^ The
white masses even today are usually most bitter and distrustful toward
upper class Negroes.® This is still often the expressed opinion also of the
upper class whites who are in control of the political and social power in
Southern communities.’
But even in the South it has become more and more unfeasible to trust
* See Chapter 32, Section 4.
^ We are referring to assimilation away from patterns in slavery, not patterns in Africa.
See Hortensc Powderniaker, ^fter Freedom (1939), pp. 354, fassim. See also Chaptei
43, Section 1, of this book.
‘See Chapters 10, 20 and 24.
* Sec Chapter aS, Section 4.
* See Chapter 28, Section 8.
* Sec Chapter 30, Section a.
<< prev. page << föreg. sida << >> nästa sida >> next page >>
