When you shoot someone who is fleeing, it's not self-defense. It's an execution.
Stephen CarterRead
To be black and an intellectual in America is to live in a box. On the box is a label, not of my own choosing.
Interpretation
What this quote means
The quote reflects the limitations and stereotypes faced by Black intellectuals in America.
Stephen Carter's quote highlights the constraints and societal labels placed on Black individuals, particularly those who are intellectuals. It suggests that being identified as both Black and an intellectual comes with predefined expectations and confines, limiting personal identity and choice in how one is perceived by society. This commentary sheds light on the intersection of race and intellectualism, emphasizing the struggle against imposed identities.
Themes
BlackIntellectualIdentitySocietyLabels
In practice
Example use cases
During a lecture on racial identity, this quote could serve to illustrate the challenges faced by Black scholars.
More from Stephen Carter
All quotes βIn real life there are indeed black people who have been in the middle class for generations, but in entertainment it's as if they don't exist.
Stephen CarterRead
Teaching civility is an obligation of the family.
Stephen CarterRead
Similar quotes
One drink is to many for me and a thousand not enough.
Brendan BehanRead
Well, we think that time "passes," flows past us, but what if it is we who move forward, from past to future, always discovering the new? It would be a little like reading a book, you see. The book is all there, all at once, between its covers. But if you want to read the story and understand it, you must begin with the first page, and go forward, always in order. So the universe would be a very great book, and we would be very small readers.
Ursula K. Le GuinRead
Character in a saint means the disposition of Jesus Christ persistently manifested.
Oswald ChambersRead
The dream might have been more than a dream. It was as if a door in the wall of reality had come ajar... and now all sorts of unwelcome things were flying through.
Stephen KingRead
If you're living with a scientist, you see the world differently than you do with a humanist. It's in some ways very subtle, the differences in perceiving reality.
Joyce Carol OatesRead
We lose many things simply out of our fear of losing them.
Paulo CoelhoRead