Cross-Cultural Issues for African-Americans The chapter on African-Americans primarily discusses three main cross-cultural issues. The first and most obvious one is the physical difference between white and black Americans, which is more pronounced than between Caucasians and any other minority group. This leads to an immediate, visual acknowledgment of difference and the predominance of severe racism that keeps people from being promoted, thinks they are less worthy, and makes them work harder for the same recognition. The second main cross-cultural issue seems to be one of group guilt. The chapter seems to suggest that blacks see individual whites as individually responsible for their actions, but whites seem to see blacks as responsible for the actions of all other blacks, seeing them not as individuals but as a profiled group. In addition, if some blacks are incompetent or criminal, they are all seen that way. The third and most cultural of the cross-cultural issues is one of behavior. Much is made about "acting black" and "acting white." This is the hardest issue to pin down, and deserves the most attention. Unfortunately, it seemed to receive considerably less attention that issues of perceived worth, genetic skin tone, and group perceptions.

What exactly is "acting black?" From the chapter, it appears that: "sociologists have attributed several cultural tendencies to this group: directness and spontaneity, expressiveness, sense of community, and a great regard for family and religion. Although there may be disagreement by some cultural specialists regarding these attributes." (Blank and Slipp) So the next question must be, from this article and from my experience, what do black people feel that white people (and what do white people) feel about these traits? Only a few of them are actually mentioned in the article. The article discusses how directness and expressiveness in male African-Americans is looked down upon by many more restrained white business men, or treated as instances of unacceptable aggression. The article also touches briefly on a sense that black people...

However, nowhere in the article is their any evidence that acting black by having a high regard for family or religion is a problem. I had to stop and ask myself if I had ever known an insistence where a high regard for these things had led to any cultural tension, and I couldn't find any. So I suppose the big issue here is candor and expressiveness: "Telling it like it is."
Now, I ought to digress for a moment and say that I was really pleased by some of the truth-telling in this chapter. I have honestly had many experiences where I noticed such racism. For example, as a co-worker on a very part time job in a grocery store, I noticed that whenever several employees were standing around doing nothing, the boss would come up and particularly upbraid the one black person in our midst and send him off to do clean-up or other menial jobs that "needed doing," before briefly telling us not to look so lazy and leaving us be. This came very much to mind during discussions of blacks being used primarily for grunt work and being pushed harder and criticized more than white co-workers. I certainly have seen this and other evidence of talented, dedicated black workers and students being treated differently from whites. I found this to be particularly bad in my school. Black kids were discouraged from getting good grades, and emphasis was always put on sports instead. If we did get good grades, it was a fluke, or we were "exceptional." One thing that I have just begun to think about is the way in which sometimes even other black kids or teachers would contribute to the idea that you weren't a good black person if you did well, that you had to be "ghetto" to be legitimate. This was pushed on us especially in classes. There is a lot of prejudice that all black kids misbehave, and so even when they're good the get called into the principle's office more often, and so on. Unfortunately, as the chapter mentions, there has always been a silence surrounding the issue. It is something that is in fact difficult to talk…