The Future of the Race: Gates, West, and Du Bois's Talented Tenth

Introduction: Du Bois and the Talented Tenth

Henry Louis Gates and Cornel West's The Future of the Race is an exploration and reflection on W.E.B. Du Bois's ideas surrounding the African-American predicament in America, from education to community life. Du Bois, heralded as one of the most influential American scholars of the twentieth century, emphasized the need for the educated and affluent to assist those less fortunate. He believed that the top ten percent of the race — measured in terms of education and socioeconomic status — should dedicate themselves to helping the remainder, an idea he called "The Talented Tenth." Gates and West, both admirers of Du Bois, show how his ideas can be translated into a modern context to address the problems facing the Black community. They also, however, identify internal flaws in "The Talented Tenth."

Their conclusions are not definitive. They do not claim to have all the answers to the problems within the Black community, nor do they present Du Bois's framework as the ultimate solution. They simply engage in an examination of the African-American situation and the modern approaches to addressing it.

Gates's Personal Account of Race at an Ivy League University

Gates and West write separate essays contained within the book. Gates focuses on his personal experiences dealing with racial issues during his four years at an Ivy League university. He describes those years as somewhat contradictory. The environment, shaped in part by the civil rights changes of the 1960s, was being restructured to be more welcoming to African-American and female students. However, Gates believes that behind the school's "good intentions" was an internal drive to preserve the elite, predominantly white identity the institution had long maintained. He felt that African-American students were never truly able to escape their stereotypes.

Gates writes: "If we weren't crushed in the dialectic over what was 'black' and what was 'blacker,' then we were crushed by those bored administrators and jaded teachers who could not see the longing and the impatience to learn buried deep behind the particular mask that each of us chose to wear" (51).

The university represented a genuine opportunity for Gates and his peers, but it was not the fully objective experience he believes it should have been. The color of his skin shaped how others judged him — including, at times, fellow African-American students. He describes being evaluated by teachers as an intelligent individual given his demographic, a qualifier that undermines genuine recognition. Gates does not wish to conceal his identity — he embraces it — but he insists on a fundamental right to individuality that was routinely denied to him and his peers.

West's Essay on Responsibility and the African-American Predicament

West's essay engages more directly with Du Bois and the concept of the Talented Tenth. West emphasizes that educated African-Americans carry a responsibility to assist those who are less fortunate, and he argues that the freedom of the individual cannot be fully realized until the freedom of the race has been achieved. He does not criticize the African-American community so much as the circumstances that produced its struggles. West writes:

"Like any other group of human beings, black people forged ways of life and ways of struggle under circumstances not of their choosing. They constructed structures of meaning and structures of feeling in the face of the fundamental facts of human existence — death, dread, despair, disease, and disappointment" (79).

He continues: "The African-American predicament resulted from the African and American character of black people's attempts to sustain their mental sanity and spiritual health, social life and political struggle in the midst of a slaveholding, white supremacist civilization that viewed itself as the most enlightened, free, tolerant, and democratic experiment in human history" (79).

Conclusion: Toward Equality and Community Uplift

Gates and West celebrate the ideas of Du Bois, yet they also recognize the difficulties involved in realizing his vision. They believe strongly that the African-American community deserves better. They argue that Americans of all backgrounds — and especially educated African-Americans — must work harder to advance equality and opportunity in the country's neglected communities. Their book does not offer a blueprint, but it offers something equally valuable: an honest, searching engagement with a question that remains as urgent today as it was in Du Bois's time.

Works Cited

Gates, Henry Louis, and Cornel West. The Future of the Race. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1996.