Racism in 'Passing'

It has been speculated that racism has been around for at least 3,000 to 8,000 years (P.Trivedi, 2001). Throughout the centuries racism has grown and mutated as if exposed to huge doses of radiation or as if it were the influenza virus changing as it grows in strength. At the beginning of the 17^th century CE, North America, with its relatively short history, embarked on the marred road of racism against Africans.

In 1619, the first Africans arrived in Jamestown via a Dutch War ship. The Africans were captured from a Spanish ship and it was questionable whether they were slaves or Indentured servants. Their marital status and a year associated to their names, used to denote the end of a servant's term, were not indicated on records from gatherings even though records of 1623 and 1624 have them listed as servants and even later records have increasing numbers of 'free' blacks, some of which were even assigned land. By 1640, one African, John Punch, had been declared a slave because he was non-Christian rather than black, but within one generation, race would become the defining characteristic of enslaved Virginians, after all one could change ones religion (PBS, 1998).

Up until 1660, due to a lack of jobs, laborers from England were used to clear fields and, plant and harvest crops. But the Great Plague reduced England's population, reducing the price of tobacco and a terrible fire in London destroyed much of the city and created new jobs for construction workers in London leaving the Virginians to look elsewhere, toward Africa, for their labor needs as the Spanish and Portuguese have done for more than a century at that point. The population of blacks grew exponentially over the next 150 years from 23 in 1625, 300 in 1650 and by 1700, over 1000 Africans were arriving at the colony every year. (PBS, 1999).

The English for the most part viewed the trading of human lives with a certain degree of contempt; however, with increasing labor demands because of sugar plantation growth their views changed and the English government from 1660 unsuccessfully tried to monopolize the slave trade. In 1698, Parliament removed monopolies and the amount of Africans transported on English ships increased dramatically to over 20,000 slaves per year and by the beginning of the 18^th century England led the world in trafficking slaves (PBS, 1999).

In 1705, Africans had become the dominant race for enslavement not only fueled by a seemingly limitless amount of Africans, but also because they were black which made identification easier than their white counterparts. At this point declarations in Virginia removed the slave's right to have disputes with slave owners judged before the court. These codes of 1705 ensured that slave owners could, free of reprimand, break the most rebellious of slaves even if the punishment inflicted upon the slave was death (PBS, 1999).

By 1780, mainland colonies had imported 250,000 slaves however the overall black population was 576,000 due to better nourishment and less exposure to disease enabling higher slave births over deaths (Foreign Policy Research Institute, 1995). Between 1790 and 1860, the slave population increased from 689,000 to 3,954,000 (New York Life Insurance Company, 2004) even though in 1787 slavery was made illegal by the North Western states. In 1808 Congress was allowed to ban the slave trade which promoted natural born slaves. By the end of the Civil War, the Thirteenth Amendment abolished slavery throughout the United States. June 19^th 1865 when 250,000 Texan slaves found out the Civil War had ended 2 months earlier, slavery in the United States effectively ended (Infoplease, 2000).

Because importing slaves into the US was illegal, slave owners allowed their slaves to live in family cabins and observe family connections. Millions of African Americans endured slavery and a viable African-American culture emerged mainly in response to slavery as an institution with the black family, its foundation. To cope with the strains and pressures of slavery, the enslaved African-Americans turned to religion with its emotional classless, irrelevant of race salvation, its singing, its fervor, its rebirth and its baptisms. In addition slave owners who embraced Christianity allowed their African slaves to attend white churches if they sat apart from and took communion at separate tables from the whites (New York Life Insurance Company, 2004).

Within the confines of slavery, blacks practiced new art forms, new music and practiced a new Creole English. Whites banned the use of drums attempting to keep enslaved Africans from communicating with each other. Dance and music substituted hand clapping, body slapping, tapping the feet and rhyming shouts to accompany jigs, shuffles, struts and back step dances in an effort to reproduce the rhythms and cadences of African drumming. They invented gourd fiddles, banjos, bows, bells and the bones and musical expression focused on worshiping, funerals, weddings and social events. Freedom and liberation became the themes behind the moving lyrics of the sad and jubilant style of music that soon became the basis of modern day blues and jazz music, one of the world's most original art forms (New York Life Insurance Company, 2004).

Escaping slavery was very popular amongst slaves with an estimated 50,000 runaways per year. Slaves became runaways to avoid harsh punishments, reunite with family, visit husbands or wives, or because their dignity had been affronted or insulted, but very few actually ran away to escape to free northern states or Canada. In the south, every town had special jails for captured runaways. Every newspaper not only carried numerous ads which identified their color, size, gender, age and physical markings, their attitude, what their motives for running were, where they were likely to be heading, but also listed those slaves recently captured and confined to jail. Captured runaway slaves whose owners did not recover them from the jail within a short period of time would be sold in a public auction (New York Life Insurance Company, 2004).

In 1860, approximately 262,000 African Americans or 6.2 percent of all southern blacks were free. Many of the South's free blacks, as much as 75% in the lower South, were mixed racially, having a white father or white grandfather due to forced or illicit sex between the white owner and their female slaves. Common was the freeing of slave women who gave birth to slave owners' children even though the children sometimes were enslaved until they reached adulthood. Some owners freed their black families after the owner's death and most whites at that time deemed a gift, freedom for blacks, rather than a right deserved as humans. A small minority of free blacks owned slaves. One Mississippian free black barber, William Johnson, used the white town guard to punish his slaves and related publically to his slaves as any other slave master would and secretly taught his slaves to read, write, think and understand their world and although he was a free man, Johnson lived in a world where it was assumed that blacks were inferior and better off as slaves. (New York Life Insurance Company, 2004).

After the Civil War and the Reconstruction (1865 to 1876) there ascended upon the south over 100 years of segregation, racial violence, lynching, and disfranchisement and the advent of the Jim Crow laws that mandated segregation in all public facilities and systematic economic, educational and social disadvantages for "separate but equal" black Americans. These laws imposed institutionalized segregation of restrooms, restaurants, cinemas, transportation, schools, military and government and public places in general.

Racism began to flourish from many different viewpoints. In the South, blacks represented the Confederate's defeat and white Democrats, threatened by African Americans who exercised their new rights, imposed segregation laws in an effort to protect their former dominant status over blacks. A common mindset in the early 20^th century took for granted anti-Black sentiment because bigotry was so widespread. In the 1920s, the Klu Klux Klan had 500,000 members and lynching was commonplace. By 1925, it had 5,000,000 members and began to spread to the north-eastern cities of Chicago, Cleveland and New York. Segregation was in full swing all over America, Asians were banned from entering the US entirely and non-whites were not respected at all. Poorer whites resented Negroes and if a Negro was considered uppity or higher in class than the whites then they were tarred and feathered or lynched.

The period from 1920 to 1930 has been called the "Roaring Twenties" and America enjoyed massive prosperity after the Great War due to a mobilized work force, massive raw material and high tariffs on foreign goods. America gave subsidies to some industries and Americans bought American products increasing profits which in turn provided more jobs, better pay, more consumer goods and better mass production. In 1908, a car cost $850 and by 1925 it cost $290. Food was plentiful and cheap, Americans had a high standard of living, they bought houses through mortgages and filled them with consumer goods and parked their cars in front of their houses. The 20s was also known as the "Jazz Age", littered with vaudeville acts, radio stations flourished being paid for by advertisers, and movies became the most popular form of entertainment in the US. In 1927, "The Jazz Singer" became the first movie with sound and starred Al Jolson who is credited with introducing white audiences to African-American music and is known for fighting against anti-black discrimination. Indeed racism has many different flavors as Al Jolson was the only white man allowed into an all black nightclub in Harlem (Wikimedia Foundation, Inc., 2001).

The New Negro Movement or The Harlem Renaissance of the 1920s brought literature littered with an influential matter-of-fact racism that some of us today find surreal. One of the Authors of the period, Nella Larsen, wrote "Passing" in 1929 close to the end of the New Negro Movement. This paper will examine some of the different types of racism accumulated out of centuries of institutionalized racism found in her book which dominates this book's subject matter. No matter how much you tried to evade the apparent racism of the time, to write something that had any semblance of reality to the time period, no matter what race you were, would have to have references in some form or another to the 'racism-of-the-day' considering how entrenched what we consider racism today was in the 1920s.

Racism in Passing

Passing by Nella Larsen begins with one of the protagonists of the story browsing through her daily mail when she comes across a mysterious, out-of-place from her ordinarily direct mail, a letter that before she even opened it, transports her back to a time in her life she does not think of a lot anymore, a time she had all but forgot, a time that no longer exists. Upon further examination her instinctive suspicions were correct. Irene Westover had received mail from Clare Kendry. Passing has many examples of various types of racism, some which are more apparent than others, as well as, some that are the result of racism itself. At this point it becomes apparent that Nella Larsen is communicating a racist attitude that blacks have towards other blacks that forsake their heritage and race. Internal Racism

Internal racism, as I call it, is when you are discriminated against by people in your own race. Some discriminate against you because you are too dark or too light, but to me this is racial discrimination or confused racial discrimination because the bottom line is they think you are a different race. To me internal racism is when you discriminate against your own race, that is if I did not like whites and I was white, then I try to be 'not white' or because I have discriminated against my own race and I am not alone, that there is a group that discriminates against their own race and I am categorized to be in this group. I become one of 'them' and now I am discriminated against because I am in that group. This racism is arguable, that is it can be considered hatred or retaliatory to my beliefs in the first place. All the same, to me, it is racism of a form.

"...An extravagantly phrased wish to see her again. Well, she needn't and wouldn't, Irene told herself, accede to that. Nor would she assist Clare to realize her foolish desire to return for a moment to that life which long ago, and of her own choice, she had left behind her."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 173)

There seems to be resentment towards Clare from Irene that Clare has left her confines of being a black woman by passing off as a white woman and in the process has forsaken blacks because for one reason or another. Why a black woman in that time period would try to pass off as white is a product of the institutionalized racism of the time which imposed social, economic and social disadvantages unfairly upon blacks as well as other races.

"....haven't you ever thought of 'passing'? [...] No. Why should I? And so disdainful was her voice and manner that Clare's face flushed and her eyes glinted....."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 190)

Irene uncontrollably displays her true feelings in regard to this matter of passing off as white and forsaking your own race. She finds it hard to believe that some are proud of their accomplishments as if something everyone would happily display in their trophy case. Irene does not share the same feelings in regard to this as Clare does.

"... a girl she had known, who had done this rather dangerous and, to Irene Redfield abhorrent thing successfully and had announced herself well satisfied, ..."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 190)

Many will disagree with me that the following quote is racism, but to me it conveys the more complex effects of being racist. The tiny details of what you say convey the largest values of what you believe and the fact that Irene finds herself outnumbered by what she abhors signifies that although she tolerates these 'types' she truly is racist towards them.

"...Great goodness! Two of them...."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 194)

Any and all forms of racism carry with them psychological affects that effect not only the people that are being discriminated against but also affect the people that harbor racist attitudes. In this next quote Irene feels the effects that she herself imposes upon the objects of her racism, isolation and in her isolation she begins to questions herself in regard to what is right and what is wrong, the guilt of racism.

"...a feeling of being outnumbered a sense of aloneness, in her adherence to her own class and kind; not merely in the great thing of marriage, but in the whole pattern of her life as well...."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 195)

Even Gertrude who has already be grouped to be in a different group than Irene harbors racist attitudes against blacks perceived to have abandoned "their" race.

"...Gertrude shrieked with laughter - 'Claude Jones!' - and launched into the story of how he was no longer a Negro or a Christian but had become a Jew....."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 198)Institutionalized Racism

One of the more common forms of racism found in Passing is that of institutionalized racism. This form of racism results when any organization, whether government, corporate or academic, treats someone differently based on some character trait a person possesses. Nella Larsen exposes the reader to an example of institutionalized racism early in the novel on its seventh page.

"...And gradually there rose in Irene a small inner disturbance, odious and hatefully familiar. She laughed softly, but her eyes flashed before her very eyes.

Did that woman, could that woman, somehow know that here before here very eyes on the roof of the Drayton sat a Negro?"

(Larsen, 2001, p. 178)

If written today, this passage would be interpreted as conceited, that Negroes are more than normal; they are special and deserve recognition if you find yourself in their presence. However, this passage was written in the 1920s and its meaning is that Negroes are not allowed in the Drayton as it is a public place and segregation laws prevent Negroes from being in there legally. The fact that a Negro would have the audacity to patronize the Drayton in the first place would be shocking to the white populace of the time. Nella Larsen's hatefully adjective sums up Negroes attitude towards this institutionalized racism. That she found it funny for a second and then her eyes flashed somewhat unwillingly conveys that this institutionalized racism was an utter reality for Negroes during this time period. Another example of institutionalized racism can be found when Irene worries about being ejected from the Drayton.

"...It wasn't that she was ashamed of being a Negro, or even of having it declared. It was the idea of being ejected from any place, even in the polite and tactful way in which the Drayton would probably do it, that disturbed her."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 179)

The manner in which Irene contemplates being removed from a place where her only crime would be the color of her skin is the direct result of institutionalized racism in the form of segregation. This concept of not being allowed somewhere in America because of your skin color today and that this was a reality to Negroes in the 20^Th century is hard to grasp. To think that people had to defend themselves because of skin color to a white person embarrasses me as a white person to understand the limitless hatred and ignorance white people were capable of. The fear of this preponderance of ignorance was paramount.

"...Suppose the woman did know or suspect her race. She couldn't prove it."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 179)

"Pardon me." The woman said pleasantly, "but I think I know you!"

(Larsen, 2001, p. 179)

As seen in this second quote above, even the most sincere of questions could become a double-edged knife used to spew hatred from whites to blacks and keep Negroes in a constant defensive state expecting the worst in any situation. This type of psychological abuse is also a result of institutionalized racism.

"...What white girls had she known well enough to have been familiarly addressed as 'Rene' by them?"

(Larsen, 2001, p. 179)

Put into context today, one would have to think that there were not many white people where Irene grew up. Put into the context of the 1920s, black girls did not and could not associate with white girls.

In order to facilitate racism one needs to dig deep into the psyche of the society facilitating racism. For early America one of the most entrenched forms of racism was in the form of religious persecution. For religion did not have to justify itself but merely rationalize some obscure passage from the bible to suit their own needs and that it did. The following passage refers to the cursed Ham and his sons. In earlier times, slave masters justified their actions so as to get into heaven by referencing that they were only enforcing what was supposed to be enforced according to the Bible.

"...weren't sure if the good God hadn't intended the sons and daughters of Ham to sweat because he had poked fun at old man Noah once when he had taken a drop too much. I remember the aunts telling me that that old drunkard had cursed Ham and his sons for all time."

(Larsen, 187)

So deeply was justification that segregation and racism was the right thing to do that people that were discriminated against could also believe that this racism was justified. This quote could also be understood from a perspective that subconsciously Clare, herself, was racist towards her own race for the same reasons whites were racist against them.

"...I was determined to get away, to be a person and not a charity or a problem, or even a daughter of the indiscreet, Ham...."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 188)

Ridiculous questions tend to have legitimate meanings when racism is involved. On first glance one might think "shouldn't he regret his marriage because Gertrude and he don't get along or do not love each other?"

"...had he ever regretted his marriage because of Gertrude's race? Had Gertrude?..."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 195)

But upon further consideration of the times, in understanding of how this institutionally racist society will treat them, their family, their children or how they are treated professionally in work or socially, or how they are treated by their families and friends and the constraints put upon their natural interactions as a married couple, then the ridiculousness of the question tends to get lost and the gravity of the question gains a footing.

Nella Larsen's portrayal of Clare's husband John is quickly summed up in the first two words he utters:

"....'Hello, Nig' was his greeting to Clare....".

(Larsen, 2001, p. 200)

John is the perfect example of the ill effects of institutionalized racism. His greeting however cheery and, to him, none confrontation shows the extreme effects of Institutionalized racism and an apparent lack of critical thinking on his part. His 'nig' greeting is meant to convey a negative idea that his wife is getting darker, that being dark is "not all right" just as Clare, herself, worried about Margery, her daughter, being dark and thus not being all right. He is the perfect cog; the perfect malleable piece of clay needed to successful implement institutionalized racism. John is a follower, a paddler that does not create waves. John does not think anything other than what he is told to think. In a nutshell, he is ignorant and is being used my Nella Larsen as racism's poster child.

"...But I declare she's getting darker and darker. I tell her if she don't look out she'll wake up one of these days and find she's turned into a nigger....."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 200)

The ignorance of John Bellew cannot be exaggerated as the joke is on him that not only has his wife "turned into a white person" but he has been married to a Negro for quite some time. Again the effects and requirements of institutionalized racism shines via John Bellew, racism's poster child of 1929.

"...'Oh, no, Nig,' he declared, 'nothing like that with me. I know you're no nigger, so it's all right. You can get as black as you please as far as I am concerned, since I know you're no nigger. I draw the line at that. No niggers in my family. Never have been and never will be.'...."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 201)

Why is it so bad if he is married to a Negro? Because. That's why. John Bellew is the product of generations of bigots and ignorance. It's bad because the rest of society says so and not because there is a real problem with it. He knows she is no Negro just goes further to convey a predominate ignorance behind institutionalized racism where it followers need no justification for the reasons they do what they do. The fact that John Bellows states that Negroes give him the creeps goes a far way in dismissing everything he has to say considering he, being the only white in a room of four, is not experiencing the creeps being amongst of the black scrimy devils.

"...'You got me wrong there, Mrs. Redfield. Nothing like that at all. I don't dislike them, I hate them. And so does Nig, for all she's trying to turn into one. She wouldn't have a nigger maid around her for love nor money. Not that I'd want her to. They give me the creeps. The black scrimy devils.'..."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 202)

Again, John Bellew being the representative of racism in the novel is portrayed justifiably ignorant as well as totally out of touch with the reality of the origins of his wife nullifying any argument he might have for his racial beliefs. Further his reasons for his beliefs are groundless and hearsay. He fits the perfect profile required for institutionalized racism to be able to grab a foothold in any society.

"...'Thank the Lord, no! And never expect to! But I know people who've known them, better than they know their black selves. And I read in the papers about them. Always robbing and killing people. And,' he added darkly, 'worse.'..."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 202)

Institutionalized racism's greatest tool, propaganda, has effectively manifested that of which it exists solely to manifest, ignorance, hate and a powerless army ready to propagate anything that the institution and powers to be wishes to propagate.

"Coming place, South America, if they ever get the niggers out it. It's run over-"

(Larsen, 2001, p. 203)

Institutionalized racism has infiltrated all aspects of John Bellew's psyche to the point that his belief system values have been modified to mirror those of the current establishments.

"...John Bellew, most certainly was as undisturbed within as without..."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 204)

The fact that lynch mobs still prevail are indicative of institutionalized racism and because Irene does not want to her children to hear about them, which they have talked about before is fact that lynching is commonplace and not a rare occurrence.

"At dinner Brian spoke bitterly of a lynching that he had been reading about in the evening paper."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 262)

Irene chooses to pretend that institutionalized racism is the way it is, without conveying to her children that it is wrong, in fact she wishes to shield them from any form of exposure to it. She cannot and in the following quote, it becomes that Negroes are not safe from the rampages of systematic racism.

"...'Dad, why is it that they only lynch colored people?'

'Because they hate'em, son.'..."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 262)

Irene is content with her ability to shield her children from the effects of racism; after all she can pass as white and enjoy the benefits of not being black when she chooses. Brian has a more realistic and morbid attitude towards racism and prefers to prepare his children for the inevitable onslaught of a society fueled by institutionalized racism.

"... They'd better find out what sort of thing they're up against as soon as possible..."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 263)

Stereotypical Racism

Stereotypical racism is prejudice and discrimination used to generalize a group or race in any manner that conveys that the perpetrator of the stereotype is not intelligent. The perpetrator can be manipulated into believing anything whether it can be backed up or not with solid facts. Stereotypical racism can have negative or positive results even though most of the time negative results are focused on more than positive results. In Passing Irene ponders:

"...White people were stupid about such things ..."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 178)

Here Irene groups all white people as stupid because they could not recognize when a black person was passing off as white. Oddly enough as she ponders if this white person could tell if she was a Negro or not she failed to notice that this white person was in fact a Negro gaining admittance herself into the 'stupid white person' group.

"...Never, when she was alone, had they even remotely seemed to suspect that she was a Negro."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 178)

At this point, Irene introduces us to the hypocrisy of racism in a manner that informs us that perhaps everyone of us tend to be racist in some form, or that racism is by our nature, natural. Here Irene indirectly states that she, too, passes off being white whether intentional or accidently. Earlier she conveys her disdain for blacks that pass off as white and in particular Clare.

"You'd be surprise, Rene, how much easier that is with white people than with us."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 187)

Here we see that issues that concern Negroes are not the same issues that Whites are spending efforts on and solely because if a white choose to pursue or marry a Negro, then legally they would be allowed to, however, I am sure whites that did were discriminated against by perhaps not only whites but blacks as well.

In this next quote John Bellew shows the resulting effects of institutionalized racism by hurling stereotypical statements to his wife who he loved for several years with no problems until now when it becomes apparent to him that his wife is a Negro. He loves his wife and always has but he has been conditioned to hate for hates sake. Right until the end, he never realizes his own deep level of ignorance solidifying his caricature perfectly, that, of the consummate racist

"So you're a nigger, a damned dirty nigger!" his voice was a snarl and a moan, an expression of rage and of pain..."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 271)

Colorism

Benefitting economically because more opportunities are afforded you because you are fairer or not as black or dark is colorism and is usually practiced amongst races or ethnic groups. A different type of colorism is called pigmentocracy where groups of a race or ethnic group who are fairer skinned discriminate against their own race if they are darker (Wikipedia, 2001).

Clare and Gertrude both display forms of colorism however it stems from the goals of having a better life because of the effects of institutional racism. Clare and Gertrude both are afraid of having dark or black children. Gertrude fears for how her children will be treated by whites and blacks while Clare fears that she will be exposed for what she has been hiding from her husband. Both fears are dependent upon the results of a society that promotes institutionalized racism.

"... for fear that she might be dark, Thank goodness, she turned out all right..."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 197)

Additionally you can see that to Clare being dark means that Margery, her daughter "would not turn out all right".

"...But, of course, nobody wants a dark child. Her voice was earnest and she took for granted that her audience was in entire agreement with her...."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 197)

In the above quote Clare's colorism is not only overt but she feels that her racist beliefs are the predominant beliefs of not only whites but blacks too.

Irene tends to be the only one of the three who is proud to have to have remained faithful to her race. However, Gertrude's response only further exemplifies that she has been totally influenced and given in to the racism that is rampant in society.

"... One of my boys is dark....

Gertrude jumped as if she had been shot at. Her eyes goggled. Her mouth flew open. She tried to speak but could not immediately get the words out. Finally she managed to stammer. 'Oh! And is your husband, is he---is he---er----dark too?'..."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 198)

Black Supremacy

Throughout the book there are subtle examples of a black supremacy racist attitude not only conveyed by the characters but conveyed by Nella Larsen through her characters actions and thoughts.

"... It was hard to believe that even Clare Kendry would permit this ridiculing of her race by an outsider...."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 200)

Here all three characters are found squirming trying to hold back their comments towards Clare's husband, John's, greeting. They are perfectly aware of the white attitude towards blacks but still the Nella Larsen creates a scene where these three women who have been exposed to all sorts of racism their entire lives are appalled over this remark that would have been commonplace for the time and place and especially considering the company they had projected themselves to be.

Again, black supremacy overtones surface as Irene's husband, Brian, professes his disgust for the current state of society.

"...as had his dislike and disgust for his profession and his country...."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 218)

Brian can be interpreted as a disappointed person that has seen enough of the atrocities of racism, but his disgust for his country displays a certain condescending attitude that he projects onto the ruling establishment of America, Whites.

"I wanted to get them out of this hellish place years ago..."

(Larsen, 2001, p. 264)

Again Brian wants the control that he feels he is capable of having and voices his dominance over the current situation and the fact that he is superior to the situation and is not powerless other than the fact that Irene, his wife, has dominated him to his own chagrin and on one hand he is expunging himself of any blame and in the other, he is stating, in fact he is not superior although he is unaware of the dual message he is sending.Conclusion

When you analyze the elements of racism found in Nella Larsen's Passing, it becomes apparent that the highest incidents of racism are of the institutionalized type of racism and furthermore, other elements of racism such as internal, stereotype, colorism and black supremacy racism are all interrelated to institutionalized racism. Most of the other incidents of racism in Passing would not exist if it were not for the degree of institutionalized racism and are borne of society's acceptance of legal racism of the time.

Some may argue that the main theme of Passing is racism. I tend to disagree. Racism was predominating during that period of time towards Negroes as well as other races. To pen any novel and not include as a major undertone aspects of racism would be to create an unrealistic portrait of the times and perhaps be perceived as a fairy tale, totally disenfranchised from the current state of affairs of the time period. I feel the main themes of Passing were relationships, sexuality, class, death and gender issues.

When we read Passing today, in the 21^st century it is painfully obvious these aspects of racism as they tend to jump out from the pages and slap our faces. However, most of the incidents of racism so apparent to us would have been skipped over adding a sense of reality to readers of the 1930s. A mixed race colleague recently told me of an incident where he was asked if he was mixed race. Usually, he would proudly say yes, but this one day he said no, that he was Thai. He explained that he just did not have the time to have a detailed conversation about what it was like to live elsewhere, be foreign and how great it is here in Thailand. I thought nothing of it. What would someone from 1920s have thought if in this same conversation? I am sure they would have read something or another into it according to their conditioning.

The title Passing, after reading the book, has transpired from an African American term used to pass off as white, to passing away, to passing from sane to insane, to passing in the role as mother or middle class, to passing blame from one to another, to passing racism on through generations and to passing previous impassable goals as to what can be accomplished by anyone or by what anyone could imagine of others.
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