While we are all still in the spirit after we all (hopefully) went to the IndyCar panel last night, and perhaps took a ride in the two-seater race car, I am crazy enough to bring this subject onto this blog. As I was once a racecar driver myself in a past life racing mini-sprints (World of Outlaws-type stuff, if it means anything), and still pay a good amount of attention to the racing world, I find it fascinating regarding who is actually driving the cars. If anyone can't see where I could be going with this, read on.
How I am connecting racing to multicultural poets is through the discussion of discrimination and multi-cultural perspectives. I am also trying to think about how not just non-white men, but also women, figure into the modern schematics of who has the talent to drive the car.
Take a look at NASCAR, for example. It was an offshoot of the racing world that was born out of bootlegging in the South. It was all about taking stock engine motors and making them faster, so that the moonshine would not fall into the hands of the law. Besides this goal setting the course for NASCAR to be a major sport, one has to wonder whether or not African American drivers in general have ever really played a big part in the development of not just NASCAR, but in racing in general.
In the Jim Crow South, an African American in stock car racing would've been an odd thing, and maybe even alarming to the status quo as time went on. Car racing has grown into a major sport where the status is based on who can best drive the car, and which team can better manage itself and the driver. While NASCAR has expanded as far as not being a totally "American" or male-dominated sport (take Danica Patrick and Helio Castroneves, who both came from the "big leagues" of racing), it could be argued even slightly that there is an inherent discrimination behind the mostly-white, mostly male profession of auto racing.
And as far as multi-cultural pespectives go, we 'Muricans may become more accepting of the fact that it is not only us who appreciates NASCAR or racing in general. NASCAR and European sports car racing, which is perhaps much mor embracing as far as opportunities go, has millions of fans straddling multi-cultural lines, from Argentina to Japan. Think about that as far we stand here an hour away from one of the iconic racetracks in the world.
So whenever I consider this question about minorities participating in groups that are predominately white, I receive an interesting answer. Immanuel and I reached this when we discussed Fiji's recruitment, and that we don't receive as many minorities prospects as some would like due to the fact that they don't feel comfortable in this space. And they don't feel comfortable because they aren't surrounded by very many other minorities. And they aren't surrounded by minorities because...you get where I'm going with this. It's a vicious cycle that is present in fraternities, athletics, hundreds of other groups. Personally I think it's the kind of thing that will be remedied slowly but surely as people become a little more accepting, and minorities begin to feel more comfortable in these spaces.
ReplyDeleteI really find this comment interesting because as a pretty diverse house (Kappa Sigma), many of our prospects are non-whites. We typically get many hispanic prospects because of the large population in the house. Over the passed few semesters, we have had many African-American's leave the college for various reasons. With less blacks in the house, the number of African-American prospects and visitors have been less-and-less over this time. I do feel that a limited number of certain ethnicities contributes to less participants of those ethnicities in these areas. Just like the government, many officials are caucasians, and in the NBA, the majority of the players are African-American. There may be other reasons for an ethnicities lack of participation in a subject/sport/organization-which there are-but a feeling of uncomfortableness around people who do not have similar backgrounds as you does contribute to less involvement of a certain group of people, just like woman do not play football and hispanics have minimal involvement in sports like football and basketball.
Delete