JOE KADI
Writing as Resistance, Writing as Love
whose world?
Hunched over on a small chair in the library’s corner, I’m invisible in my physical surroundings and on the pages I’m devouring. It’s my usual Saturday morning extravaganza—read until nauseated, stagger back to the house with an armful of books, snatch every free moment during the week, dive in.
Books shone brightly on the desolate landscape of my childhood, in ways both profound and basic. They provided fantasy, escape, a reality in stark contrast to the one around me. I especially loved reading about children with happy home lives and positive experiences with a friendly, bustling outside world. But equally profoundly, books, and the children who inhabited their pages, betrayed me by ignoring my world. Where was I? Where were workers? Arabs? Rarely to be found. And if found, never a good word. Stupid janitors who couldn’t think, idiotic truck drivers who couldn’t write, dirty Arabs who couldn’t be trusted.
And still I read, still I coveted shelves full of books, still no one could offer a better present than a book. Still I carried a deeply buried and mostly jumbled desire to carve my own niche in this world. Yet I couldn’t imagine anything other than renewing my library card year after year, reading someone else’s stories—entering this world of words and books on someone else’s terms.
Similar feelings plague me today, after working as a writer for several years. Is there a place for me? Claiming writer status remains so difficult I can barely say the words. If I manage to, I fight the impulse to cover my mouth with my hand, the exact same motion made by toothless family members. Fear and shame prompt their gestures, and my impulse. Who ever heard of someone from a general motors city, destined for secretarial work (if a great deal of luck came her way), thinking, saying, she can write books? Who ever heard of a working-class Lebanese writer?
daring tongue maneuvers
I pace back and forth in the living room of the ugly apartment my lover and I rent. We pay too much money for it and the creepy landlord never fixes things when they break. I’m getting small shocks from the shag rug and the radio’s turned up. Every day I change my mind. I’ll never turn on the news because the American media has taken lies and distortions to new levels in this particular imperialist venture taking place in the Persian Gulf. No. I’ll keep the radio on all the time because it might alleviate my feeling of utter helplessness a tiny bit.
This day, tuned into public radio, I hear someone introduce Edward Said very distinctly: “Edward Said is an Arab-American intellectual.” This astonishes me. Edward Said has ten minutes to talk about American imperialism and anti-Arab racism? Miracle of miracles. But then the full impact hits and I don’t hear anything Said says. Someone, a talk show host on national radio no less, used “Arab” and “intellectual” in the same sentence. And not as part of a comedy routine. The words catch in my chest and something tears wide open. Arab-American intellectual. Can it be possible? Do these words fit together? Can the combination work?
I’ve always understood the power of words. Certain words can be crunched together into a hard ball and flung with lightning speed. They can knock you off your feet and leave you gasping for breath. It happened to me with the word Arab. People enjoyed hurling word combinations at me—Arab whore, greasy Arab, crazy Arab—and bowling me over, day after day. I never believed anyone who said, “Sticks and stones can break my bones but names can never hurt me.” Names did hurt me.
Then, a turning point, a revelation. Words hurt; they also heal. Words jostle my insides, wake me up, jump-start my brain. Someone can place “Arab” side by side with “intellectual” and say it over the radio and the earth moves. And if I can keep my understanding of the power of words front and center while I devise my own wild mixtures, maybe I can open up worlds for people like me, maybe I can offer my writing for healing and resistance.
the importance of silence
The ropes around my ankles and wrists cut into my skin, but the tightest gag cuts across my mouth and tears into the corners. Before tying me up, my father tells me, “You’re so bad. You’re so bad.” Over and over. After he stalks out of the room and slams the door, I try to figure out what I did. I wrack my brain, but nothing comes to mind. Time crawls by. Has one hour passed, or five, or ten? Finally, my father decides—relying on some internal method I can never discern—he should undo the knots. I crawl into bed and hold myself every bit as tightly as the ropes did.
Silence is critically important. Or, more precisely, my silence is critically important. I knew that from day one. Inordinate efforts, overt and covert, went into shutting me up. Teachers rewarded quiet children. My mother told me if I didn’t have anything nice to say not to say anything at all, and she meant it. The priests who routinely ripped my body and mind apart held knives to my throat and told me they’d kill me if I ever said a word. My father tolerated me best when he had me muzzled.
All systems of oppression—from child abuse to racism to ableism—function most effectively when the victims don’t talk. Silence isolates, keeps us focusing inward rather than outward, makes perpetrators’ work easier, confuses and overwhelms. I didn’t know this as a child and teenager. I just knew I had to be quiet. The few times I managed to croak something truthful, I experienced repercussions, swift and brutal, that left no doubt about my oppressors’ intentions.
Coiled Tongues
Which tender body
shall be carved up
served on a platter
to Monsignor tonight?
Male or female?
White, yellow or brown?
Wavering at rectory door
I watched my father’s car
grow smaller.
Catholic obedience
always goes too far.
Before Monsignor devours flesh
he dresses it properly
manipulates each limb carefully.
Do clerks blanch
when selling garter belts
and black nylons
to fit 10-year-old bodies?
Are store managers
appreciative accomplices
who insist Monsignor
take generous discounts?
Mouth a final blessing.
“You Lebanese girls are so pretty.”
His voice slimed over my ribs,
anchored in.
Some words cannot be exorcised,
even with flames.
Monsignor savors flesh more
when flavored with lies.
“Yes, I liked it.”
I memorized the force
of white fingers
picking my bones clean.
Years later
I remember the children
whose eyes slid under the pew
whose tongues tangled
when Monsignor walked by.
The VanDerHagen girls
the Beneditto boys
the Lee children.
I envision priests
marking the names in ledgers
systematically recording each feeding.
Years later
at a party
someone tells a “joke”:
A newly-ordained priest
celebrates with
a lavish table.
“If this is poverty, Father,”
asks a guest,
who could have been me
who would have said it grimly
“If this is poverty, Father,
what does chastity look like?”
Times change.
Time changes.
Bony and bloody remains
on platters
metamorphize slowly,
gather force.
Now
when he poisons the room
with his presence
our eyes will rivet instead of slide
tongues coil instead of tangle.
“What does chastity look like?”
The man with the backward collar
will chew fingernail, grip chair tightly
as this new reality strikes full force:
No bodies here
for carving, serving, devouring.
Memories withstand long decades.
Sins cast long shadows.
Take heed.
Broken children coil long tongues.
Moving from Cultural Appropriation Toward Ethical Cultural Connections1
MY GRANDMOTHER trudged from the hills of rural Lebanon to the shores of the Mediterranean, carrying clothes and a derbeke.2 She and the drum survived several weeks in the steerage compartment of a large boat. No small feat. And now she’s dead, and the derbeke sits on a shelf far away from me. But I ended up with my sittee’s determination, which I’ve needed to navigate through the stormy waters of drumming.
After experiencing so much anti-Arab hatred growing up, I cut myself off from my culture as soon as I could. I tried hard to assimilate, with the attendant craziness and confusion; but thankfully, my journey into political awareness and action brought me back to my racial/cultural heritage, and in particular to its music. Hearing familiar rhythms, I found myself thinking about—and wanting—a brass derbeke with a chrome finish and intricate engraving. Just like the one my grandmother brought from Lebanon.
So my lover and I embarked on a grand search to ferret out my derbeke. It took a long time, partly because I didn’t know where to look, partly because white people’s interest in drumming hadn’t fully impacted the market. In January 1991, a year after the search began, Jan and I marched in Washington, D.C. to protest the slaughter of Arabs in the vicious outbreak of U.S. imperialism known as the Gulf War. During that weekend, alternating between grief and numbness, we chanced upon a store specializing in musical instruments from around the world. I found my derbeke.
The end of my search? No. Just the beginning. Now I needed a teacher and a community that would offer technical assistance and political respect. I attended drumming workshops, but each proved as problem-laden as my first, where I found an overwhelmingly white group of women who apparently hadn’t given much thought to the issue of playing congas or derbekes. I’m using the word “play” loosely, because even as an unskilled beginner I could tell these women didn’t know the traditional Arabic techniques and rhythms I knew simply from listening to Arabic music. Further dismay resulted when I questioned two women and discovered they didn’t know the name of their drums; they had just been drawn to the derbeke for some unknown reason and made a purchase. They spent the workshop banging happily on their drums in ways bearing no resemblance to proper derbeke-playing style.
I sat through this drumming workshop, and subsequent ones, with a familiar mix of anger and fear. Anger at the casual (mis)use by white people of important aspects of culture from various communities of color, fear that such groups would prove the only resource available and I would simply have to put up with crap in order to learn. These disheartening experiences led to another year of my derbeke gathering dust as I grew more certain I’d never find what I needed.
But after much searching, I found a wonderful teacher, Mick Labriola, as well as drumming friends/acquaintances I connect with politically and musically. Because of this, and because of my deep determination to forge ahead in spite of obstacles, drumming has proved an incredibly positive experience. I’ve re-connected with my roots. Experiencing how much beauty and importance Arabs have given the world has helped me feel pride, as opposed to shame, about being Arab.
Then there’s anger and grief. My initial experiences at drumming workshops proved common. I continually see derbekes in white people’s homes, played by white musicians, banged on at drumming circles. Many players don’t even know the name of the instrument, or where it comes from. They don’t play properly, and they don’t know traditional Arabic rhythms.
But none of this seems to raise any concern, as more and more white people jump on the drumming bandwagon. Why drumming? Why so popular? Because it’s a powerful activity? Because it’s a wonderfully communal instrument? Because it allows people to learn about other cultures through music? Most days I think these explanations provide a more positive interpretation than the situation warrants, especially when I notice the apolitical spirituality of the New Age movement embracing the concept of “getting in touch with inner rhythms” via the drums of people of color; white people dredding their hair and buying African drums; people “playing” an instrument without knowing its name.
Within these actions, I sense an imperialist attitude in which privileged people want to own segments of other people’s cultures. To me, it’s cultural appropriation, a subject I’m confused about and infuriated by. I have many questions and ideas, but few answers. The complexity of the subject lends itself more to books (not written by white people) than single essays, so be forewarned; I can’t tackle everything. I’ve tried to streamline this by focusing it around drumming, and in particular derbekes, since issues and questions relating to drumming carry over to other types of cultural appropriation.
I’ve thought long and hard about defining cultural appropriation. Culture includes any and all aspects of a community that provide its life force, including art, music, spirituality, food, philosophy, and history. To “appropriate” means to take possession of. “Cultural” appropriation means taking possession of specific aspects of someone else’s culture in unethical, oppressive ways.
While helpful, this basic definition simplifies rather than deepens. It doesn’t examine various aspects of cultural appropriation. To do that, I’ll analyze what happens when white people play derbekes incorrectly.
It seems to me those white people use derbekes perceiving them as generic, no-name drums unencumbered by hard political/historical/cultural realities, never asking themselves the questions that would uncover these realities, such as: whose music is this? What has imperialism and racism done to the people who created this music? Do I have a right to play this instrument? What kind of beliefs do I hold about Arabs? Ignoring these questions and ignoring Arab musical traditions translates into cultural appropriation—white people taking possession of Arabic culture by commandeering an important instrument and the music it produces. The derbeke and its playing style are important pieces of Arab culture, with thousands of years of history attached. To disregard that and play however one chooses whitewashes the drum, and by implication Arab culture. When stripped of its historical legacy, the drum is placed outside Arab culture, suggesting that Arab culture and history aren’t worth taking seriously; even though Arabs have created something valuable and life-enhancing in our music, that doesn’t matter. White people can and will choose to perceive the drum as ahistorical and culturally empty—a plaything that can be given whatever meaning the player chooses.
To perceive a derbeke as a plaything is to carry the privileged attitude that has wrought devastation all over our planet: “Everything is here for me to play with and use.” Whether peoples, lands, or cultures, it’s there for the grabbing. This take-take-take attitude pushed white colonizers through whole peoples and lands on the Asian, African, and American continents. Although brown, black, and yellow people filled those continents, white people perceived them as empty.
That kind of colonization continues, and new forms have evolved. The colonialist attitude has affixed itself to our music, clothing, religions, languages, philosophies, and art. I overheard a white shopper in a music store examining a derbeke. “Cool drum. I’ll take a couple.” He perceived the derbeke as an empty vessel waiting to have meaning infused into it, as opposed to an important cultural symbol/reality embodying centuries of meaning.
I don’t believe every white person who buys a derbeke holds that attitude, or that no other issues or desires are mixed in. But I do believe large and small vestiges of colonialist ideas live in many places, and it frightens and angers me. These ideas and their practice have already destroyed so many of our people and may well destroy more. Many white people don’t know they possess such a mindset, and unthinking, unexamined ignorance can cause irreparable harm.
These political questions must be raised, along with the psychological effects of cultural appropriation. Many times people of color gloss over these, possibly because we don’t want to admit the extent of our pain. I want to try.
Cultural appropriation causes me anger and grief. Anger about flagrant disregard and disrespect for me and my community, about unexamined privilege and power, about cavalier white people who use important cultural symbols/realities and turn them into no-name items. And grief, which stems from a hopeless, powerless feeling that I/my community will never get the respect and consideration we deserve, that no matter how hard we struggle, no one hears our words or heeds our demands.
Along with those responses is one that so far hasn’t been examined in our thinking and writing about cultural appropriation; for me this causes deep pain. Cultural appropriation cuts away at and undermines my basic racial identity.
It’s been hard for me to create a clear, strong identity as Arab-American. It’s been hard for me to believe I really exist as such a person, when dominant society categorically trivializes, diminishes, and whitewashes Arabs. I’ve struggled with this for years, and recently my identity has been strengthened, thanks in part to my derbekes. They help me realize I come from somewhere, my community exists, and we’ve created wonderful cultural expressions over the centuries.
When, as happens frequently, I come across the attitude that clearly says the derbeke is an empty vessel, I begin doubting myself and my community, doubting our very existence. I fight constantly against internalizing the message—if the derbeke means nothing, if it comes from nowhere, I don’t exist.
It’s impossible to examine increased derbeke sales or the increased numbers of white “shamans” without discussing multiculturalism. Strange things are happening under the guise of “honoring diversity,” because multiculturalism, as defined and practiced by white people, is partly responsible for the increase in cultural appropriation. While I’m not opposed to authentic multiculturalism, I do believe unauthentic or artificial or perverse multiculturalism simply feeds and reinforces imperialist attitudes. Examples of this abound. Young white schoolchildren aren’t taught to connect ethnically with other cultures; they’re taught to take whatever they want from other cultures and use it. White adult consumers snatch our various arts, wanting the stuff but not caring if its creators are systematically destroyed.
Given the brutal racism endemic to our society, it makes sense that much of what passes for multiculturalism is actually covert and overt cultural appropriation, actually a form of cultural genocide. As dominant white society casually buys and sells our symbols/realities, their cultural meaning is watered down and their integrity diminished. Today items from various communities of color are all the rage, but I’m not happy to see the walls of white people’s homes adorned with African masks, Asian paintings, and Native ceremonial objects. Behind the rhetoric and hype about multiculturalism and honoring diversity lurk the same attitudes of entitlement and privilege that form part of structural racism. For the most part, these white people haven’t done the work necessary to become allies of people of color. They know little or nothing about current global struggles of people of color, as we define and articulate them. They don’t engage in acts of solidarity around specific issues such as Native self-determination or Palestinian liberation. They don’t read books by radical authors of color.
Further, these white people haven’t analyzed a monster related to racism, that is, classism and the global capitalist system. All of us need to be clear about how and where and why the capitalist system fits into the picture. We need to ask critical questions. Is “multiculturalism” the latest capitalist fad? Who’s in control? Who’s benefiting? And who’s making money, now that it’s popular to hang Native dream webs on bedroom walls? Could it be people of color? Hardly. As more and more people of color are forced to live on the streets, white entrepreneurs are getting rich selling our art, music, and spirituality. Watching them profit as they exploit and appropriate our cultures, when for years we experienced hostility and scorn trying to preserve them in a racist society, is truly galling. I grew up with white people belittling and “joking” about my family’s choice of music and dancing; now I can watch those same people rush to sign up for “real” belly-dancing lessons. Taught by a white woman, of course.
Economics impact culture, as the belly dance example shows. The particular combination of racism and classism that has popularized belly dancing taught by white people has several implications for Arab-American culture. Arab dancers who can’t make a living teaching may be eventually forced to give up their serious studies of traditional dance altogether; this is one factor that eventually leads to cultural genocide. If a certain type of belly dancing becomes popular and another particular strain never catches on with white teachers, the latter could slowly disappear. Again, this factors into cultural genocide. For every cultural form happily adopted by the dominant culture’s racist and classist system, another falls by the wayside. Some expressions discarded by dominant society will continue to thrive among marginalized communities, some will be lost forever.
Further, class exploitation crosses over with racism in certain ways, and thus many people of color are working-class or working-poor. Consequently, we can’t afford to buy the now-available music, paintings, instruments, and books from our cultures. We can’t afford travel to our countries of origin. Observing white, middle-class people engaging in these activities adds yet another layer of anguish and complexity to these issues.
Recently I talked over the phone with a white, middle-class man who has traveled extensively in various Arab countries, attended Arabic language schools, and now speaks Arabic fluently. Upon discovering I was Arab-American, he began speaking Arabic to me.
As is all too usual, I got so choked up with rage I couldn’t think clearly. I said curtly, “I don’t speak Arabic,” and hung up. Next time, I have a response all planned out: “Gee, if only my grandparents hadn’t experienced so much racism and been so isolated! Then they wouldn’t have tried to assimilate. Then they would have taught us to speak Arabic. Which would be so helpful these days, now that multiculturalism is in. For those who can afford it, which of course precludes most people of color. Oh well, I hope you’re having a splendid time with it all.”
The discussion of cultural appropriation between white people and people of color is critically important, but I want to push further. If we keep the focus on relationships between colored and white, we come up with an overly simplistic analysis that ignores the fact that many people of color are just as inattentive to these issues and thus act inappropriately toward each other. It implies the only groups worth discussing are the white people and the people of color, two broad categories which are sometimes helpful but also present problems in terms of understanding the complexities of race. These simplistic categories feed into the myth that people of color constitute a monolithic group unscathed by differences of skin color, immigrant status, gender, ability, sexuality, language, class, and religion. Further, reductionist categories support the lie that we can only be discussed in relation to white people, that our only important relationships exist with white people.
A simplistic analysis of cultural appropriation minimalizes and trivializes what we as people of color from different communities do to each other, glossing over the fact that we can and do commit acts of cultural appropriation, and thus hurt each other badly. I’ve had the painful experience of watching other people of color using derbekes as no-name drums. Our racial identity doesn’t rule out unjust acts toward each other. If I were drawn to an African mask in a store and bought it without knowing where it came from, what it represents, and who made it, would that be acceptable? Of course not. I’d be committing an act of cultural appropriation as surely as any white person who did the same thing.
Our existence as people of color doesn’t mean we know much—if anything—about other communities of color. It doesn’t mean we’ve done the hard work of freeing ourselves from stereotypes and lies about other racial/ethnic groups. I’ve heard, time and again, the same kind of anti-Arab racism out of the mouths of people of color that I’ve heard from white people. Unless people of color do the same anti-racist work we want white people to do, we can’t become true allies and friends.
However, I don’t equate the actions of people of color with those of white people. There’s a difference between a white person and a person of color playing derbekes incorrectly. The white person’s actions feed into structural racism; they’re part and parcel of the systemic oppression by white people of people of color. The person of color’s actions stem, I think, from a mix of structural racism and horizontal violence in which the dominant white power structure keeps us carefully divided from each other, duplicating their mistreatment, and ignorant about the many ways our lives connect.
Even with this understanding, it still hurts when a Latino uses a derbeke as a generic drum. In some ways, because I so badly want and need solidarity from other people of color, these actions hurt more. I don’t expect as much from white people, so I’m not as shocked and hurt by their actions. But betrayal from other people of color cuts deeply.
Betrayal appears in varied forms, and I briefly want to mention sexism. Many men of color bring a problematic and divisive note to discussions of drumming and culture by insisting women can’t drum because it’s not “traditional.” I have two responses to this. First, there’s historical documentation from many cultures, including Arabic ones, of women drumming in earlier times. Second, even in relation to preserving our cultures, I find the label “traditional” almost irrelevant. If women didn’t drum in the past, why would we want to carry on with that aspect of our culture? Are the men who propose this anxious to continue every traditional cultural practice, from the most inane to the most misogynist?3 Plenty of manifestations of sexism and misogyny in Arab cultures need to be kissed goodbye.
As a person of color, I want to do more than react to oppression by white people. It’s important that, as a subject and moral agent with power in the world, I state what I want and what I consider acceptable. For starters, do I want to share cultural traditions?
There are several reasons I do. First, when healthy cultural connections occur, it’s personally and communally affirming. Someone has taken the time and energy to understand and appreciate the derbeke. She’s taken me and my community/culture seriously, and shown respect. This affirms me and helps strengthen racial identity.
Second, I’m enriched by participating in an authentic multiculturalism that involves having friends, listening to the music, learning the histories, and being allies in struggle with people from various cultures. This type of multiculturalism has, at its root, respect, thoughtfulness, a political analysis, and openness.
Third, in practical terms, I don’t know how to separate. I was born of an interracial marriage. I live in a racially mixed community and belong to organizations and groups that cut across cultures. I’ve read and listened to and integrated perspectives of people from different racial/ethnic communities. How to undo this mixing? Forget the books, the stories, the poems, the music that have become part of me? Give up friends? Return to my places of origin—which isn’t physically possible, and where I may not feel at home for other reasons? It seems foolhardy to consider this.
I support the idea of sharing across cultures, but I also believe some things should never be shared. For starters, sacred instruments, rhythms, and rituals. Yet, unbelievably, this has happened, continues to happen. Several years ago I attended a music festival where two white women planned to perform with a sacred instrument from a community of Australian indigenous people. Although an Australian aboriginal woman was present and voiced objections, it didn’t matter to the musicians. At the last minute, outcries from a larger group prevented the show. I don’t know if these two musicians used the instrument other times, but given the depth of their resistance to restriction of their “artistic freedom,” I wouldn’t be surprised if they did.
Of course, I question whether those women should have been performing at all, since their show consisted of playing instruments from various communities of color. I’m tired of seeing white people get the praise, money, and publicity from public performance. However, I can’t deal with these questions and issues here. The topic needs an essay of its own and quite possibly its own book.
Back to making and preserving connections across communities. How to make such links? And what to call them? Words carry critical weight in liberation struggles. Naming ourselves and our desires is vital. The term “ethical cultural connection” embodies my ideas. It focuses clearly on culture, on the lifeforce of a community. “Connection” speaks to a freely-chosen bonding experience between two people or two groups. The adjective “ethical” clarifies the type of connection—one based on respect, justice, and integrity.
Ethical cultural connections are comprised of respect for the community involved, a desire to learn and take action, an openness to being challenged and criticized, a willingness to think critically about personal behavior, and a commitment to actively fighting racism. These cornerstones remain the same whether I’m getting to know one Native person or buying a carving from a Native museum. They apply to people of color and white people.
I’ve come to the conclusion that I’m not opposed to non-Arabs playing derbekes if it’s done with respect, knowledge, and seriousness, and if these attitudes manifest themselves in concrete action. I want drummers to learn the derbeke’s culture and history, and the proper way to play. And to take this knowledge a step further by actively countering the imperialism, racism, and genocide Arabs experience today. It’s not enough to celebrate cultural difference by learning language, music, or history, when people’s whole worlds are at risk.
Of course, this raises a critical question. How do I know if someone’s doing those things? By watching? Maybe the person plays the derbeke correctly, maybe he knows Arab rhythms. But that doesn’t tell me how much he knows and cares about my people.
I can only know for sure if I talk to the drummer. That’s the only way any of us will know. Typing out guidelines or policing cultural events won’t do it. We need to talk—across cultures and classes. I’ve spent days and days and days writing this essay, and months pondering it, and I’ve been unable to think of any other way to know where a person stands. My analysis doesn’t help in isolation. It helps as we communicate across all racial groups—Asian (including Arabs), Latino, Native, African, and white.
And talking to one person won’t cut it. I’m sure any white person interested in assuaging her conscience could find enough white-identified Arabs to assure her whatever she does with the derbeke is okay. There are many such people in all communities—people who for whatever reasons have become so alienated from their roots and their communities that they casually approve of the worst kinds of cultural appropriation. At the music festival I mentioned earlier, participants discussed cultural appropriation several times, and it appeared the women of color shared a clear and unified response. That is, until a well-known woman of color, a superb drummer, announced from the stage that anyone who wanted a drum from whatever culture should buy it and play it. So much for solidarity.
I don’t want white people seeking out white-identified people of color to give them the stamp of approval. I want white people to talk to many people, including political activists. I want discussion around power and privilege, about who benefits from cultural appropriation and in what ways, about who will decide how cultural connections happen and what makes them ethical. I want discussion about actions and the meanings they carry.
In these discussions, participants need to take emotional reactions into account without letting them dictate the whole discussion. I’m so sick and tired of watching non-Arabs thoughtlessly pound away on derbekes, I might not notice when someone’s doing it right. I might not even care. I’m entitled to my anger, but one person’s emotions can’t set the tone and agenda for these discussions.
I believe politicized people of color and our white allies must start framing discussions with helpful guidelines that make sense to us. Discussions must be cross-cultural and focused on tough questions about racism, classism, unauthentic multiculturalism, power, and privilege. And I suggest we include the ways in which personal experience can help frame critical thinking on cultural appropriation.
Looking at the five derbekes that now grace this home, I’m struck by the connection between my drumming and my political thinking. The deeper I go with one, the deeper I go with the other. The political analysis I push myself to do translates into more meaningful drumming. Playing the derbeke helps deal with the pain I experience around vivid examples of cultural appropriation. I offer this personal example not as a “feel-good,” quick, on-the-surface remedy for oppression and cultural genocide, but rather as a somber statement of possibility. We can plumb the depths of the worst in our society while participating in meaningful cultural activities that ground us and keep hope alive.
Notes
1. Many thanks to Jan Binder for her help with this article.
2. A derbeke (pronounced der-beck-ee) is a traditional Arabic hand drum. I’ve seen several different spellings, but this is the one I prefer. The drum is also known as a dumbek (pronounced doom-beck)—there are varied spellings for that word as well.
3. Another problem with this attitude is that it feeds into the dangerous lie/myth that cultures are static and unchanging entities.