Jodi-Ann Lawrence
Professor Brim
African American Literature
March 20.2014

African American entrapment in the Double-Conciseness stigma.

Throughout my research on "Double Consciousness," I stub lame upon the founding that Dubois is the philosopher behind "Double consciousness." According to Dubois, "Double consciousness is” the presence of two apparently unconnected streams of consciousness in one individual.” This was first seen “in an Atlantic Monthly article titled “Strivings of the Negro People” in 1897. It was later republished with minor edits under the title “Of Our Spiritual Strivings” in 1903 book The Souls of Black Folk. Du Bois describes “double consciousness” as follows: “It is a peculiar sensation, this double-consciousness, this sense of always looking at one’s self through the eyes of others, of measuring one’s soul by the tape of a world that looks on in amused contempt and pity.” DuBois used the context in relation to Race, Ethnicity, and Society in the United States of America. In which I came to the understanding of this theory, African Americans do not act as how society projected as to act embedded with Darwin's theory survival of the fittest we adapt to the masculine kind in order to survive. This will help us to advance with in our society. For example: African American are known to wear their pants sagging off their rumps, even though this stereotype is true, not all of us dress as such. And this is where the “double consciousness” comes into play. Some of us African American who wants to better ourselves, and to live about the stereotyping of society, we tend to act of those who our society is more in favor of. When we talk we articulate our words, we dress with fitting clothing that is appropriate to the public and to our work environment. We act, talk and dress according to survival At the time when the concept was