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Black Is the Body: Stories from My Grandmother's Time, My Mother's Time, and Mine
An extraordinary, exquisitely written memoir (of sorts) that looks at race--in a fearless, penetrating, honest, true way--in twelve telltale, connected, deeply personal essays that explore, up-close, the complexities and paradoxes, the haunting memories and ambushing realities of growing up black in the South with a family name inherited from a white man, of getting a PhD from Yale, of marrying a white man from the North, of adopting two babies from Ethiopia, of teaching at a white college and living in America's New England today.
"I am black--and brown, too," writes Emily Bernard. "Brown is the body I was born into. Black is the body of the stories I tell."
The storytelling, and the mystery of Bernard's storytelling, of getting to the truth, begins with a stabbing in a New England college town. Bernard writes how, when she was a graduate student at Yale, she walked into a coffee shop and, along with six other people, was randomly attacked by a stranger with a knife ("I remember making the decision not to let the oddness of this stranger bother me"). "I was not stabbed because I was black," she writes (the attacker was white), "but I have always viewed the violence I survived as a metaphor for the violent encounter that has generally characterized American race relations. There was no connection between us, yet we were suddenly and irreparably bound by a knife, an attachment that cost us both: him, his freedom; me, my wholeness."
Bernard explores how that bizarre act of violence set her free and unleashed the storyteller in her ("The equation of writing and regeneration is fundamental to black American experience").
She writes in Black Is the Body how each of the essays goes beyond a narrative of black innocence and white guilt, how each is anchored in a mystery, and how each sets out to discover a new way of telling the truth as the author has lived it. "Blackness is an art, not a science. It is a paradox: intangible and visceral; a situation and a story. It is the thread that connects these essays, but its significance as an experience emerges randomly, unpredictably . . . Race is the story of my life, and therefore black is the body of this book."
And what most interests Bernard is looking at "blackness at its borders, where it meets whiteness in fear and hope, in anguish and love."
"I am black--and brown, too," writes Emily Bernard. "Brown is the body I was born into. Black is the body of the stories I tell."
The storytelling, and the mystery of Bernard's storytelling, of getting to the truth, begins with a stabbing in a New England college town. Bernard writes how, when she was a graduate student at Yale, she walked into a coffee shop and, along with six other people, was randomly attacked by a stranger with a knife ("I remember making the decision not to let the oddness of this stranger bother me"). "I was not stabbed because I was black," she writes (the attacker was white), "but I have always viewed the violence I survived as a metaphor for the violent encounter that has generally characterized American race relations. There was no connection between us, yet we were suddenly and irreparably bound by a knife, an attachment that cost us both: him, his freedom; me, my wholeness."
Bernard explores how that bizarre act of violence set her free and unleashed the storyteller in her ("The equation of writing and regeneration is fundamental to black American experience").
She writes in Black Is the Body how each of the essays goes beyond a narrative of black innocence and white guilt, how each is anchored in a mystery, and how each sets out to discover a new way of telling the truth as the author has lived it. "Blackness is an art, not a science. It is a paradox: intangible and visceral; a situation and a story. It is the thread that connects these essays, but its significance as an experience emerges randomly, unpredictably . . . Race is the story of my life, and therefore black is the body of this book."
And what most interests Bernard is looking at "blackness at its borders, where it meets whiteness in fear and hope, in anguish and love."
240 pages, Hardcover
First published January 29, 2019
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11810 people want to read
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February 20, 2024
Wow *cracks knuckles* this book y'all. The introduction and first essay is amazing. So amazing that I had to put the book down and gasp for air. After that, it seemed as though the book went downhill for me, for several reasons. I have a lot in common with the author of this book. I grew up in the south and moved to the North. My mother's family resides on the same historical land that they have since the end of (and during) slavery. I entered white Academia, and maintain a lot of close friendships with white people. However, I know all of these things didn't just happen in a vacuum. My proximity to whiteness doesn't make me feel shame, but it also doesn't make me feel immense pride. I try to move through this with self awareness, self awareness that I feel the author lacked as she made the reader hear about how wonderful her husband was, or how cute her daughters are. Which is all good and well, but I wanted to read about what it meant to have a white husband beyond "he's nice to me, we talk about race" and I wanted to hear about how she was navigating having Ethiopian daughters and deciding to raise them in Vermont, and what that could mean for their self confidence and self worth. It seemed like any pushback the author received from other Black people about anything at all was always briefly touched on, in a surface level way. I found a lot of the essays to just be rather boring. It was apparent that the author does not have many Black friends but also does not have many Black radical friends, that engage in community organizing. She invited cops to her class, and seemed shocked that someone who works in social justice would get death threats. There were way too many James Baldwin quotes. As you can see, this book wasn't for me and that's simply okay. But I think it does a disservice to future readers if I'm not honest here: this book feels as though it is written for white people. White people who have not formed intimate relationships with radical Black people, white people that only like Black people in theory. If you are a Black person looking for a book that reminds you of home, you may be bored by the stories in this book because they're too similar to your own AND the author doesn't dig deeper in a meaningful way for you to want to endure reading. I gave this book two stars because the beginning showed me exactly what Emily Bernard could have been capable of if her entire book wasn't dedicated to centering whiteness.
February 18, 2019
The earlier essays were good. I could really relate to her thinking and experiences. However as the book went on they felt repetitive. I think overall it could’ve been less. Also worth saying. This is a book filled with intimate small essays not essays on giant trauma. It’s not about the pain of blackness. It’s about Bernard’s experiences as a black woman.
March 7, 2019
Meh. Obviously, this book wasn't written for me. It was written for a non-black audience. The majority of the essays feature the author describing mundane interactions between her husband/daughters/family friends and trying to find some racial significance in them. Maybe it was meant to be intimate and show what it is like to live as a black person in a white space; instead, these moments felt shallow and forced. Worse, in each of these moments, the author frequently came off as a snide instigator of conflict between her students and white friends. I get the need to make people uncomfortable to educate them, but the examples she brought up always felt poorly done.
Also, for someone who teaches African American literature at the university-level, the author seems to have a limited repertoire of literary references. She makes way too many references to James Baldwin or Their Eyes Were Watching God, with rare mentions of anything else. I would hope to learn of more, underrated black authors and titles when reading a black literature professor's memoir.
I can't recommend. It feels too messy and fails to say anything insightful about race.
Also, for someone who teaches African American literature at the university-level, the author seems to have a limited repertoire of literary references. She makes way too many references to James Baldwin or Their Eyes Were Watching God, with rare mentions of anything else. I would hope to learn of more, underrated black authors and titles when reading a black literature professor's memoir.
I can't recommend. It feels too messy and fails to say anything insightful about race.
February 25, 2020
Should be called: Black is the Body, White is the Life. Sorry homegirl.
So here’s the premise:
Light skin, highly educated black woman, originally from Nashville by way of Mississippi relocated to Vermont, in a white-black interracial relationship, living in a white town, LOVES white people. Has fully integrated white folks into her life. Is happy. Struggles with her and others' blackness. However, that doesn’t make her any less black. Because "black people aren't a monolith?" She isn’t your quintessential black woman, which she reminds you about in numerous ways, not the least that she has a white husband and adopted Ethiopian babies, she’s like.. Sandra Bullock?? but black??..
This whole book was misleading.
Black is the body — is a beautiful title. Stories from her grandmother’s, mother’s and her time... Hmm.. I found that these stories were skewed towards things that were relegated to beauty and not necessarily blackness. She talks about long straight hair, light skin, being southern... It’s always weird to me when black folks want to highlight their white adjacency and also it’s also weird when they want to highlight the ways that their family members are more aligned to whiteness than blackness — but then want to use their blackness for clout.
It’s weird to me.
She also talks about her life in the South basically saying that she doesn’t know anyone from the south (Mississippi) who has stories of any degree of violence between black and white. Hmm... Seems like a lie, being that her grandparents grew up during the civil rights era. It's weird that someone from the south would feel the need to point that out when you look at the South during the civil rights era and we know based on history that there were mad problems, bombings and violence between black and whites in the South. Why point that out, that you don't know nobody who has any stories of violence between black and white. Unnecessary and mad weird, especially when you seemingly want to disassociate or hide your blackness.
Lastly, it's completely weird to me that she has such extensive acknowledgements. Like, excessive. I mean who am I to say or judge anyone on who they’re thanking, but when it seems like you’re thanking every white person you ever met, in the context of this bait and switch, not-every-Black-person-is-the-same, some-of-us-don’t-care-about-race-until-we-have-to type book — the pages and pages of acknowledgements just seems a bit much. I was just waiting for her to tell me how much she don't like Beyonce, I was bout to be like this woman is tripping!!
I mean - long story short - it was a weird, diary-like read. Definitely not a necessary read during black history month. Bypass. It’s my fault for judging this book by its cover. She took me down a black but don't call me black type journey and honestly, I felt a little disrespected.
1.5 stars, rounded up to 2.
So here’s the premise:
Light skin, highly educated black woman, originally from Nashville by way of Mississippi relocated to Vermont, in a white-black interracial relationship, living in a white town, LOVES white people. Has fully integrated white folks into her life. Is happy. Struggles with her and others' blackness. However, that doesn’t make her any less black. Because "black people aren't a monolith?" She isn’t your quintessential black woman, which she reminds you about in numerous ways, not the least that she has a white husband and adopted Ethiopian babies, she’s like.. Sandra Bullock?? but black??..
This whole book was misleading.
Black is the body — is a beautiful title. Stories from her grandmother’s, mother’s and her time... Hmm.. I found that these stories were skewed towards things that were relegated to beauty and not necessarily blackness. She talks about long straight hair, light skin, being southern... It’s always weird to me when black folks want to highlight their white adjacency and also it’s also weird when they want to highlight the ways that their family members are more aligned to whiteness than blackness — but then want to use their blackness for clout.
It’s weird to me.
She also talks about her life in the South basically saying that she doesn’t know anyone from the south (Mississippi) who has stories of any degree of violence between black and white. Hmm... Seems like a lie, being that her grandparents grew up during the civil rights era. It's weird that someone from the south would feel the need to point that out when you look at the South during the civil rights era and we know based on history that there were mad problems, bombings and violence between black and whites in the South. Why point that out, that you don't know nobody who has any stories of violence between black and white. Unnecessary and mad weird, especially when you seemingly want to disassociate or hide your blackness.
"Here were people that I looked like and felt like, but that I was nothing like at the same time. “How did it happen?” I wrote. “They are my family.” I hated that my voice was so different from theirs, that my speech faltered when I was around them. I felt pinched and small and foreign." 79% in 'Black Is the Body' by Emily Bernard
Lastly, it's completely weird to me that she has such extensive acknowledgements. Like, excessive. I mean who am I to say or judge anyone on who they’re thanking, but when it seems like you’re thanking every white person you ever met, in the context of this bait and switch, not-every-Black-person-is-the-same, some-of-us-don’t-care-about-race-until-we-have-to type book — the pages and pages of acknowledgements just seems a bit much. I was just waiting for her to tell me how much she don't like Beyonce, I was bout to be like this woman is tripping!!
I mean - long story short - it was a weird, diary-like read. Definitely not a necessary read during black history month. Bypass. It’s my fault for judging this book by its cover. She took me down a black but don't call me black type journey and honestly, I felt a little disrespected.
1.5 stars, rounded up to 2.
March 30, 2019
This book is a jumble of ideas and stories. The author is a seeker. But sometimes her ideas exist right next to each other without touching, that is, without the author's connecting them. For example, the very first story is on the episode of mass violence that the author says gave her her voice (allowed her to begin writing): she was among the victims in a 2001 stabbing near Yale in a New Haven coffee bar where she had been one of the patrons. Although she was the only black customer, her color was incidental to her stabbing, as the young white male perpetrator was apparently trying to commit suicide by cop and the author-to-be just happened to be on the scene. Yet a large chunk of the book has to do with her perceived danger as a black person. The current orthodoxy is that we're living in a white supremacist society, but fundamentalism of any sort can keep us from seeing the full picture, even what is right in front of us.
Flipping next to the end of the book and the last essay: the author writes that her hometown, Burlington, Vermont, has an exemplary police chief. She's always talking him up, she says, yet at the same time she's thinking he's "an aberration compared to others in his profession." In contrast to that notion, the following conclusion is derived from data described in Michael Lewis' The Fifth Risk: "(N)ot all cops exhibited the same degree of racial bias. A few cops in one southern city were ten times more likely than others to search a black person they had pulled over." We see here that the orthodox view is that bias is like biblical impurity, like a miasma that has spread over all those of a certain class (policemen), but instead of almost every policeman sharing an "average" attitude, the reality is that some have attitude galore, pushing up the overall average, while others have little to none of the objectionable attitude -- and some may have another attitude altogether. Remember those two cop scenes from the movie Green Book? One about a bad traffic stop and a bad cop -- and one that turns out precisely the opposite!
Speaking of traffic stops, Emily Bernard says that, in contrast to what we would expect based on the good police chief of Burlington, African Americans in Vermont are 85 percent more likely to be stopped than white people. Looking at the other part of that quote from The Fifth Risk, we see that Michael Lewis has written, "A young guy in the White House pulled up stop-and-search rates from another pile of policing data. He discovered that a black person in a car was no more likely to be pulled over by the police than a white person. The difference was what happened next. 'If you’re black, you’re way more likely to get searched'...." Why is it so different in Vermont? Because it's such a "white" state? Or some difference in the data or misunderstanding of the numbers? We can't say without access to the data itself, but, still, the difference is worth noting, just in case confirmation bias has brought about an error.
Throughout the book, the author holds out parts of her identity besides blackness that have been subjected to social stress, for example, her infertility and the fact she's never conceived, which led her and her husband to become adoptive parents. Though wounds experienced on other accounts than race aren't necessarily woven into an equally potent story, they are present in this book as part of the memoir. Barrenness, after all, is not an insignificant matter; it's biblical!
The author writes of insufficient black faces in New England -- a simple dearth of blackness. And yet she also writes that she has "encountered divides of class, region, and temperament that proved as difficult to overcome as any racial barrier." In college she had classes with people who looked like her but weren't like her because of their background of prep schools, exclusive clubs, and vacations in the Berkshires. At home, too, her bookishness and academic ambition could set her apart. Nevertheless, a certain baseline of black faces represents comfort, and home is home -- both back in Mississippi and in the home she's built in Vermont -- where her Italian husband is no longer white but family.
The author writes that the Trinidadian side of her family relate differently to race than she and other American blacks do. They are not trapped in the "ideological straitjacket" of black and white as are American blacks. Judging from the book, the author knows non-American blacks (to borrow from Americanah) see something different, but she's stuck with a binary black and white, the various interwoven categories to which she occasionally draws attention notwithstanding. It's as though she sees no gradations of whiteness and, ironically, all whites look alike to her. That's the chrysalis from which she has yet to emerge. It's so tempting to stay tucked inside, accepting the approved narrative and in consequence always having someone and something outside oneself to blame.
Now here's a story of a hang-up: a white immigrant a hundred years ago sees a black person and can't believe his skin color is real. So, if it's not, it might rub off with a handshake.
Fast-forward to the present, when the author's white friend has her black godson staying with her in her house. The white friend proceeds to tell the author, with apparent dismay and embarrassment, that the godson left a dark ring in the tub. The author assumes her friend is partaking of the fantasy that the godson's skin color has rubbed off and that's what she's embarrassed over. She assumes all white people at some level share that fantasy.
No; I just can't believe that, even despite that "in the South, white people want you close but not high," while in the North, you can get as high as you want but they don't want you close" -- even though the white friend may never have been close to a black person before. People see TV, they see movies, they read. In the face of all that, the illusion of blackness rubbing off like charcoal cannot be maintained. the greenhorn white immigrant of another era, yes, but not the 21st century friend. What the white friend is probably embarrassed over is the godson's not knowing better than to leave the ring in the tub (something my mother gave me a hard time over because she did not appreciate my ring). Maybe the next time the author -- or the friend -- will get over her embarrassment sufficiently to check out her assumption.
That kind "getting the other person wrong" is very common. In the book Educated, the radically under-educated Tara Westover when thrown into a college history class, sees other students asking questions so ventures to ask one herself, about a word she's never before heard. The word is "Holocaust," and to the professor and the other students, she's a Holocaust denier or right-wing extremist making a terrible joke.
Trevor Noah, in the wonderful Born a Crime, recounts an episode of double assumptions: The star dancer of his band was a boy named Hitler, made possible by the fact that large chunks of South African people at that time were not conversant with European history yet simultaneously emulated European names, among which they failed to distinguish. So when his group performs for a Jewish audience, and he's shouting, "Go, Hitler, go!" the audience freaks out, and their reaction in turn freaks out the band. Trevor thinks the audience is cracking down on his group for the sexuality of the performance, and, well, we know (although Trevor didn't) what the audience thinks.
Getting over those roadblocks posed by assumptions can only be done over time, since it's hard to check out those assumptions at the same moment one is feeling shamed or discomfited over what you think the other guy is thinking. The author is right that long-term contact is the way, that is, long-term contact characterized by mutual respect and caring. In that context people could stop being other. They are themselves. They are family.
By the way, the reason white people in the South wanted black people close is that they wanted their labor. The labor was of a certain kind and for a certain price, which is the reason white people in the South didn't want black people to rise; they had to "stay in their place." In the North, white people didn't want -- or need? -- black people's labor in the same way.
The author confirmed something I'd suspected: that when black check-out clerks or salesladies were sullen rather than smiling, it was unfinished business from the past, when they'd had to grovel and had been made to smile. Or at least I thought she confirmed it by recounting an instance in which she'd talked down to a white clerk because of her own psychological leftovers from the Jim Crow era. By the way, that anti-groveling has mostly run its course by now. I don't see it anymore; now salesclerks of all sorts are equally friendly.
Here's a last something from the book to think about: Emily Bernard is convinced she's protected her children by giving them a white father.
Is there truth in that?
I used to be secretly glad of having a non-Jewish-sounding last name, which I got by marrying a man of northern European descent and duly passed along to our children. But it only works if I don't do anything that identifies me as a Jew or hang around with other Jews in Jewish places.
I came across a review of this book somewhere that described the author as open and honest and different -- some such terms -- and not polemical. That's what made me want to read it. I was lucky to get it from the library without a wait, maybe one of its first readers. I didn't love it as much as I expected. Still, it's given me a lot to think about.
Three and a half stars, rounded up to four.
Flipping next to the end of the book and the last essay: the author writes that her hometown, Burlington, Vermont, has an exemplary police chief. She's always talking him up, she says, yet at the same time she's thinking he's "an aberration compared to others in his profession." In contrast to that notion, the following conclusion is derived from data described in Michael Lewis' The Fifth Risk: "(N)ot all cops exhibited the same degree of racial bias. A few cops in one southern city were ten times more likely than others to search a black person they had pulled over." We see here that the orthodox view is that bias is like biblical impurity, like a miasma that has spread over all those of a certain class (policemen), but instead of almost every policeman sharing an "average" attitude, the reality is that some have attitude galore, pushing up the overall average, while others have little to none of the objectionable attitude -- and some may have another attitude altogether. Remember those two cop scenes from the movie Green Book? One about a bad traffic stop and a bad cop -- and one that turns out precisely the opposite!
Speaking of traffic stops, Emily Bernard says that, in contrast to what we would expect based on the good police chief of Burlington, African Americans in Vermont are 85 percent more likely to be stopped than white people. Looking at the other part of that quote from The Fifth Risk, we see that Michael Lewis has written, "A young guy in the White House pulled up stop-and-search rates from another pile of policing data. He discovered that a black person in a car was no more likely to be pulled over by the police than a white person. The difference was what happened next. 'If you’re black, you’re way more likely to get searched'...." Why is it so different in Vermont? Because it's such a "white" state? Or some difference in the data or misunderstanding of the numbers? We can't say without access to the data itself, but, still, the difference is worth noting, just in case confirmation bias has brought about an error.
Throughout the book, the author holds out parts of her identity besides blackness that have been subjected to social stress, for example, her infertility and the fact she's never conceived, which led her and her husband to become adoptive parents. Though wounds experienced on other accounts than race aren't necessarily woven into an equally potent story, they are present in this book as part of the memoir. Barrenness, after all, is not an insignificant matter; it's biblical!
The author writes of insufficient black faces in New England -- a simple dearth of blackness. And yet she also writes that she has "encountered divides of class, region, and temperament that proved as difficult to overcome as any racial barrier." In college she had classes with people who looked like her but weren't like her because of their background of prep schools, exclusive clubs, and vacations in the Berkshires. At home, too, her bookishness and academic ambition could set her apart. Nevertheless, a certain baseline of black faces represents comfort, and home is home -- both back in Mississippi and in the home she's built in Vermont -- where her Italian husband is no longer white but family.
The author writes that the Trinidadian side of her family relate differently to race than she and other American blacks do. They are not trapped in the "ideological straitjacket" of black and white as are American blacks. Judging from the book, the author knows non-American blacks (to borrow from Americanah) see something different, but she's stuck with a binary black and white, the various interwoven categories to which she occasionally draws attention notwithstanding. It's as though she sees no gradations of whiteness and, ironically, all whites look alike to her. That's the chrysalis from which she has yet to emerge. It's so tempting to stay tucked inside, accepting the approved narrative and in consequence always having someone and something outside oneself to blame.
Now here's a story of a hang-up: a white immigrant a hundred years ago sees a black person and can't believe his skin color is real. So, if it's not, it might rub off with a handshake.
Fast-forward to the present, when the author's white friend has her black godson staying with her in her house. The white friend proceeds to tell the author, with apparent dismay and embarrassment, that the godson left a dark ring in the tub. The author assumes her friend is partaking of the fantasy that the godson's skin color has rubbed off and that's what she's embarrassed over. She assumes all white people at some level share that fantasy.
No; I just can't believe that, even despite that "in the South, white people want you close but not high," while in the North, you can get as high as you want but they don't want you close" -- even though the white friend may never have been close to a black person before. People see TV, they see movies, they read. In the face of all that, the illusion of blackness rubbing off like charcoal cannot be maintained. the greenhorn white immigrant of another era, yes, but not the 21st century friend. What the white friend is probably embarrassed over is the godson's not knowing better than to leave the ring in the tub (something my mother gave me a hard time over because she did not appreciate my ring). Maybe the next time the author -- or the friend -- will get over her embarrassment sufficiently to check out her assumption.
That kind "getting the other person wrong" is very common. In the book Educated, the radically under-educated Tara Westover when thrown into a college history class, sees other students asking questions so ventures to ask one herself, about a word she's never before heard. The word is "Holocaust," and to the professor and the other students, she's a Holocaust denier or right-wing extremist making a terrible joke.
Trevor Noah, in the wonderful Born a Crime, recounts an episode of double assumptions: The star dancer of his band was a boy named Hitler, made possible by the fact that large chunks of South African people at that time were not conversant with European history yet simultaneously emulated European names, among which they failed to distinguish. So when his group performs for a Jewish audience, and he's shouting, "Go, Hitler, go!" the audience freaks out, and their reaction in turn freaks out the band. Trevor thinks the audience is cracking down on his group for the sexuality of the performance, and, well, we know (although Trevor didn't) what the audience thinks.
Getting over those roadblocks posed by assumptions can only be done over time, since it's hard to check out those assumptions at the same moment one is feeling shamed or discomfited over what you think the other guy is thinking. The author is right that long-term contact is the way, that is, long-term contact characterized by mutual respect and caring. In that context people could stop being other. They are themselves. They are family.
By the way, the reason white people in the South wanted black people close is that they wanted their labor. The labor was of a certain kind and for a certain price, which is the reason white people in the South didn't want black people to rise; they had to "stay in their place." In the North, white people didn't want -- or need? -- black people's labor in the same way.
The author confirmed something I'd suspected: that when black check-out clerks or salesladies were sullen rather than smiling, it was unfinished business from the past, when they'd had to grovel and had been made to smile. Or at least I thought she confirmed it by recounting an instance in which she'd talked down to a white clerk because of her own psychological leftovers from the Jim Crow era. By the way, that anti-groveling has mostly run its course by now. I don't see it anymore; now salesclerks of all sorts are equally friendly.
Here's a last something from the book to think about: Emily Bernard is convinced she's protected her children by giving them a white father.
Is there truth in that?
I used to be secretly glad of having a non-Jewish-sounding last name, which I got by marrying a man of northern European descent and duly passed along to our children. But it only works if I don't do anything that identifies me as a Jew or hang around with other Jews in Jewish places.
I came across a review of this book somewhere that described the author as open and honest and different -- some such terms -- and not polemical. That's what made me want to read it. I was lucky to get it from the library without a wait, maybe one of its first readers. I didn't love it as much as I expected. Still, it's given me a lot to think about.
Three and a half stars, rounded up to four.
May 14, 2020
Okay, so this rating was hard to do. I really was so eager to read this book; however, the title is very misleading. I regret purchasing this book.
I am not saying there were not interesting parts, two essays were amazing, but what I am saying is overall this book was just bad. It read like an apology for being Black and explaining why she married a white man.
1) the subtitle "stories from my grandmother's time, my mother's time, and mine" is not accurate AT ALL. She mentions her family mother and grandmother in fleeting ways. And in doing so, she only mentions them to remind us that she indeed is Black so she is different from the white women who adopt Black children.
2) her chapter about saying "the n-word" wore me out! it was just terrible. It had me concerned to know that she is a professor and this is how she is leading her Black studies classes.
3) this story/book is mainly about how she is married to a white man and we should all just deal with it. And honestly, i could care less who you are married to; however, it felt like she just wanted to justify it and it would have been better for her to just stand in her truth and not make it forced.
4) speaking of forced, the way she forced the "connection" between Black family and Italian family had me wanting to the throw the book in the trash
Overall this book just missed the mark. Maybe if the title was different I would have better things to say. The title led me to believe (as well as the synopsis) that these would be essays truly dissecting the Black body and what that body means in society but instead it just felt like i was reading a diary written by a teenager who is having an identity crisis.
I know this review seems harsh but its my opinion
I am not saying there were not interesting parts, two essays were amazing, but what I am saying is overall this book was just bad. It read like an apology for being Black and explaining why she married a white man.
1) the subtitle "stories from my grandmother's time, my mother's time, and mine" is not accurate AT ALL. She mentions her family mother and grandmother in fleeting ways. And in doing so, she only mentions them to remind us that she indeed is Black so she is different from the white women who adopt Black children.
2) her chapter about saying "the n-word" wore me out! it was just terrible. It had me concerned to know that she is a professor and this is how she is leading her Black studies classes.
3) this story/book is mainly about how she is married to a white man and we should all just deal with it. And honestly, i could care less who you are married to; however, it felt like she just wanted to justify it and it would have been better for her to just stand in her truth and not make it forced.
4) speaking of forced, the way she forced the "connection" between Black family and Italian family had me wanting to the throw the book in the trash
Overall this book just missed the mark. Maybe if the title was different I would have better things to say. The title led me to believe (as well as the synopsis) that these would be essays truly dissecting the Black body and what that body means in society but instead it just felt like i was reading a diary written by a teenager who is having an identity crisis.
I know this review seems harsh but its my opinion
July 31, 2020
I wanted to like this book but it was a book written by a black woman centered on whiteness. She married a white man and got a job in white academia in one of the whitest states in the country. She readily admits she went through long periods with no black friends and now has only one good black friend.
My goodness! I have a lot more black friends than white friends and I am white! I felt like I was reading the memoir of an Oreo. Where was the love of Blackness? The political analysis of racism in Vermont? The in depth discussion of the disproportionate incarceration of black men in a so unbalanced state? She dances around these issues with no analysis at all because it would make white people uncomfortable.
Absolutely Yes the book was written for white fragility. The author has lived in Vermont for so long that accommodating white fragility has become second nature to her. She no longer recognizes it when she does it.
My goodness! I have a lot more black friends than white friends and I am white! I felt like I was reading the memoir of an Oreo. Where was the love of Blackness? The political analysis of racism in Vermont? The in depth discussion of the disproportionate incarceration of black men in a so unbalanced state? She dances around these issues with no analysis at all because it would make white people uncomfortable.
Absolutely Yes the book was written for white fragility. The author has lived in Vermont for so long that accommodating white fragility has become second nature to her. She no longer recognizes it when she does it.
October 6, 2019
I think she was trolling us...I desperately want to believe so. Returned to the library about halfway through, and would not recommend for anyone I can think of on my feed.
Bernard writes exactly like the worst professors you encounter in college—very bizarre and confusing when she could just be clear. She wants you to feel how smart and edgy she is, and be impressed by all of her tricks and turns. However, I just came away feeling uncomfortable and put on the spot, even while reading at home in my pajamas.
Good luck...
Bernard writes exactly like the worst professors you encounter in college—very bizarre and confusing when she could just be clear. She wants you to feel how smart and edgy she is, and be impressed by all of her tricks and turns. However, I just came away feeling uncomfortable and put on the spot, even while reading at home in my pajamas.
Good luck...
Read
January 9, 2019This essay collection has pieces on Bernard's experiences as a black woman in Vermont, on her family history in Alabama and Nashville, on her experiences teaching African American literature, and on adopting twin girls from Ethiopia. It's a strong collection, with a lot of interesting ideas and probing explorations of how we talk and think about race. Some of the best pieces are on how her students respond to issues of race in the classroom, and I loved the way Bernard dwells on questions rather than answers and digs deeply into her own ambivalences. She's a thoughtful writer, and this is a valuable collection.
October 21, 2018
Profound, compelling, relatable, and full of purpose. A new and important addition to the conversation of race and privilege going on in America right now. Ms. Bernard shares the story of her stabbing, her black physical body and also her black cultural body experience.
Her willingness to share her vulnerability is apparent and I appreciated it very much. I was struck with a visceral reaction when she confessed to her internal struggles and beliefs about the feelings white people (including her husband) harbor for her.
A book that made me rethink my racial awareness and how out of touch I really am. Recommend to all.
Her willingness to share her vulnerability is apparent and I appreciated it very much. I was struck with a visceral reaction when she confessed to her internal struggles and beliefs about the feelings white people (including her husband) harbor for her.
A book that made me rethink my racial awareness and how out of touch I really am. Recommend to all.
July 16, 2020
A beautiful series of essays that tell about the author's life as an African American woman whose husband is white and whose daughters they adopted in Ethiopia, as well as her mother's and her grandmother's lives. She is a brilliant story teller, which she attributes to her mother's side of the family. We also learn about her experience of being a professor at the University of Vermont and what it is like for her to live in Vermont, a very white state. Her writing is expressive and clear, and I wanted more from her.
May 18, 2020
What a thoroughly enjoyable and deeply thought-provoking book, written with such vulnerability and strength. Emily Bernard's writing style is as powerful as it is descriptive. This is a book I definitely recommend to anyone interested not just in stories of this author's experiences being black but in being human. I will definitely look for her other books to be immersed in!
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May 26, 2021➶ 2021 books: 70/60
Black is the Body is a series of essays focusing on what it mens to be black and Emily Bernard's own experiences facing race, family and her relationships.
As somebody that has a fascination with non fiction and memoirs, getting the chance to read this, I was so intrigued! From the first essay and the autobiographical story Emily Bernard was narrating, I was instantly invested into the following essays all whilst contemplating and thinking about the discussions being had.
Black is the Body is a series of essays focusing on what it mens to be black and Emily Bernard's own experiences facing race, family and her relationships.
As somebody that has a fascination with non fiction and memoirs, getting the chance to read this, I was so intrigued! From the first essay and the autobiographical story Emily Bernard was narrating, I was instantly invested into the following essays all whilst contemplating and thinking about the discussions being had.
November 12, 2019
I waited to rate this book as I wanted to think about it more and I finally decided on 4 stars. I really enjoyed the book.
April 26, 2019
The first few chapters were more academic in tone, which can be harder for me as a reader. But then Bernard delved more into her story and I was blown away.
This is not a linear memoir and the stories aren’t always connected in obvious ways. But they do have power and I’m very glad I read each essay. Towards the end, Bernard notes: “In every scar there’s a story. The salve is the telling itself.” And I think that sums up this book rather well. It’s not just Bernard’s story but that of her mother and grandmother. She explores her and their experiences as Black women, as well as her perspective as a professor of African American Studies. I tend to favor more intimate stories compared to an academic approach but I still learned from the more clinical chapters.
The chapters exploring infertility and adoption especially stood out to me. Her perspective as Black American woman and her white husband adopting internationally is invaluable. The twins’ adoption story was wild! There were so many layers and they’re spread out through the book in a way that really works, honing in on the details as needed and then zooming out for a more global perspective. Bernard and her husband approach the adoption that stands out from many of the narratives out there. “Some stories about adoption emphasize poverty or lack; a child unwanted or abandoned, a lost history. The stories we tell our girls are about bounty. You are adored on two continents, I tell them.”
I also really liked the way she interrogated her choice to live in Vermont. What works, what doesn’t. The questions she’s asked herself for years. Vermont’s pluses, as well as it’s difficulties for her as a person of color. She also looks at the concept of home and as someone who is still figuring that out, it really resonated with me. I’ll be thinking about this book for some time.
A note of caution: Bernard does spend the first chapter discussing being stabbed by a stranger. It was not racially motivated. She does go into detail about what happened and the aftermath of her recovery.
Additional CW: racism, microaggressions, references to lynching
This is not a linear memoir and the stories aren’t always connected in obvious ways. But they do have power and I’m very glad I read each essay. Towards the end, Bernard notes: “In every scar there’s a story. The salve is the telling itself.” And I think that sums up this book rather well. It’s not just Bernard’s story but that of her mother and grandmother. She explores her and their experiences as Black women, as well as her perspective as a professor of African American Studies. I tend to favor more intimate stories compared to an academic approach but I still learned from the more clinical chapters.
The chapters exploring infertility and adoption especially stood out to me. Her perspective as Black American woman and her white husband adopting internationally is invaluable. The twins’ adoption story was wild! There were so many layers and they’re spread out through the book in a way that really works, honing in on the details as needed and then zooming out for a more global perspective. Bernard and her husband approach the adoption that stands out from many of the narratives out there. “Some stories about adoption emphasize poverty or lack; a child unwanted or abandoned, a lost history. The stories we tell our girls are about bounty. You are adored on two continents, I tell them.”
I also really liked the way she interrogated her choice to live in Vermont. What works, what doesn’t. The questions she’s asked herself for years. Vermont’s pluses, as well as it’s difficulties for her as a person of color. She also looks at the concept of home and as someone who is still figuring that out, it really resonated with me. I’ll be thinking about this book for some time.
A note of caution: Bernard does spend the first chapter discussing being stabbed by a stranger. It was not racially motivated. She does go into detail about what happened and the aftermath of her recovery.
Additional CW: racism, microaggressions, references to lynching
February 26, 2019
Rating: 3.5 Stars
November 19, 2019
Teen fantasy is my staple, so this is definitely a change of pace. Also, this review is coming from a white woman who lives in the South, in a place that is 76% white, and racial tension and prejudices are fairly common.
This book is written so well and felt so genuine. After the first story (which blew my mind), the essays taper off in pace. But I was already captivated by her words. I loved the contrasts and comparisons to her life in the south versus her life in Vermont.
You can tell she loves and adores her family. I wish I had more insight to her view on her marriage or how other people perceive it, as it is biracial. But maybe there was no need. Either way, I really enjoyed this book, and I loved how open she was with her own thoughts and perspective. She was easy to connect with though the reader may have a very different background.
This book is written so well and felt so genuine. After the first story (which blew my mind), the essays taper off in pace. But I was already captivated by her words. I loved the contrasts and comparisons to her life in the south versus her life in Vermont.
You can tell she loves and adores her family. I wish I had more insight to her view on her marriage or how other people perceive it, as it is biracial. But maybe there was no need. Either way, I really enjoyed this book, and I loved how open she was with her own thoughts and perspective. She was easy to connect with though the reader may have a very different background.
March 17, 2019
Beautifully written, intelligent and sensitive essays about the intersection of black and white in America and in the author's life. This was really just lovely, and thought-provoking. The author writes about so many things--living as a black woman in Vermont. Growing up in the South. Her mother and grandmother's lives. Her marriage to a white man. Her twin daughters adopted from Ethiopia--each subject treated with great thought and care. This was really a treat.
April 7, 2019
I LOVED this book with my whole heart! Emily Bernard's essays are rich and deep and timely and beautiful. The writing is gorgeous, the sentiments are layered and complex, every word rings true. The last essay in the book, "People Like Me" should be required reading for all Vermonters. I spoke with a 9th grader at Teen Lit Mob yesterday who suggested this book as one teachers ought to be teaching and I completely agree! Highly highly recommend!
March 31, 2020
"I am black--and brown, too," writes Emily Bernard. "Brown is the body I was born into. Black is the body of the stories I tell."
An excellent essay collection/memoir.
An excellent essay collection/memoir.
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January 17, 2024 This is an essay collection from 2019--so prior to big events--about the impact of, well, blackness. Written by African-American lit scholar Emily Bernard, this is a solid essay collection on a variety of interesting topics: being a Black woman in white Vermont, being married to a white guy, using the n-word especially in the classroom, adopting twins from Ethiopia, being aware of things like just getting on a dance floor at a normal event but being the only Black person out there. I thought it was a good book. Strong, smart writing!
May 1, 2019
I am black—and brown, too: Brown is the body I was born into. Black is the body of the stories I tell.
Perhaps it’s because she’s an academic, but the ways in which Bernard went about discussing race, more so in her personal life than in her essays, or, I suppose, those essays that focused more on her personal life, was strange and a bit...pressing to me. In one essay she talks about writing a friend whose farm her daughters stay at in the summer to remind her that, despite their brown skin, they need sunscreen. Then she took that moment to explain what it felt like to be black in a white space which, okay, that’s fine. But then she went on to talk about how the woman needed to be always aware of her daughters’ vulnerable brown bodies and it was just...too much. I understood but it felt like a step too far. And that’s what it seemed like in a lot of her anecdotes—like either she was silent when she shouldn’t have been or said too much when it wasn’t necessary, to compensate for having said nothing before.
It seems to come from living in Vermont and being married to a white man and so only interacting with white people, so she’s constantly taking the burden onto herself of doing emotional labor to help people understand her place in the world and blackness in the world while still grappling with it herself (which is fine—being so visible in white spaces and always having to take on the burden of representation is exhausting and something that will always be grappled with.)
I am of two minds about this, particularly the fact that she was so...open. As a person of color, there are inherent things that you know not to talk to white people about, that you talk about only with other black people or POC. There are exceptions, of course—my best friend is white and we talk everything, including race. But there was an odd sort of desperation I felt from Bernard’s writing any discussions with others, some deeper need of hers to constantly talk about race with white people despite also not wanting it to pervade or control her life.
This collection of essays, I have realized upon finishing, is not for me, not really. There are some essays that I connected to, that highlighted the need to be around other black bodies after being surrounded by white ones and the nuances of blackness and brownness, but mainly this book was for a white audience. For people who seem to want to understand or to be better allies or just out of some curiosity. It gives a glimpse inside the black mind while still allowing for a sense of reassurance—black people are not scary, they’re just like you, just with different worries and vulnerabilities!
So, I wasn’t a huge fan. But then again, this wasn’t for me, no matter how much it seemed to be at first glance.
Perhaps it’s because she’s an academic, but the ways in which Bernard went about discussing race, more so in her personal life than in her essays, or, I suppose, those essays that focused more on her personal life, was strange and a bit...pressing to me. In one essay she talks about writing a friend whose farm her daughters stay at in the summer to remind her that, despite their brown skin, they need sunscreen. Then she took that moment to explain what it felt like to be black in a white space which, okay, that’s fine. But then she went on to talk about how the woman needed to be always aware of her daughters’ vulnerable brown bodies and it was just...too much. I understood but it felt like a step too far. And that’s what it seemed like in a lot of her anecdotes—like either she was silent when she shouldn’t have been or said too much when it wasn’t necessary, to compensate for having said nothing before.
It seems to come from living in Vermont and being married to a white man and so only interacting with white people, so she’s constantly taking the burden onto herself of doing emotional labor to help people understand her place in the world and blackness in the world while still grappling with it herself (which is fine—being so visible in white spaces and always having to take on the burden of representation is exhausting and something that will always be grappled with.)
I am of two minds about this, particularly the fact that she was so...open. As a person of color, there are inherent things that you know not to talk to white people about, that you talk about only with other black people or POC. There are exceptions, of course—my best friend is white and we talk everything, including race. But there was an odd sort of desperation I felt from Bernard’s writing any discussions with others, some deeper need of hers to constantly talk about race with white people despite also not wanting it to pervade or control her life.
This collection of essays, I have realized upon finishing, is not for me, not really. There are some essays that I connected to, that highlighted the need to be around other black bodies after being surrounded by white ones and the nuances of blackness and brownness, but mainly this book was for a white audience. For people who seem to want to understand or to be better allies or just out of some curiosity. It gives a glimpse inside the black mind while still allowing for a sense of reassurance—black people are not scary, they’re just like you, just with different worries and vulnerabilities!
So, I wasn’t a huge fan. But then again, this wasn’t for me, no matter how much it seemed to be at first glance.
November 17, 2020
La autora comienza este conjunto de doce ensayos con la experiencia que sufrió cuando fue apuñalada, que, curiosamente, no tuvo nada que ver con ser negra, pero que le dejaría secuelas para siempre. De ahí nos lleva a cómo es vivir en una ciudad con la mayoría de habitantes blancos donde ser negra inevitablemente sobresale. Nos habla de su trabajo dando clases en la universidad y poniendo ante las cuerdas a sus alumnos al intentar hacerles decir la palabra “nigger”.
Bernard detalla la experiencia de crecer siendo negra en el Sur con un apellido heredado de un hombre blanco. Desde ahí nos transporta en la historia a diferentes sucesos que han pasado a lo largo de los años en su familia y conocidos donde han sido víctimas de acoso, persecuciones, malos tratos y asesinatos.
La última parte la dedica a su vida familiar, como se casó con un hombre blanco y juntos adoptaron a sus hijas de Etiopía. Nos narra todo el proceso y a la vez lo que implica ser una pareja interracial. Igualmente habla de cómo afronta la educación de sus dos niñas siendo negras en un país de blancos y los obstáculos que se va encontrando por el camino.
En resumen, un libro muy interesante y con una prosa ligera, pero que a mi se me quedó un poquito escueto a la hora de hablar del acoso hacia los afroamericanos en EEUU. Entiendo que es una experiencia personal, pero me hubiese gustado un poco más de historia. Sin duda el libro sigue siendo muy recomendable.
Bernard detalla la experiencia de crecer siendo negra en el Sur con un apellido heredado de un hombre blanco. Desde ahí nos transporta en la historia a diferentes sucesos que han pasado a lo largo de los años en su familia y conocidos donde han sido víctimas de acoso, persecuciones, malos tratos y asesinatos.
La última parte la dedica a su vida familiar, como se casó con un hombre blanco y juntos adoptaron a sus hijas de Etiopía. Nos narra todo el proceso y a la vez lo que implica ser una pareja interracial. Igualmente habla de cómo afronta la educación de sus dos niñas siendo negras en un país de blancos y los obstáculos que se va encontrando por el camino.
En resumen, un libro muy interesante y con una prosa ligera, pero que a mi se me quedó un poquito escueto a la hora de hablar del acoso hacia los afroamericanos en EEUU. Entiendo que es una experiencia personal, pero me hubiese gustado un poco más de historia. Sin duda el libro sigue siendo muy recomendable.
March 5, 2019
This has been my favorite book so far this year. Bernard's essays gave me so much to think about, especially about the topic of race, in an honest, non-judgmental way. As an adoptive mother, I also loved reading about her adoption of twins from Ethiopia.
Bernard's essays are personal but not self-pitying; even the first in which she describes being stabbed for no reason in a coffee shop in New Haven. She talks about being one of the few black people in Burlington Vermont where she teaches African-American studies; of her reaction when one of her white friends admits that Emily is her only black friend. She shares what it is like to be married to a white man, and some of her experiences with motherhood. As the sub-title suggests, she also includes stories from her mother's and grandmother's time as well and links their experiences to hers.
I loved loved loved this book and wish I could hang out with Bernard over a glass of wine and just talk. You might feel the same way.
Bernard's essays are personal but not self-pitying; even the first in which she describes being stabbed for no reason in a coffee shop in New Haven. She talks about being one of the few black people in Burlington Vermont where she teaches African-American studies; of her reaction when one of her white friends admits that Emily is her only black friend. She shares what it is like to be married to a white man, and some of her experiences with motherhood. As the sub-title suggests, she also includes stories from her mother's and grandmother's time as well and links their experiences to hers.
I loved loved loved this book and wish I could hang out with Bernard over a glass of wine and just talk. You might feel the same way.
August 11, 2020
I really wanted to like Black is the Body more, but it just wasn't what the title made it out to be.
At the most superficial level, I disagree with the subtitle. There wasn't a whole lot of story about Bernard's mother's and grandmother's time—certainly not a large enough part of the book to present as though it was a collection of intergenerational experiences. It was, at its core, stories of Bernard's time. Even "Black is the Body" isn't necessarily an accurate summary of a book that deals more with interracial relations than blackness.
I think what confused me about Black is the Body is that it seemed at odds with itself. Its title doesn't suit its contents. The essays are both repetitive and inconsistent. It tackles small experiences and big ideas. There's stories, but little analysis. It left me confused about what it was trying to say, and I'm not convinced it knew either.
It wasn't a bad reading experience, nor a wasted one, but it did leave me wanting.
At the most superficial level, I disagree with the subtitle. There wasn't a whole lot of story about Bernard's mother's and grandmother's time—certainly not a large enough part of the book to present as though it was a collection of intergenerational experiences. It was, at its core, stories of Bernard's time. Even "Black is the Body" isn't necessarily an accurate summary of a book that deals more with interracial relations than blackness.
I think what confused me about Black is the Body is that it seemed at odds with itself. Its title doesn't suit its contents. The essays are both repetitive and inconsistent. It tackles small experiences and big ideas. There's stories, but little analysis. It left me confused about what it was trying to say, and I'm not convinced it knew either.
It wasn't a bad reading experience, nor a wasted one, but it did leave me wanting.
February 9, 2019
Spectacular! An amazing tapestry of essays woven together with grace and elegance. Bernard’s book should be required reading for all first year college students. Her reflections on race and otherness are deep and thought provoking. But what I found most moving were her essays on family - her childhood growing up in Nashville and family pilgrimages to Mississippi - the life she’s created in her new home in Vermont with her Italian husband and adopted children from Ethiopia. It’s just an extraordinary body of work.
March 24, 2023
I really loved this collection of essays. Bernard has such a lovely and uncomplicated way of writing that makes some of her more mundane subjects glow. She begins her collection with an essay about a horrible attack she experienced as a young woman, and this incident follows her throughout the other stories, but not in a novelistic, plot-driven kind of way, and more of a real-life way where traumatic events are something we carry through mundanity. But anyway, I liked her other essays better because of this talent she has with the every day.
November 19, 2019
Loved this book with all my being. Emily Bernard's short vignette-like essays paint such a deep, rich portrait of what it feels like to be in her body in the world. This book hops over from academia to body-based thought -- which was particularly impressive for an academic like Emily Bernard. For this book to be largely set in Burlington, and to have run into her now a few times around town, brings this book to life in a whole new way. Another window into being a person of color in VT.
February 2, 2019
I found each essay captivatingly intimate. I especially love how Emily expresses her deliberations and honest interpretations of life and humanity. Black Is The Body is a fluid, lovely, meaningful read.
If you value motherhood, family, friendship, culture and human connections, you will love this book!
If you value motherhood, family, friendship, culture and human connections, you will love this book!
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