John McWhorter: the most unpopular black man in America?

Clive Davis, The Sunday Times (UK)

- If Barack Obama is the most admired black man in America right now, it may be no exaggeration to say that John McWhorter is a candidate for the unpopularity prize. Which is an odd thing to say about a courteous academic from the arcane realm of linguistics. Yet by venturing onto the mean streets of hiphop with a dispassionate critique of a multimillion-dollar industry, he risks becoming a target of drive-by shootings by enraged academics, book reviewers and bloggers.

McWhorter is not all that surprised that critics have given him a pummelling. He lets out a sigh of resignation: “By its very nature, this book cannot be received fairly. It’s difficult for people to separate feelings from thought. Tempers are going to have to cool.”

So, what is the incendiary message of his book? Interestingly enough, McWhorter doesn’t align himself with that beleaguered minority of sceptics who see rap as a cultural dead end, a bloated, bragging perversion of the American Dream. He may be in his forties, he may be a devotee of musical theatre (Cole Porter is one of his deities, and he met his wife at a sing-along cabaret bar), yet McWhorter admires the best that rap has to offer. He likes the Roots; he occasionally listens to Snoop Dogg while cooking dinner.

Click here for more…