Race and Racism

Racial oppression and racial hatred lie at the heart of Dutchman Yet this play is not a simplistic denunciation of racism but rather one long invective against one (in Baraka's view ineffective) solution to racism: assimilation. Clay is a representative of the form of assimilation practiced by many of the black middle class, a pursuit of white values and culture through "white" education. Clay carries a stack of books, and he wears the garb of the well educated Lula seems to hate Clay on sight, explaining that he is a "type" she has seen often. She infers that he has a black friend with a "phony English accent" Clay, she tells him, looks like he is trying to grow a beard and has "been reading Chinese poetry and drinking lukewarm sugarless tea." These are the trappings of the Bohemian intellectual, such as Baraka was himself at...