Culture Theft? When White People Adopt African-American Culture, Is It Integration Or Exploitation?

On his 25th wedding anniversary, Will Jones and his wife spent the evening dancing to the music of Duke Ellington, Cab Calloway, Lionel Hampton and other African-American big band leaders.

But the musicians playing the tunes were white, as were the club patrons. In fact, Jones and his wife were the only African-Americans there.

“I love these experiences. I like the fact that American culture has taken hold of our culture, which we share, and is keeping the flame going,” said Jones, a musician in Orlando.

That flame is burning big and bright these days. The African-American presence in popular culture — from music, dance, dress, slang, movies and advertising — looms large. Some people call it the biggest crossover of African-American culture in this country.

“I see an enormous amount of this,” said Susan Gubar, author of “Racechanges: White Skin, Black Face in American Culture.”

Suburban white teens, imitating urban youths, wear pants three sizes too large. The phrase “You go, girl!” rolled off so many tongues that talk show queen Oprah Winfrey said she was tired of it. The black male handshake and “high five” have been popular among whites for some time.

White consumers buy 71 percent of rap music, according to Emerge, a magazine about black America.

“Rap would be dead if it weren’t for white kids buying the music,” said Alfonso Hawkins, assistant professor at Florida International University.

Some people believe borrowing from African-American culture is a step toward full integration of black and white cultures. Others consider the trend superficial and exploitive. Some African-Americans are flattered by it, but others complain that blacks “can’t have anything” anymore.

“I hear black people say this all the time, at least once a week,” said Veraunda Hubbard, a lawyer who is African-American.

Experts say black culture is omnipresent because of the effects of mass media, especially video music. But whites imitating blacks is an old phenomenon.

“The first time we see whites imitating blacks in America is on the minstrel stage, and that was ridicule and mockery,” said Gubar.

Appearing in black face is unacceptable today, but mainstream society’s yearning for the energy and vitality of African-American culture hasn’t diminished, experts say.

And nowhere is this more evident than in the influence of black music on popular culture.

For instance, the new nightclub House of Blues pays commercial tribute to African-American music and folklife. Black music has worked its way into the movie industry and television advertising, where it is selling everything from autos and hair coloring to cheese and orange juice.

Composers and musicians such as Ellington, Hampton and Calloway inspired Benny Goodman, Tommy Dorsey and Glenn Miller. Rockabilly musician Carl Perkins, who died in January, was heavily influenced by black field workers in the South.

Elvis Presley got his music and style from blacks in the Mississippi Delta. Stevie Wonder taught Beatle John Lennon how to play the harmonica.

Singer Michael Jackson took this trend to a new level in a music video that used computer-generated technology called “morphing,” which is short for metamorphosis. Dancers in the video went from white to black to Hispanic to Asian, female to male and so on.

“People are more interested in crossing racial boundaries and imagining race in more elastic terms,” Gubar said.

Morphing or trying different clothes, hairdos, slang, music and dance is a safe way to do that.

The results can be funny, as when comedian Robin Williams impersonates urban black kids. The Julia Roberts movie, “My Best Friend’s Wedding,” released last summer, has an entire skit about black singer Dionne Warwick ending with the all-white characters bursting into her songs.

Other times it can be eerie, as in a commercial showing a space view of Earth while Louie Armstrong, who died in 1971, sings “What a Wonderful World.”

Occasionally it may cross the line into mockery, where the borrowing of dress or slang seems to reinforce racial stereotypes of African-Americans.

“You don’t want to be mimicked; you want to be respected,” Hubbard said.

Hubbard also teaches public speaking at Valencia Community College and is sometimes taken aback by the way white students address her.

“Yo, Miss Hubbard” is quite common, she said.

Others question the depth of the imitation, saying it’s not to be taken as an indication of the end of racism. It is simply “boutique multiculturalism” or “going native,” critics said.

“They are playing at it. They can play the bad street hoodlum during their high school years, but they will go to college and make something of themselves,” said Gerald Reynolds, president of the center for New Black Leadership, a conservative think tank on black issues in Washington.

Reynolds is especially critical of white youths imitating the negative traits of the black community by using profanity, street lingo and the baggy pants that once were a sign of gang membership.

But there are many instances when blacks have borrowed symbols from white America.

For instance, comedian Eddie Murphy did a spoof of the children’s program “Mr. Rogers’ Neighborhood.”

Concluded Jones, the Orlando musician: “The mainstream is like a black hole, and it’s sucking us all in.”