Chocolate City speech
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The "Chocolate City" speech was a notable speech delivered by New Orleans Mayor Ray Nagin on Martin Luther King Day (January 16, 2006).
Background
The concept of a "Chocolate City" originated with radio DJs in Washington D.C. in the early 1970s and was popularized by the band Parliament. Prominent scholar Cornel West also used the term "chocolate cities" in his 1993 book, Race Matters. The chocolate city concept refers to a positive, harmonious image of a predominately African American city.In an interview with Public Radio International's Tavis Smiley (originally broadcast on January 13, 2006)[link] Nagin used the phrase "chocolate city" in reference to New Orleans' future demographics, a term that would become troublesome for him just a few days later.
The Speech
At a Martin Luther King Day celebration in New Orleans on January 16, 2006, the mayor gave a speech. This speech put the post-Hurricane Katrina recovery process of New Orleans in the context of the civil rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s. Nagin's speech reflected on the problems of violence and crime in pre- and post-Katrina New Orleans. He also referred to the humanitarian plight of the largely African-American hurricane victims in the Superdome and Convention Center.
Nagin repeated the "Chocolate City" metaphor he had earlier referred to, and proclaimed that New Orleans will be "chocolate again". Specifically, Nagin argued that a rebuilt New Orleans "should be a chocolate New Orleans . . . This city will be chocolate at the end of the day."
Nagin also proclaimed "I don't care what people are saying Uptown or wherever they are." Nagin stated that "This city will be a majority African-American city. It's the way God wants it to be." [link]
Nagin also stated: "Surely God is mad at America. He sent us hurricane after hurricane after hurricane, and it's destroyed and put stress on this country....Surely he doesn't approve of us being in Iraq under false pretenses. But surely he is upset at black America also. We're not taking care of ourselves." Nagin then went on to relate an imagined conversation with the deceased Rev. Martin Luther King regarding both the response to Katrina and the modern problems of black America which he believes offended God. [link] His rhetorical 'conversation' with Dr. King ended with a call for the African-American community to focus on self-improvement, and eliminating black-on-black crime.
Reaction
The speech generated an intense reaction, much of it negative. The "Chocolate City" metaphor was seized on and parodied by commentators, and cartoons depicting Nagin as Willy Wonka appeared in print and on the internet. A Times-Picayune commentator suggested that Nagin had just ruined his own chances at re-election. [link]
Political commentators point out that while this may just have been another example of Nagin speaking off the cuff, it will likely hurt his standing among white voters who are currently the majority in New Orleans.[link]
Nagin later attempted to explain away his remarks by offering a more racially inclusive metaphor, saying "How do you make chocolate? You take dark chocolate, you mix it with white milk and it becomes a delicious drink. That's the chocolate I'm talking about."[link]
Nagin said that his remarks were meant to be a call for African Americans to once again return to New Orleans despite the supposed belief that many of the people Uptown did not want them back. [link]
The Mayor apologized for the suggestion that people Uptown (a mixed neighborhood) were racist, noting the importance of that section of town in the city's recovery. He particularly stated regret for the statements about God. "I don't know what happened there," he said. "I don't know how that got jumbled up. That whole God thing, I don't know how that got mixed up in there." Nagin concluded "I need to be more aware and sensitive of what I'm saying... Anyone I've offended, I hope you forgive me." [link]
Related themes
Conjecture about a deceased hero's (in this case, MLK's) stance on issues after their lifetime is a common rhetorical device; George Washington, for example, is often appropriated as a supposed endorser in issues that have no relevance to his era. Conjecture about King's opinion on modern issues was also featured in a January 15, 2006 episode of The Boondocks television series. In a related (but magnified) sense, claiming to represent God's opinion also falls into the same rhetorical category; compare Prophet and False Prophet.
In this metaphorical recipe, Nagin implies the African-American people are reprepresented by cocoa solids, and the milk represents caucasian people. [link] Ironically, chocolate milk consists of less than 20% cocoa solids and cocoa liquor in a majority milk-based (white) beverage. Chocolate milk also contains carrageenan, sugar and vanilla; although vanilla is a common pejorative term for suburban caucasian culture, it is unclear what is demographically suggested by sugar and suspensors.
Strong racial or ethnic identification with a type of food or cuisine occurs in many media. The film Shaft, for example, compares Italians and Blacks to garlic and soul food. As mentioned above, chocolate often symbolizes African-Americans (see Cornell West, Race Matters), but chocolate does not figure prominently in traditional African-American cuisine relative to other food styles. Although Ray Nagin used milk to symbolize whites, the term vanilla is also commonly used.
See also
External link
- [Transcript of the Chocolate City Speech]
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