THE ICHIGAN CITIZEN FEBRUARY 22 - 28, 1987
e Cool Syndrome:
81 sSing Or Curse?
CHAMP AIG ,m. - "Cool" is
a fortress African-American
mal have built against White
American society, says a
University of Dllno - resear
cher. Ho ever, like m walls
that eep outsiders out, it also
traps insid in.
1be trademark "cool. poses" .
of African-American males are
their means of SUrvival, said
Richard Majors, a doctor8l can
didate in coun eling
psychology .
"1be cool po a comple t
of postures, allo ed African
American men to m intain can
trol, retain their muculinity
and ve their If-esteem,'' be.
said. "It says, 'See me, touch
me, hear me but, White man,
you can't copy me'."
Cool poses are everywhere -
aloof and fearl faciall!IDrf!!IIoo
• OIlS, fancy dancing in the foot
ball end zone, complic ted
handsbak and complicated
dance steps, he d. By its
nature, the cool pose continual-
hur ood
arshall
chol r hip
fund to aid
E YORK - merit
holar ip pro ram named in
h nor of U .. Supreme Court
J u tice Thurgood arshall, h
been e tablished for student
attending the nation's hi tori
cally Blac publi colleges and
univer itie .
The creation of the Thur
good arshall Bl c Educ tion
Fund was announced here today
by official from th Office
for dvancement of Public
Blac College OAPBC re-
pre nting 35 member in itut
i n in 18 tate .
In ugural pport i being
provided by iller Ute beer
through a grant of 50 ()()() d
in-kind promotional advertising
exceeding 1 million in value.
The United egro College
Fund has long provided upport
for priv te in titution but,
hereto for a imilar fund ha
not exi ted for public colleges
and univer ities. OAPBC in-
tituti n with 130 000 u-
dents em II ne rly 25 percent
of all U.S. B1 c tudents in
iller Ute
Iy evolves to stay a step ahead
of imitators, moving on to rap
talking and break dancing, for
example. .
African-American men see
cool their equalizer, said Ma
jors, gre up in a ew
York ghetto, observing and
pnctidng being cool.
"Instead, they channeled
tbelr creative energies into the
construction of ·symbolic
and adopted Wlique
pc-. and postures to of&et
their negative !elf-image."
'Ibis, ho ever, created a
paradox.
''Tbe very tbinp that allo
Africao..Americana to survive
in the te man'. orld are
the things that can hurt
them," he said. "any
African-American males have
failed to diacriminate tbe ap
IJI"OPI:iale of cool ,ac
tine cool most the time
·thout regard to time 'Or
"
Tbus, African-Americans in
many 'tuations oo't aDo
tbemaeJves to ezpress any fonn
of or fear. They will
UIIIUDlIe a facade of strength, at
all costs, rather than blo their
front, be said.
Such constant loofness
parate African-American
men from White, helping to
keep racial barriers in place, he
said. And hile African
American omen are initially
, a
"
attracted to the detached de
meanor of "cool:' they later
find they can't understand or
get close to the men adopting
the poee.
While Majors sees the
modem use of cool an
African-American and White
question, he has traced
evidence of "cooln "to an
ei t African civilizations.
The Yorubas of western
igeria assimilated coolness in
to their commWlity between 900
B.C. and 200 A.D., be said. A
young man ould use cool in the
ay be carried himself before
his peers and the ay he im
presaed his elden during initia
tion rituals.
With the advent of the modem
slave trade, cool became
detached from its indigenous
cultural setting and became en
trenched in the African
American psyche as a survival
mecbani.sm and officially en
dorsed cultural ritual, Majors
said. To be fully grasped, it
must be seen as an approved
ideology of the African
American community, a litual
of socialization.
, .
Heads nation's largest
minority-owned truck firm
Continued from Page 1
City Transfer and tor e om
pany, Troy Ohio operating city
pic -up and delivery service in
the mid we a well as a ware
housing operation' Expre Hub
Centers onro ichigan oper
ating con lidati nand redis
tribution rvice center for
Jones Transfer and Eldridge
Truck Line mer set Ken
tucky, a personnel rvices com
pany. The firm operates over a
terminal network of 36 locat
ion in Michigan Ohio Indiana
entucky and Tennessee utiliz
ing 450 company 0 ned tractors
and 2200 trailer, while employ
ing 1,193 people to rve the
shipping public.
r. White explained that the
multi-million dollar buyout of
the 64 year old company,
originally incorporated in 1923
and re tructured in 1946 by
Robert Duffey and Ralph
Manausso, and the late Jo ph
P. Duffey wa accomplished
with funding leadership provided .
by the ational Bank of Detroit.
Additional funding was secured
by the Monroe Bank and Tru ,
onroe, and the Fir Inde-
pendence ational Bank of
Detroit.
Born in ind r, Ontario,
Canada, he moved to Washing
ton, D.C. while rving in the
U.S. Air Force at the Pentagon
from 1952 to 1957, Following
hi h he ame t Detr it
or ing with veral ity dep rt
ment in vari u p itie in
cludin internal audit rand
Convention PI nnin Repre nt-
tive f r Cob Hall onvention
Center. He left the cityempl y
and pent the next ten year
in the production of audio and
visual program for corp rate
merchandising and training act iv
iti . He owned and operated
the White A ciation Inc. an
audio vi ual company from
1970 through 1975. In 1975,
he returned to the City of
Detroit a Public Information
Department Director, for ayor
Coleman Young. He left in
1977 to join Ford otor to
become anager-Minority Sup
plier Development - � program
with many innovative approach
'e to minority econ mic de
velopment which grew from 9
million dollar in annual pur
ch from minority busine s
to nearly a quarter billion
dollar for 1986.
During hi career he ha
been affiliated with numerous
civic, church and charitable
organization. In ddition he
h been a guest lecturer at the
Univer ity of ichigan chool
of Busine Administration and
the Arno Tuck Scho I of
Busine Adrnini tration Dart
mouth College. He i li ted in
Who' Who Among Black Ameri
can,
r. White and his family
reside in Detroit.
Ho ard U. Dean
named ·visiting
scholar at W U
Arizona
boyco
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