So You Want to Talk About Race: Chapter 10 Summary & Analysis

Oluo is at an airport terminal, frazzled and hungry, and she finds a food spot called “Africa Lounge.” She’s excited, hoping they serve Ethiopian food. But as she gets closer, she notices chairs with zebra patterns on them, a mural depicting cavemen, and menus for burgers. She realizes that it’s not an African restaurant, but an American restaurant dressed up like something else. She grows sad thinking about the few amazing African restaurants she does know, which evoke memories of eating delicious West African fufu for dipping in stew, hearing music that reminds her of Nigerian family gatherings, and being happy. She’s disappointed to see a “caricature of [her] culture” at the airport.

Oluo sees cultural appropriation as something that happens when a dominant culture exploits or uses an oppressed culture. Examples of appropriation by dominant white culture include using Native American headdresses and Indian bindis as accessories. Many people find cultural appropriation confusing because they think of the United States as a multicultural place and where it might help fight racism to embrace other cultures’ practices. Oluo argues that these practices become a problem when there’s a power imbalance between the two cultures.

Take music, for example: Oluo argues that music has been an important way for black Americans to process the pain of their oppression. But blues, jazz, and rock (which evolved from African musical traditions) were all deemed dangerous until white artists began imitating the sound and garnering fame, money, and respectability. Today, many talented black rappers remain in obscurity, while “okay” white rappers have tremendous success. This white-sounding rap becomes legitimized, and black artists struggle further because their rap sounds different. To Oluo, there’s also a problem with rappers who can’t connect with rap’s history as a source of strength for black people facing adversity.

The biggest problem, for Oluo, is that cultural appropriation betrays a society that “prefers its culture cloaked in whiteness.” In a society where all cultures are equally appreciated, an imitation is just an imitation, but in American society, attempts to borrow from marginalized cultures become exploitative. Things get complicated, Oluo notes, when one thinks about who defines what belongs to a culture, especially when practices have been shared for a long time and play an important role in the dominant culture too. In the end, Oluo says that if your biggest concern is whether or not to wear a geisha costume to a party, you should count yourself lucky.