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Blackness Explained Bizarrely

Hamilton Nolan · 02/14/08 09:23AM

For those of us who have been wondering what it means to be "really black," John McWhorter is here with some impenetrable explanations. McWhorter is a scholar at the conservative Manhattan Institute and frequent phoner-in of columns to the New York Sun (seriously, today's is just him riffing on how much the play "Hairspray" sucks, for no apparent reason). In an essay on TheRoot.com, he takes on those backward-thinking idealists who reject the question of who is "black enough." What's McWhorter's groundbreaking formula for measuring blackness? Hint: It involves dance skills, Ebonics, and chicken!