Archived posting to the Leica Users Group, 2006/06/22
[Author Prev] [Author Next] [Thread Prev] [Thread Next] [Author Index] [Topic Index] [Home] [Search]Arche wrote: > Two questions: how long have you been working on > this, and how come we're only seeing such terrific > stuff now? Thanks for the kind words. Going on three and a half years, and I introduced the project a year or two ago and included the link that's in my sig. It takes you to what is, in effect, a rough draft. > Man, I'm humbled. Don't sell yourself short. > One quibble: in my experience, the majoriy of kids > laying claim to being 'white trash' are doing so > out of pride of position as economic and social > underdogs, not from a racist motivation. I agree and hope I didn't give the wrong impression. The people in my photos wearing the white trash and redneck t-shirts are very far from being racists. I know this from direct personal experience. On the other hand--and this is the sort of thing that makes life interesting--similar people wearing similar t-shirts have made me feel unwelcome at stock car races, including stock car races held on the circle track at the same racing facility as the drag strip in the photos. > My half-baked take (this has what? 4-5 days thought > behind it?) on why there are more blacks in drag > racing has to do with the nature of the competition. > Drag racing does not invite the possibility of an > escalating physical confrontation, the way stockcar > racing can and often does. I agree with this, too. It's an important part of the puzzle. The cultures of the two sports matter as well. Stock car racing was born in the South. It's long been a central part of white, southern, working class and middle class identity in a way that drag racing is not. Organized drag racing was born in southern California, just before and after WWII. White southerners never claimed it as their own, as they have stock car racing. Originating, as it did, in urban southern California, drag racing wasn't particularly concerned with policing racial boundaries. I don't know if the white drag racers of the '40s and early '50s actually welcomed blacks and Latinos, but it's clear that they didn't drive them away. Thanks, again, Arche. --John PS In case anyone's wondering, Arche and I are ignoring open wheel racing because the financial entry barriers are so high. We're ignoring sports car racing for the same reason and because Americans only paid attention to it, in large numbers, for a brief period in the '60s and '70s when Follmer, Donohue, and Posey were racing Mustangs, Camaros, and Challengers. We're ignoring rallying because... Well, I certainly don't have to explain that. J Mason Charlottesville, Virginia DEMOCRACY OF SPEED, a Photo Documentary Project: http://www.people.virginia.edu/~ds8s/john-m/john-m.html __________________________________________________ Do You Yahoo!? Tired of spam? Yahoo! Mail has the best spam protection around http://mail.yahoo.com