The Search for an Oppositional Voice

In this article, John O. Calmore provides a systematic description of Critical Race Theory by comparing it to Archie Shepp’s “fire music.”  In doing so, he is able to draw a parallel that helps to clarify the idea of Critical Race Theory.  “Thus like Critical Race Theory, fire music represented a distinctly African-American approach to cultural expression, heavily influenced by an experiential perspective” (p317).  The fire music of the sixties was intentionally outside the mainstream music community, in order to voice dissent and express a uniquely African-American voice.  “The idea of the Negro’s having roots and that they are a valuable possession, rather than the source of ineradicable shame, is rather than the source of ineradicable shame, is perhaps the profoundest change within the Negro consciousness since the early part of the century” (p317).  With the recognition of African-American culture and the rejection of white culture as the “paradigm against which people of color must be measured” (p326), the door was opened for the expression of a distinctive voice.

Critical Race Theory is a “way of finding meaning within legal scholarship through combining language, thought, and experience.”  By recognizing that the black experience is different from the white experience and validating the uniqueness of that experience, Critical Race Theory challenges the “universality of the white experiences and judgment as the authoritative standard” (p318). 

Critical Race Theory, in the legal context, challenges the “dominant discourses on race and racism as they relate to law” (p318).  In this way, Critical Race Theory attempts to analyze the legal system and racial subordination and to enact social change by extending the “narrow world of traditional legal scholarship” (p320).  A key theme of Critical Race Theory, is maintaining a sense of authenticity in order to, “in simplest terms, be true to ourselves” (p321).  This theory advocates personal expression that allows “experiences and lessons, learned as people of color, to convey the knowledge we possess in a way that is empowering” (p321).

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