A journalist and author raised in St. Albert is facing criticism for a self-published book for which he admittedly donned blackface and a wig while hitchhiking parts of the United States in order to experience instances of racism, but said that he is proud of his work on the book.
The journalist, Sam Forster, has previously been published in the National Post, the Spectator, the Buenos Aires Times, and for most of last year regularly contributed articles to the Gazette as a freelance reporter.
Forster announced his new book, Seven Shoulders: Taxonomizing Racism in Modern America, on X, the social media platform formerly known as Twitter, on Tuesday, May 28, and was almost immediately met with backlash and criticism for the book's premise.
In an email, Forster defended the use of blackface for his book, arguing that John Howard Griffin’s Black Like Me published in 1961 and Ray Sprigle's In the Land of Jim Crow, published in 1949, as well as that of journalist Grace Halsell who did something similar in the late 1960s, had a “positive” impact on the U.S. civil rights movement.
“These journalists were extremely influential in shaping public sentiment, accepting tremendous personal risks in order to draw attention to an important issue,” Forster said in an email. “That’s what journalism used to be about, and I think it's to the public's detriment that fewer journalists are willing to take risks these days.”
“I'm proud of my work, even if it manages to antagonize people who don't take the time to understand it.”
Forster said he was expecting Seven Shoulders to raise quite a few eyebrows, but he thinks many of those criticizing him online are “mischaracterizing” his work.
“For instance, there are some who have accused me of not talking to any Black people in the process of writing the book,” Forster said, adding, “I include entire interviews with Black people.”
“Anyone who has read the book knows that seeking out and engaging with Black perspectives was a priority, just as it should be for any serious work on the subject of American race relations.”
He also said the “immersive reporting” section of the book is relatively brief, and is used to “support conclusions that most level-headed people intuitively understand.”
“Suggesting that a brief reporting stint can afford someone a lifetime of experience or perspective is absurd,” he said. “It’s not something I would ever do.”
Public backlash
Last summer, I disguised myself as a Black man and traveled throughout the United States to document how racism persists in American society.
— Sam Forster (@ForsterSam) May 28, 2024
Writing Seven Shoulders was one of the hardest things I’ve ever done as a journalist.
It’s out on May 30th:https://t.co/jK2kvIPh1H pic.twitter.com/TE8mEfOiHi
David Sterling Brown, an associate professor of English at Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut, who is Black, responded to Forster's announcement by saying “disguising oneself as Black to write about racism is offensive, inauthentic, [and] harmful.”
Various X users, including Carliss Chatman, an associate professor at Southern Methodist University's Dedman School of Law in Texas, took issue with a blurb describing the book on Amazon, which includes a sentence that reads: “Seven Shoulders is the most important book on American race relations that has ever been written.”
“My favourite thing about this self-published book is how this white man has declared it the most important book on race ever in the Amazon description,” Chatman wrote sarcastically.
As well, many X users pointed out that the act of a white journalist donning blackface to try and experience racism has been done a handful of times already, all of which were met with or have since been criticized for the racist act of wearing blackface, and for not simply relying on and writing about the actual experiences of racism that Black people have had.
The decision to do blackface rather than doing actual journalism by seeking out and elevating the voices, lived experiences of black Americans themselves is… quite something. https://t.co/5NH18OVgGW
— Leila Molana-Allen (@Leila_MA) May 29, 2024
A reboot of Black Like Me? Folks will do anything but actually listen to the communities they claim to be trying to uplift, an incredibly dehumanizing approach. https://t.co/VJv0TgHUBo
— âpihtawikosisân (@apihtawikosisan) May 28, 2024
An excerpt of Forster's book published on the Tucker Carlson co-founded news and opinion website The Daily Caller on May 29 reveals that he aimed to produce a “modern adaptation" of Black Like Me and In the Land of Jim Crow.
The excerpt, a shortened version of the book's chapter called “Becoming Black” includes Forster explaining that he used a “Mocha” shade of foundation produced by Maybelline, brown eye contact lenses to hide the fact that he has blue eyes, a “tinted pomade” to darken the colour of his eyebrows, and wore an “Afro wig.”
“In order to pose as a Black hitchhiker, I first needed to figure out how to become Black... which is actually more challenging than one might expect,” the excerpt reads.
“There isn’t a lot of useful advice out there.”
Seven Shoulders is Forster's second book. His first, Americosis: A Nation's Dysfunction Observed from Public Transit, was published earlier this year by Sutherland House Books.
