688). But as stated, Pompey too has given himself to the white hegemony and plans to forsake his community for personal gains. Pompey thus actually teaches Lila Mae that “she hated her place in their world, where she fell in their order of things, and blamed Pompey” (Whitehead 239). To push technological progress forward, Lila Mae accepts the inability she shared with Pompey and, like Fulton, decides to not fight directly against white hegemony. She lets them think what they want to think while she works on the perfect elevator. Like Liggins states, “all of them are searching for a means of escape, of rising above their present individual and social circumstances” (Liggins 365). Nevertheless, Liggins believes that “the potential for this transformation
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When Natchez, already exposed as Raymond coombs, reveals his motive for manipulating Lila Mae at the end of the book: “let two [colored] in, you got a race war as they try to kiss up to whitey” (249), Lila Mae stands her ground. By that point, Lila Mae is no longer affected by Natchez’s insult which focuses on damaging her previous racial ideology and pride. Lila Mae, like Pompey, knows that self-elevation, which also comes with technological progress, comes at the cost of abandoning social progress. Natchez too abandons his chance to improve his community for his personal gains and standing. Selzer claims that uplift ideology will not bring about racial progress. She states “where might the hopes for social reformation more profitably lie? Certainly not in silence, and not in increasingly solipsistic space…, a retreat sustained by questionable faith in technological perfection and by suspect fantasies of self-reliance” (697). But it is important to realize that pursuing uplift ideology does not necessarily cost racial progress. It is just a derailment for the person who pursues technological advancement. With her unmatched skill as an Intuitionist and the key to unlock Fulton’s secret, the benefits society gains from Lila Mae pursuing the black box seems to be much larger than if she chooses to commit her time to …show more content…
While she might be able to contribute somewhat to racial progress, she knows that by doing so “the other world [Fulton] describes does not exist [and] there will be no redemption because the men who run this place do not want redemption” (Whitehead 240). Technological progress will bring about redemption but unlike Liggins’s belief, Lila Mae must not align her race with such promised progress. The white community will thwart her if she does so and after all, “the elevator world will look like Heaven, but not the Heaven you have reckoned” (241). Clinging onto the current hegemony and social structure like Pompey will also lead to eventual demise as Lila Mae figures “they’re all doomed anyway. Doomed by what she’s working on” (254). A pursuit of technological progress requires one to abandon one’s role in helping community progress. Such technological progress will bring about individual’s salvation and hopefully perhaps, racial progress but never its destruction, just personal derailment.
Bibliography
Whitehead, Colson. The Intuitionist. New York: Anchor, 1999. Print.
Omi, Michael, and Howard Winant. "Rac." Race Critical Theories: Text and Context. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2002. N. pag. Print.
Selzer, Linda. "Instruments More Perfect than Bodies:
When Natchez, already exposed as Raymond coombs, reveals his motive for manipulating Lila Mae at the end of the book: “let two [colored] in, you got a race war as they try to kiss up to whitey” (249), Lila Mae stands her ground. By that point, Lila Mae is no longer affected by Natchez’s insult which focuses on damaging her previous racial ideology and pride. Lila Mae, like Pompey, knows that self-elevation, which also comes with technological progress, comes at the cost of abandoning social progress. Natchez too abandons his chance to improve his community for his personal gains and standing. Selzer claims that uplift ideology will not bring about racial progress. She states “where might the hopes for social reformation more profitably lie? Certainly not in silence, and not in increasingly solipsistic space…, a retreat sustained by questionable faith in technological perfection and by suspect fantasies of self-reliance” (697). But it is important to realize that pursuing uplift ideology does not necessarily cost racial progress. It is just a derailment for the person who pursues technological advancement. With her unmatched skill as an Intuitionist and the key to unlock Fulton’s secret, the benefits society gains from Lila Mae pursuing the black box seems to be much larger than if she chooses to commit her time to …show more content…
While she might be able to contribute somewhat to racial progress, she knows that by doing so “the other world [Fulton] describes does not exist [and] there will be no redemption because the men who run this place do not want redemption” (Whitehead 240). Technological progress will bring about redemption but unlike Liggins’s belief, Lila Mae must not align her race with such promised progress. The white community will thwart her if she does so and after all, “the elevator world will look like Heaven, but not the Heaven you have reckoned” (241). Clinging onto the current hegemony and social structure like Pompey will also lead to eventual demise as Lila Mae figures “they’re all doomed anyway. Doomed by what she’s working on” (254). A pursuit of technological progress requires one to abandon one’s role in helping community progress. Such technological progress will bring about individual’s salvation and hopefully perhaps, racial progress but never its destruction, just personal derailment.
Bibliography
Whitehead, Colson. The Intuitionist. New York: Anchor, 1999. Print.
Omi, Michael, and Howard Winant. "Rac." Race Critical Theories: Text and Context. Malden, MA: Blackwell, 2002. N. pag. Print.
Selzer, Linda. "Instruments More Perfect than Bodies: