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Michael Eric Dyson

Michael Eric Dyson Quotes

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Michael Eric Dyson is an American author, academic, and public intellectual, born on October 23, 1958. He is recognized for his work in African American studies, sociology, and cultural criticism. Dyson has authored numerous books on race, politics, and culture, and has held faculty positions at various universities.

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Famous Michael Eric Dyson Quotes

“We need all the newfangled web-based Internet spread, you know, social media that can catalyze, you know, some serious consciousness about what's going on. But we also need people on the streets pounding the pavement to make a significant and dramatic appearance to suggest that what's going on here is unacceptable.”

People Knows Needs Social Consciousness Streets Media Serious Internet Appearance Social Media Spread Significant Dramatic Pavement

Author:Michael Eric Dyson

“I hope [white brothers and sisters] read this book [Tears we cannot stop] and engage with it, but other white people have a better chance of speaking more directly to the white folk they know, because they're less likely to be subject to ridicule. They're insiders, so to speak.”

People Knows Book Speak Chance White Subjects Tears Brother Folks Brothers And Sisters Ridicule Insiders

Author:Michael Eric Dyson

“My job is to explain stuff you don't know or already know and have to unlearn. My job is to teach you stuff you don't know that you need to know, stuff you should know. I'm going to take what you already know and re-describe it.”

Knows Needs Should Jobs Stuff Teach Unlearn

Author:Michael Eric Dyson

“I don't mind the job of saying to white people, "Yes, this is what I think you need to know, this is what I think you've been missing." And it's my job to educate white folks every day.”

People Thinking Knows Needs Mind Jobs White Missing Folks Educate

Author:Michael Eric Dyson

“Blackness is an ocean, a universe, a possibility that can never be exhausted. And so we have to constantly reaffirm the necessity of excavation, of archiving and curating, but also exploring, and understanding afresh and learning for the first time what it is that we need to know, and what the limits and boundaries are, and what the themes and preoccupations should be, and what the redemptive character of that erudition is. I find myself in the exciting position of doing all that, and at the same time having the obligation to explain to white people what the deal is.”

“Even when you don't know, you're supposed to know.”

Author:Michael Eric Dyson

“Whiteness itself is artifice, is fiction, is a construction, is narrative, is myth. And I seek to deconstruct all of that, to challenge the accretion, the intellectual accretion, the philosophical secretion that generates within the edifice of white supremacy that allows people easy escape, and egress. And I'm saying, "No, you can't leave now. You cannot afford to not know what I'm talking about, because you gotta be held accountable."”

People Knows Easy Challenges White Fiction Talking Intellectual Philosophical Myth Narrative Construction White Supremacy Saying No Supremacy Whiteness Artifice Edifice

Author:Michael Eric Dyson

“I think sometimes younger people - not necessarily thinkers and intellectuals and the like, but people who are on social media and who are not as informed as journalists or professional thinkers - may get a bit, you know, impatient with the necessity of sustained thinking, sustained argumentation, sustained dialogue.”

People Thinking Knows May Sometimes Social Bits Media Social Media Dialogue Journalist Thinker Impatient Argumentation

Author:Michael Eric Dyson

“I knew Snoop Dog didn't start misogyny. I knew that Tupac Shakur didn't start sexism, and God knows that Dr. Dre didn't start patriarchy. Yet they extended it in vicious form within their own communities. They made vulnerable people more vulnerable.”

People Knows Made Form Community Dog Vulnerable Sexism Misogyny Drs Patriarchy Vicious God Knows Dr Dre Snoop Dog

Author:Michael Eric Dyson