DISCUSSION QUESTIONS
FOR WHITE LIKE HER by Gail Lukasik
(Questions by Nicole Thomas)
1) (p. 145) Lukasik refers many times to her
mother’s “grief” in the context of her mother’s secrets. She calls her mom “...a woman who’d prided
herself on her beauty, who used her beauty to her advantage, was she mourning
her loss of romantic love or was she mourning what she traded for love?”. What
did the author mean by this? To what
extent do you think her mother truly endured grief as Gail was oblivious to
this “grief” for most of her life? (p.249)
Were there any instances where you feel Lukasik may have jumped to conclusions
regarding her mother’s feelings and attitudes?
2)
Do you believe that owning a mixed racial
heritage is important today?
3)
How do you feel about the importance of
racial identity? Do you believe it
is important? How do you believe one can
benefit by making it important? How do
you think it might assert the opposite of what the author might believe?
4)
(p. 32) Should your ethnic identity take
precedence over your racial identity?
When, if ever, are these relevant?
5)
(p. 41-43, 50) Was Gail honoring or dishonoring her
mother by revealing her secrets publicly? Are we obligated as parents to reveal
our entire past to our children? Did
Gail have anything to lose? Did Gail
have anything to gain during this journey?
6)
(p.81, 141) Lukasik took on a persona that she
was a shy, quiet person, yet was very motivated to apply for the televised
show. She continued to claim she didn’t
like all the attention and was uncomfortable with revealing her family’s
secrets publicly. She later writes a
book about the whole experience, goes on televised interviews, and accepts
public speaking events with little hesitations. What does this say about her
validity of her stances?
7)
Do you believe there were double standards held
within “White Like Her”? For instance,
would there be a different accountability held for a black woman to pass as a
white woman versus a white woman passing as a black woman. There’s another example that the author’s
mother broke the pattern of endogamous marriages even though there the opposite
occurred less than 100 years before (p. 165).
8)
(p. 33) Define your “authentic self”. Would you ever base this on your skin color?
Your culture, family, religion, character?
9)
(p. 39, 55) Lukasik described her mother as not
affectionate and often would “…find fault in me.” She goes further in her
concern of being like her mother; “content to live in the convenience and ease
of half-truths”. What is your take on
Lukasik’s insecurities and how her childhood experiences may have affected her
adulthood?
10)
(p.43) Gail expresses that she “never truly knew
her as a person” while discussing her mom.
Do we ever truly know people?
11)
(p.63) Gail’s mother was obsessed with her
appearance. Wearing make-up to bed,
avoiding the sun, etc. Gail often would refer to her mother as having to lose
her family over her skin color. Her
mother also was not truthful about her Aunt Laura’s disappearance. Consider the possibility of her mother being
on the “outs” with her family/ dysfunctional roots and that being the reason
why she sought refuge – in CA (p. 138) and then later with marriage.
12)
(p. 95) The author claims her mother might’ve
been following the familial pattern that had been established so early in her
life. “Family slipping in and out, not to be relied upon or sought after, the
rejection too deep to matter, better to let them go, consider them dead.” Do
you believe with the author’s assessment of her mother’s attitude regarding
family? Discuss the role of family in
this book.
13)
Let’s discuss the following opinionated
statement; By creating an underclass, another group stands to profit
financially and in other ways. How might this attribute to history
and current times? How could using this
approach contribute to Marxism (the oppressor and the oppressed), BLM, WOKE,
anti-cop agendas? (p. 248, 253)
14)
(p. 80) Gail’s mother begs her not to reveal her
racial secret until she passed away. Why
do YOU think her mother was so adamant, even in such modern times as the late
1980s?
15)
Do you believe systemic racism exists in our
country?
16)
(p. 179) The author accuses her own
working-class town of Parma, of being born of cultural racism. She believes they were fostered in the tight
ethic Cleveland communities, where many of them grew up. In the same paragraph she calls her own
father a racist. (p. 182) She later
describes that her dad was racist because of him being vocal using bigotry
words such as jig-a-boo, spear chucker, and coon. How do you feel about her accusation of her
father? (p. 224) Describe Gail’s relationship with her father.
17)
(p. 84-5, 96) Ula, her aunt, who was white enough
to pass for white, made conscious choices to socialize with the black
community. She turned down an
opportunity for a job and a college education because she didn’t want to live
totally as white. Alvera, also chose to not
associate with “Aunt Laura” for a reason that wasn’t revealed. Laura and Edward
chose to live as white. Using “choice”
as the theme, do you believe turning their backs on their family’s was part of
their choice? Do you believe they
regretted their decision? Do you believe
the decision to escape/or not to escape their black heritage and capitalize on
their white appearance was/would’ve been worth it?
18)
(p. 191-2) Gail is hard on her friend when her
friend made a bad tasting joke regarding “cracking the whip”. She became very defensive of her “African
heritage” and felt her friend saw her differently and in turn she saw her
friend differently. What is your take on
how she reacted?
19)
Consider if we had no Ancestry.com. Consider there was no Genealogy Roadshow
or Who Do You Think You Are television series. Imagine the lack of knowledge we would have
about our ancestral history. When do you
feel it is important for us to know our own history? What factors seem unimportant?
20)
How would you personally feel if you found you
had a black heritage in your family line?
Why do you think it was so important to Gail Lukasik?
21)
(p. 192, 209, 219) Lukasik was determined to
find evidence of a slave within her family line, and finally her enslaved
ancestor, Marta. (p. 192) Before, when
facing dead ends, she was concerned she would “have no slave story to tell”. (p. 195) She comments; “I’m left with a
dilemma many genealogists face when the records don’t support their
suppositions and often their desires.
Who finds her statement disturbing?
22)
(p. 219) What do you think was Gail’s reason for
writing this book?
23)
(p. 240) Gail uses the term “color line” when
discussing her mother’s choice of passing for white or black. What sort of problems would you anticipate
when individuals within a society began dividing citizens based upon color?
24)
(p. 253, 258) Lukasik is offended when a member
of the audience during one of her presentations about race and her mother’s
story. The lady asks, “What are
you?” Why do you suppose Gail became so
ruffled? Was she justified? She later states that she’s offended by
people’s need to dissect her past. What
do you think about her stance?
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