"We all have crowded bookshelves in our heads crammed with texts for every person we know. They knock about in our skulls, falling off the shelves. We refer to them again and again, wearing the pages thin."

— Grossman-Heinze, Dahlia


Date
March 5, 2015
Metaphor
"We all have crowded bookshelves in our heads crammed with texts for every person we know. They knock about in our skulls, falling off the shelves. We refer to them again and again, wearing the pages thin."
Metaphor in Context
When you meet me for the first time, you read me as if I were a book. Every idea you have about me and every word I say is part of that book.

When you look at me, you will think I am white. I already know this. When you shake my hand and meet me for the first time, you always already read me as white. You will hear me speak English without an accent and think I am white. You will hear or read my last name and think I am white. You read me wrong.

We all have crowded bookshelves in our heads crammed with texts for every person we know. They knock about in our skulls, falling off the shelves. We refer to them again and again, wearing the pages thin. When you read me wrong, everything that follows is askew.
Provenance
Reading
Citation
Dahlia Grossman-Heinze, "The Right Words to Say: On Being Read as White" The Toast (March 5, 2015). <Link to the-toast.net>
Date of Entry
07/08/2015

The Mind is a Metaphor is authored by Brad Pasanek, Assistant Professor of English, University of Virginia.