By Arei D. Butler and Chelsey R. Carter

American poet, novelist, and playwright, Paul Laurence Dunbar wrote the poem “We Wear the Mask” in the early nineteenth century. The poem is one of the earliest enunciations of Black people’s experiences navigating between multiple worlds in the U.S. Now over 100 years later, his words are eerily relevant in the face of the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic. As we think about the consequences and realties of living in the COVID-19 moment, two queer Black feminist scholars re-examine their own experiences of Black life, Black death, and Black material culture feeding into our newest iteration of the mask.

“We Wear The Mask”

“We wear the mask that grins and lies/It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes/This debt we pay to human guile; With torn and bleeding hearts we smile, And mouth with myriad subtleties. Why should the world be over-wise, In counting all our tears and sighs? Nay, let them only see us, while We wear the mask. We smile, but, O great Christ, our cries To thee from tortured souls arise. We sing, but oh the clay is vile Beneath our feet, and long the mile; But let the world dream otherwise, We wear the mask!”
–– Paul Laurence Dunbar

“We wear the mask that grins and lies,
It hides our cheeks and shades our eyes…”

I (Arei speaking) was 15-years-old when the Air Jordan XVII dropped in 2003. The XVII’s design was specifically created for Michael Jordan’s (MJ) historic return to the court with the Washington Wizards for the 2001-2002 NBA season. I remember the day I copped them like it was yesterday. I met my dad after school and walked over to a sneaker store near his job. The shoes were nothing I had seen before — the patent leather faux snakeskin on the eyestay and ankle; the inner bootie; the translucent midsole with the white Jumpman peeking through; the perforations on the side panels; and the chrome detailing on the eyelets and heel that came with a special blue “peel” sticker on it to prevent scratches.

The shoe design spoke to MJ’s mid-air wizardry – his literal ability to improvise while in flight. The seriousness of MJ’s return was also made apparent in the dope “extras” included with the sneakers’ release. The Air Jordan XVIIs retailed at $200, came in a metal briefcase, and had an accompanying interactive CD-ROM. In 2001, these shoes were the most expensive Air Jordan’s ever. I wore those sneakers until the soles literally fell off, and my dad eventually repurposed the suitcase to store his art supplies. While my fashion taste has evolved over time, the sense of confidence I feel every time I open a fresh pair of kicks remains the same.

I first experienced hip-hop fashion’s dual life when I put the XVIIs on— a silent yet deafening, subtle yet bold, subversive yet compliant feeling. Hip-hop fashion and Black fashion more generally speaking, have always been dynamic, constantly shifting between contrasting and seemingly incompatible worlds. Survival as a Black person in America has required that we approach life using a “both/and” rather than “either/or” perspective. The poem which structures this article is one of the earliest articulations of this dynamic – the necessity of constantly circumnavigating distinct worlds as a Black person in America, and the harmony and dissonance that manifest over the course of those travels.

We’ve responded to both threats using face masks and coverings created “for us, by us.” Black online fashion entrepreneurs have begun to figuratively and literally capitalize on this moment— providing the means for Black folks to feel fly and stay alive, to blend in but also stand out. The work of Black queer designers is particularly notable. Stuzo Clothing, described by founders Uzo Ejikeme and Stoney Michelli, as a “gender free clothing company”, recently started selling masks with Black power fists and phrases like, “Yup, Still Gay.” Now, many Black people are even donning “Ahmaud Arbery” masks in honor of the Arbery’s untimely murder by two white men in February 2020. The phrase, “We wear our politics” has never been clearer than in this moment. Art, perhaps, is one of the most ideal avenues to advance the aims of the long Black freedom struggle––given suspicion, surveillance and containment are an ever-present reality for Black people. Fashion does this political work. Yet as always, Black fashion can never fully operate without multiple paradoxes existing that dictate Black life in this country.

The mask is a powerful physical weapon—a tool to resist anti-Black violence in the moment of COVID-19. It is a lot like the Air Jordan XVIIs: neither are particularly comfortable, but the sustenance they provide outweighs their functionality. The face mask selfie, or ‘melfie,’ is now part of our everyday lives. When Black people stay home we still make sure our fits hit and we catch every angle. “We wear the mask”… even indoors with an entire outfit to match. Like we saw in Atlanta after lockdown was lifted, Black fashion is a subversive and necessary tool even in perilous times. Jordans, like the mask, allow Black people to experience and imagine a life void of violence against Black bodies because Black feelings and Black memory always matter.

“This debt we pay to human guile;
With torn and bleeding hearts we smile,
And mouth with myriad subtleties.”

In this particular moment of COVID-19, fashion is not exclusively life-enhancing for Black folks—it is paradoxical. No garment captures the multiplicity of paradoxes more than the mask. The mask, like most fashion garments worn by Black bodies, leads a dual life. It on one hand, demonstrates the power of Black creativity, Black buying power, and Black survival. Fashion has always meant serious business for Black folks. Historically speaking, it’s helped enhance Black life. I felt pride strutting out that store, suitcase in tow, living in a society that has historically profited from our dehumanization. However, if history and current statistics are indications, Black folks will ultimately bear the brunt of COVID-19 and, as the hood prophet Lil’ Wayne says, “The numbers don’t lie.”

“Why should the world be over-wise,
In counting all our tears and sighs?”

Around the country we are seeing evidence of these disparities. St. Louis is case-in -point. While St. Louis County’s population is 25% Black and 68% white, in April 2020 there were 183.5 positive cases per 100,000 Black people and 42.9 positive cases per 100,000 white people. The first three people to die from COVID-19 related symptoms were Black women: Judy Wilson Griffin, Jazmond Dixon, and Juanita Graham. Now, in St.Louis and throughout the US, data shows the damaging effects of systemic inequality and institutionalized racism entangled with the current pandemic. Similar trends have been cited in Louisiana and New York City, as Black Americans are overrepresented among COVID-19 cases and deaths in both locations. Now a disease that for the first weeks of the pandemic many dangerously joked Black people were immune to is wreaking havoc in Black communities—and killing Black women especially. Black people’s history within this country’s healthcare system is particularly problematic and now we are front in center in coronavirus-related discourse as agents of blame and surveillance, now that the Center for Disease Control (CDC) has recommended that we wear masks as a form of personal protective equipment (PPE).

Image of a COVID-19 mask with the American flag on the front. Photo by Martin Sanchez on Unsplash.

“Nay, let them only see us, while
We wear the mask.”

I (Chelsey speaking) went to Schnucks, a grocery store chain in St. Louis in March. As I approached, I noticed the store’s new pandemic adjustments because the entrance and exits had changed.

When I walked in, a white grocery store clerk immediately looked at my bare face and questioned me: “Ma’am, where’s your mask?” When I apologized and told him I did not have one yet, he stared at me sullenly and said, “Next time you won’t be allowed in without a mask.” Two weeks later, after city-wide suggestions had encouraged mask use, I entered a Schnucks on the fancy side of town (read: affluent and white), and I observed countless white consumers without masks throughout the grocery store. Unsurprisingly, I never witnessed any white person, stopped, harassed, or surveilled. I wish my experiences were isolated moments of surveillance during the pandemic but sadly this is part for the course. My story is only one of innumerable stories of Black body surveillance and harassment during this pandemic. In Philadelphia, as of April 10th, the SEPTA transit system did not have an official policy on mask requirements for their riders. However, a Black man was dragged off public bus for not wearing a mask on his way to work. Later in April, two Black men in a Walmart in Nashville were racially profiled for wearing the mask and subsequently, banished from the store. Here in St. Louis, a Black woman friend of mine, Taylor, and her daughter, went to the grocery store and an older white man stopped the five-year-old and directly asked her, “Where’s your mask? You need to get her one,” finally looking at Taylor, the adult. The five-year-old replied back “But, I could suffocate,” staring blankly into the man’s eyes. Sadly, these experiences aren’t isolated and are clear reminders of the complications Black folk are enduring in the midst of a global pandemic. To wear the mask or to not wear the mask?

“We smile, but, O great Christ, our cries
To thee from tortured souls arise.”

Many argue that the “mask” is potentially lifesaving and actively helps “flatten the curve”— the main purpose of all of these quarantine safety measures. PPE is quite literally meant to be worn to minimize exposure to hazards like the highly contagious novel coronavirus. The disease is spreading rapidly throughout Black communities. Coupled with the media’s portrayal of the mask, the attention on the Black community right now places undeserving blame and responsibility on Black people for contracting or potentially contracting COVID-19. And this blame then fuels white supremacist values that legitimize surveillance of Black bodies by positioning Black people not only as criminals, but now as biological threats. Yet, white people and the Flu Flux Klan have now recklessly flooded the streets all around the U.S––with and without PPE––protesting the social distancing measures (while violating “stay-at-home-orders”) put in place to keep all of us safe.

The embedded histories and present effects of oppression and systemic racism are causing high rates of COVID-19 in Black communities — not Black people electing to not wear masks. The racial disparities in the outcomes of this pandemic are driven by social factors, and those social factors have been shaped and maintained by structural racism. Because of racial disparities and high mortality and morbidity rates, Black people live in a state of perpetual fear and paradox that is often very unfamiliar to white people. We are simultaneously fearful of not having access to a mask and of being surveilled for wearing one. What can we do?

“We sing, but oh the clay is vile
Beneath our feet, and long the mile.”

COVID-19 brings these historical trends of Black fashion, surveillance, and marginalization into sharper view. Yet, it also exacerbates them. Our collective experiences draw attention to the multiple threats Black people face in the current moment––namely, the virus and those who see our masked faces as threatening. Racism is endemic to America, and thus this pandemic has shown––and will continue to show––the lengths and depths of white supremacy with an item once as “simple” as a mask. On one hand, masks deepen Black material culture: masks are a powerful source of resistance and expression of Black genius, just like Arei’s pair of Air Jordan XVII’s they bought at 15-years-old. On the other hand, the mask is much deeper than resistance. Chelsey’s disparate grocery shopping experiences demonstrate this––revealing the paradoxes Black people are forced to navigate to simply survive in post-civil rights America. Masks hold important consequences and paradoxes for the lived experiences of Black people in the US and across the entire Diaspora. Given bias, surveillance, and racism in the midst of a health crisis we are still left with the question of whether or not Black people will still wear the mask and the consequences of our decisions on Black life and death.

“But let the world dream otherwise/

*We wear the mask*!”

–– Paul Laurence Dunbar

Arei D. Butler (she/they) is a doctoral candidate in American Studies at Saint Louis University, where she’s also earned a graduate minor in Women’s and Gender Studies. Her dissertation research focuses on the intersections or “borderlands” of hip-hop’s terra incognita and the Black Lives Matter Movement from 2012 to 2019. Arei’s research interests include black popular culture, transnational studies, and theories of race in post-civil rights America. Arei received her B.A from DePauw University in 2009 as a Posse Scholar and Black Studies and Women’s Studies double major. Their scholastic endeavors have been recognized by Phi Beta Kappa and Phi Alpha Theta honor societies. Born and raised in the Bronx, New York, Arei is a hip-hop historian and aficionado, pug whisperer, and plant zaddy. Her work can be found on Instagram at @arei_butler and @areibutler on Twitter.

Chelsey R. Carter (she/her) is a writer, anthropologist, and educator. She is currently an MPH/PhD candidate in Anthropology at Washington University in St. Louis and she holds a certificate in Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies. Her dissertation project examines how Black people with neuromuscular diseases (like ALS) navigate healthcare spaces and experience care by healthcare institutions in post-Ferguson St. Louis, Missouri. Chelsey’s scholarship has been recognized by the Ford Foundation, National Science Foundation (NSF), the Andrew Mellon Foundation, the Wenner Gren Foundation, and the Edward Bouchet Graduate Honor Society. Chelsey received her bachelor’s degree in Anthropology with a minor in Spanish, receiving high honors from Emory University. She can be found tweeting random anthropological musings on Twitter at @AudreTaughtMe2 and more of her writings can be found at crcarter.com.

“We Wear the Mask": The Ironies of Black Life and Death During the COVID-19 Pandemic