Soul on Ice by Eldridge Cleaver

towards America’s racial caste system, Cleaver attempts to offer a foundation for racial progress and hope for future generations. He states that black men yearn for sexual relationships with white women, and black women similarly seek sexual interactions with white men. Specifically, Cleaver critiques the Uncle Tom "Negro leaders," explores the underlying sexual tension between whites and blacks and unravels the roots of stereotypes of the "Super-masculine Menial" – black man – and the "Omnipotent Administrator" – the white man.

Cleaver clearly expresses a contempt towards previous "Negro leaders" who have refused to challenge the white power system.

Based on Cleaver’s assumption that America’s identity crises rested largely on the sexual tension between whites and blacks, Cleaver boldly illustrates sexual encounters with vivid imagery.

General Conclusions

Cleaver’s themes and rhetorical devices help raise several important questions about American society in the 1960’s. "

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This desire, which ironically was created because of restrictions imposed by white men, serves to stir racial conflict because white men often have an almost obsessive fear that black men will rape white women. The reader finds himself coping alongside Cleaver, almost sympathizing and hoping for Cleaver’s salvation as Cleaver begins to write. This sexual tension leads to racial stereotypes of "black bestiality" and cause serious racial conflict. "The ‘Negro leaders’ and the whites who depended upon them to control their people, were outraged by the impudence of the students. Individual’s entire worldviews were turned upside down, and Americans began to seek out more meaningful answers to the racial problems of the day. Therefore, Cleaver’s honest depictions serves to enhance, not stymie, progress along the civil rights front because it effectively capitalizes on an Americans’ yearning for new ideas and new solutions towards racial conflicts. The racial upheaval of the 1960’s had begun by this time, but Cleaver’s vivid and unabashedly crude imagery served to jolt the American psyche and thus drive home Cleaver’s theme relating to the intensity of the sexual tension involved. While many literary pieces about the 1960’s explore racial bigotry, few authors can provide the unique perspective that Eldridge Cleaver offers in Soul on Ice. While many conclusions can be drawn about Cleaver’s work, the central question the reader must deduce from Cleaver’s work is: Do honest and sometimes painful discussions about society help lay the foundation for future progress; or, do these honest discussions lead to a bitter atmosphere that serves to restrict, not increase, thoughtful and productive dialogue about society’s pressing issues?

It’s my argument that, coupled with other simultaneous civil rights efforts of the time, the honest dialogue brought forth by Eldridge Cleaver played an important role in providing Americans with a fuller understanding of the dynamic and complex nature of the civil rights struggle of the 1960’s.