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This chapter argues that John Singleton's 1995 film Higher Learning offers a hauntingly relevant meditation on the politics and affective labor of being and staying “woke” as a Black college student in the United States. Singleton's fictive campus is read as a metaphor for the nation, where colorblind and dysconscious racism, hegemonic whiteness, and institutional violence circulate as "ordinary air" through athletics, security, and classroom life. This essay then situates Higher Learning alongside the Trump era's resurgent white nationalism, including the Charleston church massacre, campus assaults, and Colin Kaepernick's anthem protest to argue that the film anticipates contemporary struggles over flags, bodies, and belonging. Ultimately, Malik's partial victory is framed not as safety or closure but as irreversible, rage-suffused consciousness that demands both self-care and collective activism. Singleton's film remains a crucial text for understanding the high cost of Black wokeness on predominantly white campuses and within American democracy more broadly. By pairing close film analysis with contemporary case studies, this chapter foregrounds student-centered praxis.

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“Run, Nigger, Run”: The Consequences of Being and Staying “Woke” in Higher Learning

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  • 发表日期：

    2026年

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  • Tracey M. Gholston

摘要

This chapter argues that John Singleton's 1995 film Higher Learning offers a hauntingly relevant meditation on the politics and affective labor of being and staying “woke” as a Black college student in the United States. Singleton's fictive campus is read as a metaphor for the nation, where colorblind and dysconscious racism, hegemonic whiteness, and institutional violence circulate as "ordinary air" through athletics, security, and classroom life. This essay then situates Higher Learning alongside the Trump era's resurgent white nationalism, including the Charleston church massacre, campus assaults, and Colin Kaepernick's anthem protest to argue that the film anticipates contemporary struggles over flags, bodies, and belonging. Ultimately, Malik's partial victory is framed not as safety or closure but as irreversible, rage-suffused consciousness that demands both self-care and collective activism. Singleton's film remains a crucial text for understanding the high cost of Black wokeness on predominantly white campuses and within American democracy more broadly. By pairing close film analysis with contemporary case studies, this chapter foregrounds student-centered praxis.