More Than Just An Athlete: Tiger Woods (Part 7)

The attempt to see “all” of Tiger was a valiant attempt at open-minded multiculturalism. But the clumsiness of his classification and its failure to truly capture all of who Tiger is “resulted from both the flawed conception of cultural and racial origins…and an inability to leave behind an obsession with the idea that race is a biological category represented by individuals.” Thus even though Woods is a self-described “Cablinasian,” (CAucasian + BLack + INdian + ASIAN) he is reduced from his whole identity to his darkest ancestry—black.[1] “Cablinasian” gained very little traction in the press because it served to describe Woods and only Woods. As our racial history has shown, we like things simple and categorical, and thus Woods is most conveniently described as an African-American. Even today, though categorizations based on race have been effectively attacked, the new theories of culture are still rooted in the historical groundings of biological and race based classifications of yesteryear. So while Woods was heralded as ushering in a new age of multiculturalism, the ensuing analysis of his mixed racial heritage was not fully divorced from nineteenth-century conceptions of race.[2] Nevertheless, the overarching theme is that Woods reveals the central stupidity of racial politics in America: the discrepancy between the rigid way we talk about race and the fluid realities of who we increasingly are.

When Woods went on the Oprah Winfrey Show and described himself as “Cablinasian,” many did not know what to make of it. People had never heard such a description used before and maybe for simplicity’s sake they labeled him black. Or perhaps there were elements of racial ignorance and lingering “one drop rule” logic that sent Tiger’s multiculturalism on the path to blackness. But there also existed “a seemingly positive desire to paint Tiger in a darker shade, a pulling for Tiger to be a heroic black man who would save America from its racist past.”[3] In a 1995 Sports Illustrated article, Rick Reilly first hit on Tiger being labeled a “Great Black Hope” which he drew out of Tiger’s childhood appearances on television shows such as The Mike Douglas Show and That’s Incredible.[4] By the time Tiger turned pro, other were pondering “Who can he [Tiger] be? Pick a name. Arthur Ashe. Jackie Robinson. Colin Powell.”[5]

The way in which Tiger Woods was received by mass media and other black leaders reveals our post-Civil Rights Era train of thought with regard to smoothing out racial differences. Woods exposes our insatiable need for a “Great Black Hope” and our delirious confidence that one man, through sheer individual talent and will, can redeem us from our sullied racial past. Sports Illustrated’s Jaime Diaz expressed this hope, writing, “African-American heritage would make a victory in the tournament [The Masters], in which no black was invited to play until 1975 and where every caddie was black until ’83, a transcendent accomplishment.”[6] The hope here is clear: that the action of one man would change the way people look at race. Have we? Perhaps. Is it because of Woods? That is more difficult to discern.

But it is easy to see the insatiable hope that many had to make Tiger into an African-American liberator. Indeed, the application of being a “Great Black Hope” put Woods in a long line of black sports heroes who have ascended into God-like status as they transcended racial barriers to fulfill the expectations of many and redeem US society from its ugly past. Starting with Jack Johnson of the early 19th century, to Joe Louis, Jackie Robinson of the mid-20th century, and on to OJ Simpson and Arthur Ashe and now Tiger Woods, journalists and writers have romanticized that one individual could right the pasts wrongs.[7] These tales have thus shaped the way we view individual blacks and the greater movement towards a society where race is supposed to matter less and less. Of course, the entry and ascendancy of Woods to the top of a formerly segregated game should not be devalued. Indeed, it is a special and great accomplishment. But the idea that a single martyr could help a nation overcome a negative past in some ways induces us to forget, or simply take solace in looking past, all of the institutional and structural causes and effects of racism that continue to exist in our society.

[1] Kamiya, “Cablinasian Like Me”
[2] Clarence Page, “A credit to his races” Transcript from NewsHour with Jim Lehrer, aired May 1, 1997.
[3] Yu, 332.
[4] Rick Reilly, “Goodness Gracious, He’s a Great Ball of Fire,” Sports Illustrated, (March 27, 1995).
[5] Leigh Montville, “On the Job Training,” Sports Illustrated, (September 9, 1996).
[6] Jaime Diaz, “One for the Ages,” Sports Illustrated, (April 7, 1997).
[7] David Owen, “The Chosen One,” New Yorker August 21 and 28, 2000, 117