Becoming
Back in the ancestral homeland of Michelle Obama,
black women were rarely granted the honorific Miss or
Mrs., but were addressed by their first name, or simply as
“gal” or “auntie” or worse. This so openly demeaned them
that many black women, long after they had left the South,
refused to answer if called by their first name. A mother
and father in 1970s Texas named their newborn “Miss” so
that white people would have no choice but to address their
daughter by that title. Black women were meant for the field
or the kitchen, or for use as they saw fit. They were, by
definition, not ladies. The very idea of a black woman as
first lady of the land, well, that would have been unthinkable.
Disponível em: www.nytimes.com. Acesso em: 28 dez. 2018 (adaptado).
A crítica do livro de memórias de Michelle Obama, exprimeira-dama dos EUA, aborda a história das relações
humanas na cidade natal da autora. Nesse contexto, o uso
do vocábulo “unthinkable” ressalta que