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Chapter 22
Themes
Key
LitCharts assigns a color and icon to each theme in The Hate Race, which you can use to track the themes throughout the work.
Racial Discrimination in Australia
Racism, Childhood, and Loss of Innocence
Race and Beauty Standards
Injustice and Complicity
The Power of Words
Summary
Analysis
Maxine and Cecelia wear braces for 18 months. Afterwards, Maxine’s teeth are slightly better, but Cecelia has undergone a complete transformation, having grown into a slim and gorgeous young woman. She decides to enter a local modeling competition, which Cleopatra supports but which Bordeaux severely disapproves of, to the point that he refuses to go. Cecelia performs extremely well, winning multiple trophies and making it to regionals. Maxine thinks back to a time when she discovered Cleopatra’s old acting scrapbook and asked her about it, learning that Cleopatra sacrificed her acting career to raise her children. When Cecelia goes to regionals, all the Clarkes except Bordeaux go to see her, and Maxine is wowed by Cecelia’s incredible presence on stage. Although Cecelia loses first and second place to two white contestants, Maxine knows that she won in the ways that matter.
Cecelia’s modelling work serves as the antithesis of the harmful ideas Maxine has internalized about the beauty of Black girls. Although Maxine has often believed that her Blackness makes her ugly, Cecelia is beautiful because of her Blackness rather in spite of it, which inspires Maxine and helps her rethink her ideas of beauty. However, another undercurrent of this chapter is tension between Bordeaux and the rest of the family. Even though modelling is clearly important to Cecelia and the rest of the Clarkes are in awe of her, Bordeaux refuses to take it seriously or support it, showing the increasing distance between him and his wife and children.
Themes
