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Nevertheless: Throughout all of cyberpunk’s active history, I
only recall being asked to sit on one cyberpunk panel with
[William] Gibson . . . In the last ten years, however, I have
been invited to appear with Octavia at least six times, with
another appearance scheduled in a few months and a joint
interview with both us scheduled for a national magazine. All
the comparison points out is the pure and unmitigated strength
of the discourse of race in our country vis-a-vis any other. In a
society such as ours, the discourse of race is so involved and
embraided with the discourse of racism that I would defy
anyone ultimately and authoritatively to distinguish them in
any absolute manner once and for all. (395-6)
4. As George Clinton also put it: “Funk is something that one feels, and
everybody has the ability to feel it” (xiii).
5. How does one achieve the funk? Clinton remarks: “The irony is: the more one
thinks about it, the harder it is to get the feel of the Funk. It’s just done” (xiii).
We have no way out of the present, but we go there anyway. We just do.
Works Cited
Butler, Octavia. “The Monophobic Response.”_Z9(7r/: Matter: A Century
o f Speculative Fiction from the African Diaspora. Ed. Sheree R.
Thomas. New York: Aspect, 2000. 415-6. Print.
Clinton, George. “Foreword.” Funk: The Music, the People, and the
Rhythm o f the One. By Rickey Vincent. New York: St. Martin’s,
1996. xiii-xv.
—. “Interview, KALX Radio, 1985.” Qtd. in Funk: The Music, the
People, and the Rhythm o f the One. By Rickey Vincent. New
York: St. Martin’s, 1996. 4.
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