"Reverse Self-Segregation"

Gretchen Sorin's "Driving While Black" includes two examples of "reverse self-segregation". The first took place at the Shady Rest Golf and Country Club in Scotch Plains, New Jersey, which was "the first black golf club in the nation" and "a gathering place for the black upper class". Duke Ellington and other jazz greats played summer concerts there to two sets of dancers: African Americans inside, white locals in the parking lot. Similarly, Prince's in Nashville served their "hot chicken" to African Americans who came in through the front door while the whites entered through the back. In each case, the white desire for African American culture inverted segregation for a moment. (Andrew Shields, #111words, 18 July)