In "Marching to a Different Drummer" the figures and props surrounding the central African-American figure reveal him to be a white-collar worker who has received his university education on a sports scholarship. He "marches" with white America, but the pained look on his face and the ball chained to his foot demonstrate the extent to which his black heritage is both ever-present and ever-compromised. Colescott's work comments on white perceptions of blacks and black perceptions of whites and of themselves and shows how racism and self-imposed inferiority define black identity.

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