Hitler is an easy enemy; Saddam was an apt nemesis. Drawing attention away from slavery allows Americans to feel smugly superior. Nothing like that could happen in the land of the free, home of the brave. Americans are deluded into thinking that nothing evil has happened on our time. A slavery museum will force Americans to take responsibility for a slave trade it perpetuated and for a plantation economy it profited from. Remembering slavery is therefore a frightening and controversial prospect for many Americans. It is easier to point the fingers where others went wrong than it is to face the darkness within our own past.
The memory museum reminds visitors that slavery was not limited to the plantation; it was a way of thinking that in many ways persists till this day. For instance, exploiting human beings for economic expediency appears to be a capitalistic norm in our country. Slavery still exists today in the income disparity between the wealthiest and poorest Americans. The association between race and poverty can also be traced to slavery and these are the issues that a memory museum can address frankly. No memory museum of slavery would be complete without an explication of African-American history, which is sorely lacking from public school curricula.
School children learn more about Booker T. Washington than about W.E.B. DuBois. The memory museum changes...
In 1837, Lincoln took highly controversial position that foreshadowed his future political path. He joined with five other legislators out of eighty-three to oppose a resolution condemning abolitionists. In 1838, he responded to the death of the Illinois abolitionist and newspaper editor, Elijah Parish Lovejoy, who was killed while defending his printing presses from a mob of pro-slavery citizens in Alton, Illinois. In a statesmanlike manner, Lincoln gave a cautious
As activists in women's liberation, discussing and analyzing the oppression and inequalities they experienced as women, they felt it imperative to find out about the lives of their foremothers -- and found very little scholarship in print" (Women's history, 2012, para. 3). This dearth of scholarly is due in large part to the events and themes that are the focus of the historical record. In this regard, "History was
Those officials who did look at the question of Japanese intentions decided that Japan would never attack, because to do so would be irrational. Yet what might seem irrational to one country may seem perfectly logical to another country that has different goals, values, and traditions. (Kessler 98) The failures apparent in the onset of World War II and during the course of the war led indirectly to the creation
Black women enjoy most of these same relationships, which the study creators did not anticipate. The studies also discovered that even those aging blacks with few family members are good at establishing a network of close friends and distant relatives for support and kinship. For example, the study found if a man has no children, he might become increasingly close to his nieces, nephews, and cousins in an attempt
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