Thoughts from the History Major: Propaganda of The Brownie's Book 10/29

[Lies My Teacher Told Me; James W. Loewen; Touchstone (1996)]

Thoughts from the History Major posted “Propaganda of The Brownie's Book 10/29” on Oct. 27. Its opening paragraph, and a link to the full post, are followed by a Comment we posted on the same date:

“Propaganda of The Brownie's Book 10/29”

When I first began reading the Du Bois article “Criteria of Negro Art” I wondered what connections I could make with The Brownie’s Book. Since Prof. Wells had told us that it was intended for children, I guess I picture it as an old time Highlights, but I was considerably struck by the letter in the ‘grownup’s corner.’ While I knew that text book history did not consider the contributions of African Americans until rather recently, I hadn’t thought of what it might feel like to be a child growing up with out role models or a mother unable to tell her child about the people the text books forgot. It was then I thought about what Du Bois said about propaganda. Read the full post

Comment

I would like to comment on the observation that text books did not teach the accomplishments of African Americans until recently. Prof. James Loewen brought this home to me powerfully in his 1996 book "Lies My Teacher Told Me". He documents the intentional exclusion of Black contributions from textbooks, because of the belief of publishers that school boards and textbook adoption committees don't wish to see such facts included.

I read the book while compiling books and recordings to document the contributions made to classical music by people of African descent. I used my findings for a website which is now known as www.AfriClassical.com It profiles 52 Black composers, conductors and instrumental performers of classical music. A few months ago I started a companion AfriClassical Blog to deal with some of the hundreds of additional classical artists who have been brought to my attention.

Over a period of seven years of maintaining the website, I have found that year after year, curious students and teachers have continued to come to my site for material which I believe should have been made part of textbooks by now. I first focused on Le Chevalier de Saint-Georges (1745-1799), the son of a slave who was educated with the sons of the nobility, and who became the finest fencer in France before he was a fashionable composer, virtuoso violinist and conductor of the best orchestras in Paris. During the French Revolution, Colonel Saint-Georges commanded 1,000 volunteers of color, and heroically halted a military advance by a far larger force sent by the treasonous Gen. Dumouriez, secretly allied with Austria.

In 2003, CBC TV first aired a documentary called "Le Mozart Noir"; it was released on DVD in 2005. My name is in the credits because I made my research available for the production. It remains the only documentary film on Saint-Georges.

Why is the life of this amazing man of color still not presented in most History textbooks? While it is certainly true some Black classical composers and musicians are now mentioned, many other important musical figures and their works are still missing from textbooks today.

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