Library of Congress's Blog, page 79

Guest Blog: For Love, War, and Tribute: Featherwork in the Early Americas

This is the second in series of guests posts by Giselle Aviles, the 2019 Archaeological Research Associate in the Geography and Map Division, where she is delving into the treasures of the William and Inger Ginsberg Collection of Pre-Columbian Textiles and the Jay I. Kislak Collection of the History and Archaeology of the Early Americas. It was first published on the Library’s Worlds Revealed blog by John Hessler. We’re republishing a slightly edited version here so that more people can get a glimpse of her work. Aviles is undertaking an ethnographic analysis of Andean textiles and Mesoamerican ceramics, tracing and unfolding their stories. She is a former Research Fellow of the Quai Branly Museum-Martine Aublet Foundation in Paris, and has conducted fieldwork in Puerto Rico, Haiti, Algeria, France and Spain. She has come to the Library through the Hispanic National Internship Program sponsored by the Hispanic Association of Colleges and Universities (HACU).

From vivid reds, blues, oranges and yellows, to iridescent turquoise and purple, feathers can resemble a perfectly designed suit — delicately colored, with every detail evoking the sublime perfection of nature. It does not take much to imagine this kind of admiration for feathers many centuries ago in the early Americas, with objects like the ancient miniature tunic (shown below), part of the William and Inger Ginsberg Collection, looking as if it were made yesterday.

Miniature Tunic. Ica Valley, Peru, 1200-1350 A.D. William and Inger Ginsberg Collection, Geography and Map Division. Photo by Giselle Aviles, Archaeological Research Associate, Library of Congress.

Scholars believe that this tunic (28.3 x 28.9 cm) comes from Ica Valley in Peru and that it dates from 1200-1350 AD. Heidi King, senior research associate at The Metropolitan Museum of Art, says these tunics were likely made as offerings to the deceased or as a wak’a (an object that represents something revered in Quechua), substituting for full-size garments. A close examination reveals that both sides have small openings for arms, and that there was once an opening at the top, now sewn, presumably for the head. It gives us deep insight into the techniques and skilled manipulation of feathers and cotton that Andean artisans utilized. We can see the meticulous nature of the craft,  weaving little by little, until all the feathers were in place, creating a masterful work of art.

Tunics like this are composites, part woven textile and part natural feathers. They can be difficult to trace by date. Many are attributed to the Nasca (1st B.C.-7th A.D.) and Huari  (7th-10th century) cultures because of their origin on the south coast of Peru. Although we do not have written documentation on feather workers from the Ica Valley of the 12-13th century A.D, later sources of information provide us some clues to their techniques and origin.

 

[image error]

[image error]

Ultraviolet and Visible Light Microscopy of the Ica Tunic. Photos and microscopy by Tana Villafana, Senior Research Scientist and Giselle Aviles, Archaeological Research Fellow, Library of Congress.

Love for feathers is found throughout the cultures of the early Americas, and there is rich historical documentation about them. Most of these are written from the post-conquest Spanish chroniclers’ point of view. Felipe Guaman Poma de Ayala, for example, a Peruvian noble of Inca origin, wrote El Primer Nueva Corónica y Buen Gobierno Compuesto por Don Phelipe Guaman Poma de Aialas (The First New Chronicle and Good Government) in about the 17thcentury. It narrates stories of the costumes, traditions, and political structures from centuries past. Although the miniature tunic pictured here doesn’t belong to the period that Guaman Poma described, some of what he says helps us put it in context.

Guaman Poma tells us that “young boys hunted birds with slings; they kept the flesh for food and the feathers for use in the production of cloth.” Feathers were part of the patrimony of the richest nobles, and were also composed of precious stones, pearls, and necklaces. Rich Inca houses could have aviaries full of big and small macaws, parrots, parakeets, kestrels, doves, along with other birds from across the continent. The Incas valued feathers for the burial of their beloved family members. Guaman Poma writes that for someone recently deceased, “they wash his body and dress him all with his clothes and feathers and silver or gold jewelry, and put him on some ‘andas’ and go to the procession. They sing, go jumping and crying as the costume says.”

Further information can be taken from the 1770 Cartas de relación. This is a later edition of letters to King Charles V from the conquistador Hernán Cortes. It also includes other images and notes by the Archbishop of Mexico, Francisco Antonio Lorenzana. The first pages of the book show an image of Cortes offering the king a globe, a symbol of the New World, and next to him is the indigenous Nahua, dressed in a customary feathered skirt. The bow and arrow on the ground remind us that the violent swords of the Spaniards have defeated them.

Archbishop Lorenzana explains in the prologue “that his [Cortes’] obligation, imposed by the Royal Councils and Laws, was to love them tenderly and care for the Indians as minors, giving them an abundant spiritual covenant, breaking bread in small parts and the livelihood provided for their capacity and complexion.” Despite this paternalistic attitude, Lorenzana adds that the Aztecs were very ingenious in the arts, “so much that having sent to Rome a garment of the high priest of them, Achcauhquitlenamacani, the Court was marveled, and having seen the silversmiths of Madrid some pieces and bracelets of gold that Hernan Cortés had sent to King Charles V, they confessed that they were inimitable in Europe.”

Title page from the 1770 edition of Cortes Letter to Charles V showing indigenous Nahua in feathered costume. Jay I. Kislak Collection, Library of Congress.

In a section of the book entitled, “The people, which before the conquest paid tribute to Emperor Moctezuma, and in what species and quantity,” the Aztecs tax obligations are spelled out. Feathers served as tributos since people from different towns had to pay taxes to Emperor Moctezuma with the different objects they manufactured. Cortés explains that these tributos had to be paid every year and included military adornments, dresses, blankets, huipiles (traditional garments) for the women, and dresses with feathers.

Page from the Historia de Nueva-España / escrita por su esclarecido conquistador Hernán Cortés ; aumentada con otros documentos, y notas, por el ilustrisimo Señor Don Francisco Antonio Lorenzana, Arzobispo de Mexico. Jay I. Kislak Collection, Library of Congress.

Finally, an interesting manuscript from the Kislak Collection contains the reflections of  the first Viceroy of New Spain, Arturo de Mendoza y Pacheco. Relación de las Ceremonias y Ritos y Población y Gobernación de los Indios de la Provincia de Michoacán reads almost like modern ethnography. Like Cortes, he recounts the trade of the Aztecs, and also how the Purépechas, rivals of Aztecs, divided their artisans into featherworkers, stonecutters, fishermen, painters, bow-makers, hunters, merchants, shoemakers and so on.

The uscuarecuri, Mendoza tells us, were craftsman who worked with feathers to make the dresses of their gods, using feathers from papagayos, herons, and many other birds.

Page from the Relacion de las ceremonias … de los Indios de la provencia de Mechoacan, 18th century. Jay I. Kislak Collection, Library of Congress.

Mendoza, Cortés, and Guaman Poma wrote about different cultures in different eras, but there is a continuity in their observations. Through them — and in a small tunic — we can see not only the value of feathers in the Ica Valley, but also the panorama of love, war and beauty that they represent across the ancient Americas.

New CRS Content Now Online

Less than half a year ago, I announced that the Library of Congress is providing Congressional Research Service (CRS) reports to the public for the first time. Since the launch of the CRS reports website, crsreports.congress.gov, the Library has made available all new or updated reports. Created for Congress by experts in CRS, the reports present a legislative perspective on the full range of topics before the U.S. Congress. The reports are written to be timely, nonpartisan, authoritative and objective.
 
Since launching, we’ve added hundreds of new reports and are working hard to include the back catalog of older CRS reports – a process that is expected to be complete later this month. Today, you can access more than 2,300 reports on topics ranging from the Small Business Administration to farm policy. 
 
Starting this week, the Library is making additional product types available on the site. The site now includes In Focus products, which are two-page executive level briefing documents on a range of policy issues. For example, recent topics include military medical malpractice and the Temporary Assistance for Needy Families (TANF) Block Grant. Another newly-added product type is the Insight, which provides short-form analysis on fast moving or more focused issues. Examples of topics include volcano early warning systems and Congressional Member Organizations. Users can filter by product type using the faceted search on the left hand of the search results page.
 
As we continue to add CRS products and identify ways to enhance the site, I hope you will engage with the material and explore the many other resources the Library makes available online. 

Pic of the Week: Dr. Carla Hayden Testifies Before Congress

It’s International Women’s Day, so we’re recognizing the celebration with this image of Carla Hayden, the first female Librarian of Congress, testifying before the U.S. Senate Committee on Rules and Administration earlier this week. Dr. Hayden was testifying as part of annual oversight hearings. The Library, she noted, received 1.9 million on-site visitors and more than 114 million visits to the Library’s websites.

[image error]

Librarian of Congress Carla Hayden testifies before the Senate Rules Committee, March 6, 2019. Photo by Shawn Miller.

A Soldier’s Story: Thomas Michael Martin

 

In Tom Martin’s life, the U.S. Army seemed like the family trade.

His dad, Ed, put in 29 years. His mom, Candy, 38. Erika (Noyes) Holownia, his fiancé, graduated from West Point in 2005, the same year as Tom. They served in Iraq together. She flew helicopters to airlift injured soldiers; he ran a sniper team. When she choppered into his base, he’d run out and say “Hi” for the two minutes she was on the ground.

“I love Calvin and Hobbes, watching movies and the Army,” he wrote in one of his popular blog posts. He also like the Cincinnati Bengals, the University of Arkansas Razorbacks, beer (Guinness) and scotch (Glenlivet). His friends razzed him that he’d stay in the Army until he had “forty eleven years of service.”

[image error]

Candy, Tom and Ed Martin braving the cold for an Army-Navy game. Thomas Martin Collection, Veterans History Project, Library of Congress, AFC2001/001/113364 (PH02)

He did not get that many.

Tom’s story, organized into five neat manila folders and two oral histories completed by his parents under the Gold Star Family Voices Act in the Veterans History Project, is one of the recent, moving additions to the Library’s 108,000-and-counting story collection of the lives of veterans from World War I forward. Veterans use everything to tell of their stories — on-camera interviews, emails, drawings, photographs, military paperwork — and thousands of volunteers use the project’s guidelines to help them organize it.

“These aren’t dusty documents on a shelf,” says Megan Harris, Senior Reference Specialist for the project, holding the folders that tell Tom’s story. “These are things that are very, very personal.”

Some of the stories are dramatic. Some are simple. All of them are tiles in the historical mosaic. Tom’s is a short story, but is true in fact and in its unadorned honesty. It is beautiful that way.

It goes like this.

Thomas Michael Martin was born in 1980 in Huron, South Dakota. The family left shortly thereafter and wound up in Cabot, Ark. He was active in church, 4-H, played in the school band, and went from Boy Scout to Eagle Scout. After high school, he enlisted in the Army and, in due time, wound up at West Point.

As a cadet, he started on the rugby team. He got his Parachutist Badge. He went to Ranger School and got the tab for that, too. He also fell in love with Erika, his fellow cadet. They are a handsome couple, him tall and broad-shouldered; she shorter and wiry. They seem to be on the verge of laughter in all their pictures. His first posting was at Fort Richardson, Alaska. About a year after graduation, she flew to visit him for the Labor Day weekend.  They took a cruise tour of the Kenai Fjords. When the ship paused at a glacier, he was ready. As he later wrote on his blog:

“We were facing the ice and I hugged her from behind and started talking about how life was perfect when we were together and how I wanted that in the future. I talked about all the trips we’ve taken and the good times we’ve spent together and how I thought we both wouldn’t mind doing stuff like that for the rest of our lives….I turned her around so she was facing me I got down on one knee and brought out the ring and asked her to marry me. She rather adamantly said yes and as I put the ring on her finger the people around us started clapping and cheering. It was perfect.”

They made plans for the wedding. But first, they both had active duty stints in Iraq. They were headed to a dangerous region south of Baghdad, between Sunni and Shiite areas; her unit would be in support of his.

It was an ironic posting. Tom’s mother, Candy, served an active tour (as a warrant officer) in that area from 2005-6.

“We’ll be fine,” he wrote on his blog.

For a year, he was. He was a 1st Lieutenant in Troop C, 1st Squadron, 40th Calvary, 4th Brigade Combat Team, detailed as Scout Sniper Platoon Leader. He went on more than 300 missions and walked more than 600 miles on active duty, his family later noted.

On October 14, 2007, in the dead of night, his unit was on patrol when they came under attack. Shots were exchanged. At 1:21 a.m., one of those rounds found Tom. Then another. They did their work, there in the darkness, deep in the night. Frantic radio calls for help. A helicopter rushed to pick him up. “I knew it was Tom right away,” Erika later told Maxim magazine, when she heard the call go out.

Everyone did everything they could. But 27 minutes later, Thomas Michael Martin’s heart stopped beating. The casualty category, on the military form that listed his passing, was as terse as it was final: “Killed in Action.”

He was 27. He was buried in West Point National Cemetery.

But his story, his life and what it meant, to his country and to those who loved him, kept going. Erika was offered a chance to transfer, but stayed in Iraq to finish her posting. “At least if I was in Iraq, I stood a chance of helping somebody else. And potentially that next person we picked up would be somebody else’s Tom,” she told Maxim. The family set up a memorial foundation his name. Candy served as national president of American Gold Star Mothers Inc. She and Ed have devoted their retirement to a slew of volunteer groups serving soldiers.

It’s a fine and touching military family story, tinged by heartbreak and sacrifice. It lingers with you, after the folders are closed and the papers put away. Its resting place is the Thomas Michael Martin Veterans History Project Collection.

[image error]

Tom in his US Military Academy uniform and his mother in her Army dress uniform. Thomas Martin Collection, Veterans History Project, Library of Congress, AFC2001/001/113364 (PH05).

 

 

 

Inquiring Minds: Researching Women’s History at the Library

[image error]

Stephanie Salinas (left) and Lorena Rodriguez in the Manuscript Reading Room. Photo by David Rice.

For years now, Saundra Rose Maley has encouraged her English composition students at Montgomery College in Montgomery County, Maryland, to think of themselves as detectives. The setting for their investigations: the Manuscript Division of the Library of Congress. Their task: to scout out primary sources for novel or surprising details about historical figures and write a research paper about their findings.

Late last year, Maley shared her thoughts about the assignment in a blog interview. “Every semester, there are at least five, maybe more, students who turn out to be excellent researchers and discover that they really like doing the work,” she said. “Some even decide to change their majors when they discover something intriguing about their research subject.”

Now two of Maley’s students — Lorena Rodriguez and Stephanie Salinas — talk about their experience doing research at the Library. Both chose to explore papers of notable women in American history. We are publishing their comments today as part of the Library’s celebration of Women’s History Month.

Tell us a little about your background.

Rodriguez: I was born in El Salvador and came to the United States when I was 10 years old. I live in Laurel, Maryland, with my parents, younger sister and twin sister. I am majoring in business at Montgomery College.

Salinas: I was born and raised in Washington, D.C., but my family is originally from El Salvador. I transferred to Montgomery College in 2018 from Trinity Washington University. I am majoring in general studies while I complete my prerequisites for nursing. I also volunteer at the Children’s National Hospital, and I have volunteered at other local clinics.

What was your reaction when you first heard about the assignment?

Rodriguez: I had high expectations, because history is something I’m passionate about. But I was a little concerned about going to the Library of Congress for research – I had never been to the Library before, and I did not know what to expect.

Salinas: When I first heard about the assignment, I was a bit intimidated, because I had never worked with primary sources before. But I love doing research and learning about new things. Looking back, Professor Maley’s class was one of my favorites. It challenged me and taught me a lot about primary sources and other scholarly resources.

Who did you research and how did you start?

Rodriguez: I decided to research Clare Boothe Luce, because she was a politician and a writer – that got my attention immediately. I love to write, and I’m interested in politics. The fact that she was a woman made it feel more personal and made me even more curious to research her story. I started by setting a calendar with deadlines and outlines. I also asked Professor Maley as many questions as I could about Luce and searched for biographies and books about her.

Salinas: I researched Elizabeth Blackwell, the first women to receive a medical degree in the United States. I chose her because I’m interested in a career in the medical field, and I want to understand the history of women in medicine. Also, I am really passionate about women in male-dominated industries and occupations, and the Library has an extensive collection of her family’s manuscripts. I started by looking at finding aids about Blackwell, and then I did some research on my own before heading to the Library. I worked with microfilms there, which definitely took some time to get used to.

What interesting or surprising discoveries did you make?

Rodriguez: I made many interesting discoveries. But in the diary of Luce’s daughter, Ann Clare Brokaw, I discovered that Luce and her daughter did not have a great relationship – Brokaw complained about her mother’s attitude. Another interesting discovery was Luce’s relationship with Bernard Baruch. I read quite a few letters between the two that made it seem as if their friendship was very intimate. In one letter, Baruch complained about Luce not returning a message.

Salinas: I was completely unaware of all the struggles Blackwell faced growing up and while pursuing her education. I came to the conclusion that she was actually a really sad individual. She did so much and contributed to science in so many ways. But looking at several of her letters, you can really see how alone she felt even though she was surrounded by all these people. Still, she was a true inspiration to so many women in her time who wanted to pursue medical careers.

What was your experience like working at the Library?

Rodriguez: My experience was great. When I arrived at the Manuscript Division, a staff member helped my friend and I get started. From that moment until I finished my research, the staff was very polite and helpful.

Salinas: I have lived in the District of Columbia my whole life, but I had never visited the Library. My first visit, I got lost and went to the Jefferson Building instead of the Madison Building. Getting lost was probably one of the best things that happened to me, because the Jefferson Building is beautiful, and the staff is great. Working at the Library was a true honor. The staff of the Manuscript Division was really helpful – Patrick Kerwin of the division suggested certain boxes to look at, and other staff taught me to use the microfilm. My favorite boxes were the one including articles and books Blackwell had written. I also loved looking at the miscellaneous folder, because you never knew what interesting thing you were going to discover that day.

How would you describe the value of the assignment?

Rodriguez: It was important to me, because it took me out of my comfort zone and challenged me to do something I wouldn’t normally do. It made me realize how much I can genuinely enjoy going to the Library of Congress and doing research for myself.

Salinas: I learned a lot about myself as a writer and a researcher. I enjoyed how the assignment challenged me to look at primary sources, something I had never done before. Anyone would be lucky to take Professor Maley’s course. I was kind of upset that it eventually came to an end. I really encourage anyone who wants to look at primary sources to go to the Manuscript Division at the Library, because you never know what you are going to discover.

Pic of the Week: James Baldwin’s “Little Man, Little Man”

[image error]

Photo by Shawn Miller.

Aisha Karefa-Smart, James Baldwin’s niece, reads from a recently released edition of “Little Man, Little Man: A Story of Childhood,” the only children’s book Baldwin wrote, at a Library of Congress panel discussion on Feb. 28, 2019. Karefa-Smart, a D.C.-based author, wrote the book’s afterword. The book was originally written in 1971, when Baldwin was living in the south of France, the same time and place in which he wrote “If Beale Street Could Talk.” The 120-page novel tells of the adventures of four-year-old TJ – in real life, his nephew and Karefa-Smart’s brother, Tejan Karefa-Smart, who is now a photographer in Paris.

African-American History Month: ‘Native Son,’ Uncensored

This post is republished from the January–February issue of LCM, the Library of Congress Magazine. The entire issue is available online.

[image error]

Richard Wright, 1943. Photo by Gordon Parks.

In his classic novel “Native Son,” Richard Wright tells the story of a poverty-stricken young black man who takes a job as a chauffeur to a white family in Chicago, accidentally kills the daughter and tries to cover it up.

For decades, the film version of “Native Son” didn’t tell the whole story — the result of censorship before its U.S. release. Only in recent years has the original version been available, thanks to a restoration done by the Library of Congress.

The film was shot in Argentina by French director Pierre Chenal from a screenplay written by Wright, who also (and unusually) starred as the lead character, Bigger Thomas.

“Native Son” premiered in Argentina in 1951 but was heavily censored for its U.S. release. Censors cut, among other things, comments about white “race hatred,” shortened sequences depicting Thomas’ consultations with lawyers and his murder trial and removed scenes showing a white lynch mob and police violence.

Those cuts resulted in another loss: the near-disappearance of the original version.

For some six decades, the censored version of “Native Son” was the only one available — until the Library restored the original film to its original 107 minutes using a 16mm Argentine print and an international version discovered in an abandoned nitrate film vault in Puerto Rico.

The Library documents the original film in another way, too. Its Copyright Deposit Descriptions collection — material acquired through copyright submissions — holds the “dialogue continuity,” a transcription of the final version of the film complete with corrections, amendations and passages struck by censors. In one scene, censors cut a scene in which Thomas kills a footlong rat in the family apartment, softening the depiction of brutal living conditions. In another, censors delete a discussion about smashing the Jim Crow system.

In the Library’s collections, however, Wright’s original vision lives on, both on film and paper, for future audiences. Scroll down to view a portion of the dialogue continuity acquired by the Library through copyright deposit. A larger version is available in the printed LCM.

[image error]

This transcribed page from the final version of “Native Son” shows cuts marked for the film’s U.S. release.

New Online: Educating the Public about Education

This is a guest post by Amanda Reichenbach about a new American Archive of Public Broadcasting (AAPB) collection covering education reporting on public television. The AAPB is a collaboration between the Library of Congress and the Boston public broadcaster WGBH. Reichenbach worked on the release while interning last summer at the Library’s John W. Kluge Center. The previous summer, in an internship with the Library’s Junior Fellows Program, she worked with newly digitized material related to the Watergate scandal of the 1970s, made available online last year by the AAPB. Reichenbach has a B.A. in history from Yale University and teaches history at the Groton School in Massachusetts.

[image error]

Amanda Reichenbach

Last month, I contributed to a roundtable at the annual meeting of the American Historical Association (AHA) encouraging historians to use public broadcasting archives in their research. I attempted to show why broadcasts are useful to the historian in a different way than, say, newspapers or even commercial television. It seems to me, for example, that watching the Watergate hearings — the subject of my 2017 Library of Congress internship — draws the researcher into the drama that kept Americans glued to their televisions in summer 1973 more powerfully than simply reading the transcripts can do.

So why use public television archives to tell a story about education, the subject of my most recent internship? What special angle do these broadcasts offer? Three snapshots stand out to me, illustrating why I believe the videos in the exhibit have so much to offer historians.

Public Television and Student Activist Groups

In the early years of public television, documentary producers had special access to groups like the Students for a Democratic Society (SDS) thanks to a reputation for progressive coverage; student groups often blocked commercial networks from filming their meetings. “NET was the only network organization offered unrestricted access to the strategy meetings of these groups, giving NET an edge in its coverage of the student movement,” recounted historian Carolyn Brooks, referring to National Educational Television, an early attempt at a public television network, which operated from 1953 to 1972. This access resulted in a slew of fascinating films documenting campus unrest in the final years of the 1960s. One documentary, “Diary of a Student Revolution,” was filmed at the University of Connecticut in December 1968 during a wave of student protests surrounding on-campus recruiting by military contractors. One crew followed the UConn branch of SDS, while another monitored the president of the university, Homer D. Babbidge Jr. In the final cut, the viewer is a fly on two rather different walls, witnessing reactions to events on both sides of the battle simultaneously. Such compelling cinema was made possible by the implicit trust the student groups had for public television producers. Listen to a clip below.

{mediaObjectId:'812BCD30D45A00A0E0538C93F11600A0',playerSize:'mediumStandard'}

Public Television to Build Investment in Local Institutions

In the 1980s, after public television had gained more traction, local school boards saw the medium as an opportunity to build investment in their schools. From Rocky Mountain PBS in Denver, to WCTE in Cookeville, Tennessee, to Southern Oregon Public Television and the New Jersey Network, school administrators found their way onto the television schedule. These broadcasts capture one local institution — public television — supporting another — the public school system — working together toward the broader goals of community growth and democratic citizenship. One of the values of the AAPB collection is that it does not just capture history from the perspective of major cities, but also from local communities across the country as they cope with new national problems.

[image error]

The broadcast “Their School? Your School!” calls attention to building projects needed by New Jersey’s public schools.

Excellence in Education Coverage

For years, John Merrow, one of the most well-respected education journalists, found his home in public broadcasting. Following the publication of “A Nation at Risk: The Imperative for Educational Reform” in 1983, television coverage of educational stories expanded. However, the education beat tended to go to entry-level journalists and had the distinct flavor of “youth at risk” sensationalism. Merrow bucked this trend with thoughtful commentary on the MacNeil/Lehrer NewsHour and in his stand-alone documentaries, collectively called “The Merrow Report.” With his commitment to asking tough questions and following up on stories, Merrow set the gold standard for what education coverage should look like, all on public television.

These are just a few of the examples from the archive of public education reporting. But they reflect public television’s goal: to educate and serve the public. In pursuit of this goal, member stations have produced compelling, thoughtful local programs like these and many more over the past 50-plus years. This content is a gold mine for the historian.

New Online: Occupational Culture of Home Health-Care Workers

This post by Stephanie Hall of the American Folklife Center was first published on the center’s blog, “Folklife Today.”

[image error]

Home health-care worker Nargiza Turanova (right) being interviewed with assistance from a translator (left).

An important new oral history collection documenting the lives and careers of home health-care workers in Oregon is now available on the Library of Congress’ website. The American Folklife Center recently announced the release of “Taking Care: Documenting the Occupational Culture of Home Health-Care Workers.” This fieldwork is part of the center’s Occupational Folklife Project and the seventh such collection to be put online.

In 2014, Professor Bob Bussel and his colleagues at the University of Oregon Labor Education and Research Center in Eugene, Oregon, received an Archie Green Fellowship from the American Folklife Center to conduct oral history interviews with workers who provide home-based care for the elderly and the disabled throughout the state of Oregon. Bussel and his team worked closely with the Service Employees International Union (SEIU), Local 503, to record 35 in-depth interviews with home health-care workers, an occupation that was not previously represented in the American Folklife Center archive.

The collection’s interviews with the health-care workers took place primarily in the workers’ homes and at the offices of SEIU Local 503 in Eugene, Portland and Salem, Oregon, as well at as the office of the American Federation of State County and Municipal Employees in Grants Pass, Oregon.

Interviews were conducted primarily in English, although a few were conducted in Russian. Interviewees ranged from long-time home health-care workers to individuals who had more recently joined the profession. Many interviews also touched on the role of their union, SEIU, in training individual workers, establishing professional standards and enforcing equitable pay and benefits.

“Taking Care” is part of the multiyear Occupational Folklife Project of the American Folklife Center to document workers in contemporary America. Over the past eight years, supported by the American Folklife Center’s competitive Archie Green Fellowships program, more than 40 researchers and research teams throughout the United States have received funding to document oral histories with workers in a wide variety of trades. Interviewees include ironworkers, hairdressers, electricians, domestic workers, longshoremen, funeral home employees, trash collectors, gold miners, racetrack workers, tobacco farmers and many more working Americans from all sectors of contemporary society. Through the project, oral histories of hundreds of American workers — stories about their skills and work routines, legendary jobs (good and bad), respected mentors, flamboyant co-workers and more — are now part of America’s national record. These oral histories not only enrich our current understanding of our fellow Americans, but will also inform scholars and researchers for generations to come about the lives of contemporary workers at the beginning of the 21st century.

As American Folklife Center director Betsy Peterson noted, “With the launch of AFC’s innovative Occupational Folklife Project, researchers and members of the public will have direct access to hundreds of hours of compelling fieldwork. They will be able to hear the interviews and view fieldwork images and documentation that previously could be accessed only by visiting the Library in Washington.”

Learn More

Read about the history and development of the Occupational Folklife Project.
View a list of Archie Green fellows.

 

African-American History Month: First Pan-African Congress

This is a guest post by Ryan Reft, a historian in the Manuscript Division. It coincides with the centenary this month of the first Pan-African Congress.

[image error]

W.E.B. DuBois, 1919. Photo by C.M. Battey.

The problem of the 20th century is the problem of the color line, author and civil rights pioneer W.E.B. DuBois famously wrote in “To the Nations of the World,” the culminating address of the first Pan-African Conference, held in 1900 in London. Issued by the gathering of prominent black leaders from America, the West Indies and Africa, the address served as a cautionary yet aspirational statement: racism was a problem, but one the 30 delegates hoped to remedy as a new century dawned.

The conference was a first step toward not only uniting the black global diaspora, but also establishing a black internationalism that would come into its own in the years after World War II. The burgeoning political movement played a critical role in dismantling European colonialism in Africa and Asia.

In Feb. 1919, nearly two decades after the 1900 conference, the first Pan-African Congress took place, and once again DuBois was at the center of its proceedings. It was held adjacent to the Paris Peace Conference, the meeting convened to create a lasting peace following the Great War. The Pan-African Congress attempted to secure a place for peoples of African descent within the new world order.

The Library of Congress’ online exhibition, Echoes of the Great War: American Experiences of World War I, provides insights into the 1919 congress, which in many ways served as a model for future congresses, as a forum for uniting the global black diaspora and as a means for setting a course for black internationalism.

[image error]

A portrait of DuBois by the artist Frank Walts appeared on the cover of the Feb. 1918 issue of The Crisis, the NAACP’s publication.

DuBois traveled to France in Dec. 1918 as a representative of the NAACP, confident that the Paris Peace Conference provided the ideal setting for a parallel gathering of black dignitaries from around the world to discuss the international problem of racism. “Every attempt must be made to present the case of the Darker Races of the world to the enlightened public of Europe,” DuBois wrote to the NAACP’s board.

With the help of French parliamentarian and Senegalese native, Blaise Diagne, DuBois hastily arranged the congress. Unfortunately, few African representatives could attend because colonial governments refused to allow them passage to Paris; numerous African-Americans similarly failed to make the trek since the U.S. government blocked their attempts to reach the French capital.

Undaunted, DuBois, Diagne and 55 other participants from 15 nations gathered in Paris over three days in February. The largest cohort included African-Americans such as DuBois and activists Rayford Logan and Addie Waites Hunton.

The debates that unfolded were far from revolutionary and in many ways reflected both the diffuse nature of black internationalism and the Western biases of Diagne and Dubois. As a member of the French parliament and a beneficiary of colonialism, Diagne carefully avoided critiquing imperial France in any meaningful way. Educated in America and Germany, DuBois had absorbed Western thought in regard to Africa, and he never really pushed for the full autonomy of African colonies. Instead, he believed they needed Western guidance to bring them to political maturity. The system that emerged from the Paris Peace Conference reflected much the same view in that it failed to grant full autonomy to several former colonial states.

Some delegates to the Pan-African Congress were, however, more militant. They included delegates from the West Indies and others such as John Archer, leader of the newly created African Political Union and the first person of African descent elected to the English parliament. In a Nov. 1918 speech, Archer conveyed his general thoughts on African self-governance, reflecting the anti-imperial attitude he brought to the conference: “I am not asking,” he said. “I am demanding.”

[image error]

“The Congress is over. It was a hard job but of tremendous significance and importance,” wrote DuBois in a postscript to a report he submitted to the NAACP about the 1919 congress.

Whatever its flaws, the Pan-African Congress began the critical process of defining and implementing black internationalism. Three more congresses would take place in the 1920s, followed in 1945 by a Pan-African Congress held in Manchester, England. In attendance were African independence leaders Kwame Nkrumah, later prime minister and president of Ghana, and Jomo Kenyatta, later prime minister and president of Kenya, as well as the West Indian Marxist George Padmore. With a tide of independence movements gaining speed, the delegates called for an end to imperialism and for full independence. DuBois contributed to the gathering, but more as a respected figurehead rather than a driving force.

In the aftermath of World War II, during the 1950s and 1960s, much of Africa and Asia emerged newly independent. Given the agency of colonized peoples and the weakness of postwar Europe, imperialism no longer proved feasible. African-Americans, too, asserted their independence through the civil rights movement, with the Southern Christian Leadership Conference, the NAACP, the Student Non-Violent Coordinating Committee, the Congress on Racial Equality and others demanding racial equality.

The 1919 Pan-African Congress was a precursor to such international developments. Together with the experience of having chafed mightily under discriminatory policies of the segregated U.S. military during World War I, the congress instilled in African-Americans “a racial consciousness and racial strength that could not have been gained in a half century of normal living in America,” Addie Waites Hunton noted. The color line would continue to bedevil the West, and particularly the United States, but the stakes had been raised and the fight engaged. The results are still unfolding.