Standing Soldiers, Kneeling Slaves: Race, War, and Monument in Nineteenth-Century America, New Edition

by Kirk Savage

A history of U.S. Civil War monuments that shows how they distort history and perpetuate white supremacy

The United States began as a slave society, holding millions of Africans and their descendants in bondage, and remained so until a civil war took the lives of a half million soldiers, some once slaves themselves. Standing Soldiers, Kneeling Slaves explores how the history of slavery and its violent end was told in public spaces―specifically in the sculptural monuments that came to dominate streets, parks, and town squares in nineteenth-century America. Looking at monuments built and unbuilt, Kirk Savage shows how the greatest era of monument building in American history took place amid struggles over race, gender, and collective memory. Standing Soldiers, Kneeling Slaves probes a host of fascinating questions and remains the only sustained investigation of post-Civil War monument building as a process of national and racial definition. Featuring a new preface by the author that reflects on recent events surrounding the meaning of these monuments, and new photography and illustrations throughout, this new and expanded edition reveals how monuments exposed the myth of a "united" people, and have only become more controversial with the passage of time.

Genres: History, Nonfiction, Civil War, Art History, Art, Race, American History

296 pages, Paperback

First published November 3, 1997

Reviews

[Aaron Urbanski · Rating 5 out of 5]

Savage's story of monument making in the immediate decades after the American civil war demonstrates how the powerful members of a nation abandoned the ideas of emancipation and secured a social order that, to this day, elevates white manhood above all else. Savage's pages show the near impossibility of giving visual representation to an abstract concept, in this case a multi-racial citizenry with agency to stand for both individual and national values.

[Ashley · Rating 5 out of 5]

Standing Soldiers, Kneeling Slaves, by art and architecture historian Kirk Savage, presents a nuanced critique of post-Civil War memorial sculpture that emphasizes gender, race, and a rapidly shifting sense of nationalism. Savage argues that the ambiguous nature of the United States’ national identity after the Civil War is the defining factor in late 19th century memorial design. By examining the process of designing and building monuments to emancipation, Lincoln, the common soldier, and Lee, Savage demonstrates that this uncertainty about the new American identity influenced a variety of distinct memorial projects. Savage is, without a doubt, a “new art historian.” He spends as much time on formal analysis as on the history and social context of the era. The source material used in Standing Soldiers, Kneeling Slaves includes the correspondence of planning committees, artist plans that were never executed, and more traditional art history sources. One of Savage’s techniques is comparing a critical reading with the opinions of contemporary critics. This effectively underscores just how unfathomable a black body on a memorial was to 19th century observers. The disconnect between written descriptions of a monument and what he observes in the pieces is striking (for example, see page 42).

Many scholars of memorials refer to the collective memory as the motivating force behind memorials. Often, there is little discussion of the struggles involved in defining a collective and creating its memory. The collective memory is taken as a given. Savage’s discussion of the “subcollective memory” (125) provides a useful rhetorical device for acknowledging the tension between the “collective memory” of the majority and the kind of vernacular history that is passed down outside the sphere of memorials and public history.

As a reader, I was left wondering what happened to some of these less successful, or outright offensive, monuments. Although it was outside the scope of Savage’s project, learning about how contemporary politics revisit these sites could be an interesting method to explore the ongoing (re)definition of the American national identity. Similarly, some communities found that to express their membership in the new American identity they needed to replace their more artful memorials with the more typical single, standing soldier form (183). A larger discussion about the removal of memorials could add depth to Savage’s observations about the relationship between national identity, race, and sculpture.

Although the book does not discuss monuments built after about 1920, his analysis of the interaction between race and national identity in sculpture remains as relevant to today’s monuments. Were Princeton University Press to publish a new edition, I hope that Savage would add a new introduction or epilogue that extends his arguments forward to the new, and controversial, Dr. King Memorial on the National Mall. The sculpture of Dr. King, in particular, is dramatically different than the pieces that form the bulk of Savage’s analysis. Nevertheless, because the figure of King is not sculpted fully in the round, it suggests incompleteness and the continued applicability of some of Savage’s observations. This may indicate that the bulk of the US collective imagination can embrace Dr. King’s message but that there remains some tension between the goals of the Civil Rights Movement and the ongoing structural racism that plagues the US.

[Jessica (JT) Thelen · Rating 4 out of 5]

Great descriptions and examples, but could have been edited a bit more for concision (some repetition throughout). Very interesting read.

[MH · Rating 5 out of 5]

This examination of how the Civil War was memorialized in the late 19th Century is academic without being impenetrable, and it covers a lot of ground - representations of race and masculinity, art history and social history - tackling each of these topics thoroughly and clearly. Savage's central argument is that the North tried to imagine a national future (and largely failed) and the South tried to rewrite their recent past (and largely succeeded, as we see with our continued difficulties with Confederate monuments), and both groups contributed to an erasure of America's newly enfranchised African American citizenry. Savage is an art historian, and his close readings of various monuments and statuary combine nicely with histories of the artists, patrons and a changing civic society - it's an excellent book, smart, readable, and at times heartbreaking.

[Timothy · Rating 5 out of 5]

The public monuments controversy is not new. Kirk Savage explores the contested history and ultimate reactionary vision that led to the construction of these 19 century reactionary and racist monuments that shaped the public memory of the Civil War. Savage began his work as a graduate student and finished the book in the mid1990s. He does a terrific job of discussing the potential images and the ones that came to represent the Civil War. His insights are incisive and his writing is clear and jargon free.

[Carol Mcgarry · Rating 5 out of 5]

amazing insight into the choices we make about public art

[Victoria · Rating 4 out of 5]

blew my mind a little. this was really interesting.

[Lisa · Rating 3 out of 5]

An art history of civil war monuments.

[Michael Connor · Rating 4 out of 5]

Still-relevant discussion of the ways that white supremacists resuscitated the confederate cause, and sanitized slavery, through public monuments.

[Mariel · Rating 3 out of 5]

Savage examines public monuments sculptural representations of slavery and emanciapation. Both the iconography/visual language of sculpture and the function of public monuments are critical to his book. He argues that monuments offer a unique glimpse into a "collective consciousness" because they reflect a statement supported by the public and something that the creators intended as a permanent or definitive interpretation/understanding of an historical moment.

One of the more intriguing aspects of Savage's argument is that emancipation could only be represented through the figure of the white hero, Lincoln, with former slaves in subordinate and/or kneeling positions in contrast with Lincoln's proud, erect posture. Savage discusses examples in extreme detail and also examines plans for statues that were designed but never built. He offers a glimpse into "historical possibilities" that show potential for a completely reimagined visual and public language.

This study and approach borders on art history at times, but no so much to lose the historian completely. His points about composition and posture are clear enough regardless of the reader's background. I'm always thinking about memory, memorials, commemoration and history, and this book had ideas that I hadn't thought of before. I wish I had read it when I was writing about the Kent State memorials because the idea of permanent interpretation that is assumed by the creator of a monument would have helped me formulate my argument in a much better way. Oh well. Maybe next time.

[Alexandra · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a really fabulous book dealing with the complex and uneven process of memorialization during the period of American reconstruction. Kirk Savage manages a difficult interdisciplinary feat: he marries exacting archival research like the best American historian with a close, and even loving reading of some key monuments and sculptures. Rather than attempting to "reconstruct" black experiences or to simply condemn racist cultural actors, Savage wisely shifts balance to white self-understanding, and asks how memorials reflect or refract national narratives. Although philosophically sophisticated, this book is highly readable--in fact, after reading a few chapters for class, I went out and finished it!

[Wendy G · Rating 3 out of 5]

As far as historical narratives go, "Standing Soldiers, Kneeling Slaves" is a well-researched and pretty well-written. It's a blend of art history, American culture, Civil War-era history, and gender studies. The Civil War brought the end of black slavery in the US, but it did not bring racial equality. Because of prevailing ideas about whiteness and masculinity, black men were not considered appropriate subjects for public monuments to the Union, the Civil War, and even to Emancipation. This explains the plethora of statues of lone white male soldiers, standing with their rifles; and statues of Abraham Lincoln and Robert E. Lee.

[Warren Perry · Rating 3 out of 5]

Savage is simply a good historian. In SS, KS, he takes apart the psychological underpinnings of our monuments. Especially keen is his analysis of the race configuration in monumental tribute. I'm pretty sure I had walked by the statue of Lincoln (on the cover) a hundred times-- it is in Lincoln Park around the block from our house) without giving the symbolic gestures of the portrayed emancipation a second thought.

[Justin · Rating 4 out of 5]

This book is awesome. It analyzes race and nationalism through the lens of sculpture and art while staying interesting and readable and avoiding devolving into a joyless diatribe of art history jargon. Read it.

[Cameron · Rating 4 out of 5]

"Public monuments are the most conservative of commemorative forms precisely because they are meant to last, unchanged, forever. (...) The irony is that now, in the twenty-first century, we must work so hard to recover that voice once thought to be eternal."

[Christy · Rating 5 out of 5]

This is a really interesting monument study of race as represented before, during, and after the civil war. Important for any student of history or public art.

[Sean Chick · Rating 3 out of 5]

Good thesis and idea. Too bad the book is poorly written in general.

[Erika · Rating 5 out of 5]

Quite useful....and while there are a few places I wish he had extended his thesis, it opens up sufficient doors to my own research.