monuments

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• SOURCE: New York Times
  7/1/2020
  

  How Mount Rushmore Became Mount Rushmore

  Historian Gene A. Smith and Oglala Lakota activist Nick Tilsen offer contest for the creation of the monument, its relationship to tribal lands, and the legacies of Washington, Jefferson, Lincoln and Theodore Roosevelt from an indigenous point of view. 

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• SOURCE: Baltimore Sun
  6/29/2020
  

  Confederate Monuments Are Coming Down. Now, What Do We Do About Memorials to Slaveholders like Washington and Jefferson?

  Historians Paul Finkelman, Martha S. Jones, and Kirk Savage discuss the legacies of such monuments and suggest how to reckon with the damage they, and the figures they represent, have caused.

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• SOURCE: WTOP
  6/28/2020
  

  Parents, Historians Urge DC’s Mayor Bowser To Initiate Wilson High Name Change

  Honoring a person like Wilson sends a poor message when in general, society should be honoring the ideals of diversity, respect, equality and inclusion said Judith Ingram, co-founder of the D.C. History and Justice Collective.

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• SOURCE: National Geographic
  6/29/2020
  

  As Monuments Fall, How Does The World Reckon With A Racist Past?

  Historian Kevin Gaines discusses the growing movement to challenge memorialization of racists in public places and suggests its cross-racial nature makes it harder to ignore. 

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• SOURCE: American Historical Association
  6/26/2020
  

  Erasing History or Making History? Race, Racism, and the American Memorial Landscape: July 2

  The American Historical Association will host a Zoom discussion of memorials and racism on July 2 at 12:30 PM EDT.

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• SOURCE: Cleveland Plain Dealer
  6/26/2020
  

  The Rap Against Christopher Columbus Statues Overlooks Their Origins

  by Jonathan Zimmerman

  The great achievement of the 20th-century United States was the integration of formerly excluded ethnics -- Italians, Irish, Jews, and others -- into full citizenship and equality. And the great tragedy was our failure to do the same for nonwhites, especially African Americans and Native Americans.

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• SOURCE: Washington Post
  6/23/2020
  

  Ken Burns: Our Monuments are Representations of Myth, Not Fact

  James Baldwin reflects on the complexity of "liberty" in the context of anti-black racism. 

• 
• SOURCE: Washington Post
  7/25/2020
  

  Yes, The Freedmen’s Memorial Uses Racist Imagery. But Don’t Tear It Down.

  by David W. Blight

  As a nation, let’s replace a landscape strewn with Confederate symbols with memorialization of emancipation. Tearing down the Freedmen’s Memorial would be a terrible start for that epic process.

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• SOURCE: Washington Post
  6/25/2020
  

  Yes, D.C.’s Emancipation Memorial Advances White Supremacy

  by Rebekah Bryer

  The argument that freed slaves commissioned the Emancipation Memorial is only half true; white officials used the funds but ignored designs that expressed a role for the enslaved in bringing about emancipation.

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• SOURCE: Wall Street Journal
  6/25/2020
  

  Monuments to a Complicated Past

  by Sean Wilentz

  Unless we can outgrow the conception of history as a simplistic battle between darkness and light, we will be the captives of arrogant self-delusions and false innocence.

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• SOURCE: WTOP
  6/22/2020
  

  Students of Robert E. Lee High in Fairfax County Call for Name Change

  Students of the school, 80% of whom are nonwhite, expressed their desire to stop memorializing the Confederate general. 

• 
• SOURCE: Vanity Fair
  6/23/2020
  

  “There Is No Excuse”: University of Mississippi Faculty Members Condemn Proposed “Shrine to White Supremacy”

  by Kiese Laymon

  For years members of the community have fought state legislators to have a Confederate statue removed. Faculty are releasing this statement in response to new plans for the memorial that would include its move to a newly renovated cemetery, “a shrine to white supremacy,” as one staff member and signatory puts it.

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• SOURCE: Charleston Post and Courier (SC)
  6/25/2020
  

  John C. Calhoun Statue Taken Down from its Perch above Charleston’s Marion Square

  The city's removal of John C. Calhoun's statue was much more difficult than anticipated. May we assume the same of his legacy? 

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• SOURCE: Vox
  6/24/2020
  

  Monument Avenue is Richmond’s Racist Row. Will Tearing it Down Redeem a City?

  Historians Kevin Levin, Karen Cox, Ashleigh Lawrence-Sanders, and Michael Dickinson weigh-in on the history behind the Virginia street with five Confederate monuments.

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• SOURCE: The New York Times
  6/23/2020
  

  This Monument to White Supremacy Hides in Plain Sight

  by Richard White

  The invisibility of Drake’s Cross in a San Francisco park may make it the most fitting monument to white supremacy in the country.

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• SOURCE: Daily Beast
  6/20/2020
  

  Erasing History? Um, History is Full of Torn-Down Monuments

  According to historian Sarah Bond, the practice goes all the way back to the ancient world.

• 
• SOURCE: Washington Post
  6/24/2020
  

  U.S. Marshals Told to Prepare to Protect Monuments Nationwide as Trump Targets People who Vandalize Structures during Protests

  A spokesman for the Marshals service said Wednesday, “We don’t confirm or deny any enforcement actions that we might take.”

• 
• SOURCE: Washington Post
  6/19/2020
  

  Removing Lost Cause Monuments is the First Step in Dismantling White Supremacy

  by Ashleigh Lawrence-Sanders

  Black activists have always understood that the symbols of the Confederacy are tied to current politics of racial subordination; removing symbols can't be the end of work toward justice. 

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• SOURCE: Washington Post
  6/19/2020
  

  Destroying Confederate Monuments isn’t ‘Erasing’ History. It’s Learning from It.

  by Keisha N. Blain

  Confederate monuments and symbols emerged in an effort to intimidate black Americans and uphold a revisionist — and racist — version of history. 

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• SOURCE: New York Times
  6/23/2020
  

  Will the Last Confederate Statue Standing Turn Off the Lights?

  A monument to Robert E. Lee in Richmond, Va., has become the site of an unlikely community space. That may change abruptly with new restrictions from the police.