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seasonal words
Jul. 5th, 2018 08:46 pmI usually link to the NPR reading of the Declaration of Independence, so here it is:
https://www.npr.org/2018/07/04/623836154/a-july-4-tradition-npr-reads-the-declaration-of-independence
We were distracted briefly, wondering whether Ofeibea Quist-Arcton had recorded her section in Dakar (if you don't listen to NPR much, that might seem like an odd concern, but her pronunciation of her home town is so distinctive that it usually pops to mind, wherever the actual dateline of a story is).
I had seen part of "1776" on TCM recently, and while that helps remind me why they deleted the anti-slavery bits, it still makes me mad. In a conversation we had months ago, I said that subsequent horribleness was obvious to them at the time, and they were responsible. Arthur said something about kicking the can down the road, and of course I had to look it up (GW died before canned food, but TJ and therefore JA lived long enough for literal can kicking to be possible).
On the 3rd, I joined the Boston group reading Frederick Douglass's 1852 oration "What to a slave is the fourth of July?"
There were 53 parts, as set up by the printed version the Mass Humanities handed out. The first few readers were designated in advance (organizers, politicians), but after that we just lined up and took the next part as it came. We didn't run out of readers. I counted backwards enough to mentally rehearse my part a bit before getting to the microphone.
"What, am I to argue that it is wrong to make men brutes, to rob them of their liberty, to work them without wages, to keep them ignorant of their relations to their fellow men, to beat them with sticks, to flay their flesh with the lash, to load their limbs with irons, to hunt them with dogs, to sell them at auction, to sunder their families, to knock out their teeth, to burn their flesh, to starve them into obedience and submission to their masters? Must I argue that a system thus marked with blood, and stained with pollution, is wrong? No! I will not. I have better employment for my time and strength than such arguments would imply."
I’m in this photo, 3rd in line to read, partly obscured. White dress with blue flowers. I don't know whom to credit for the photo, but it was posted by Mass Humanities, I think.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DhM3URNWAAILc2l.jpg
I think the Boston event was the first, ten years ago, but now they happen all over the state and elsewhere. A great deal of it currently relevant. Also, I found some of it pretty snarky in a very rhetorical way. The exhibit of photographs of FD (claimed to be the most photographed person of the 19th century) at the African American Museum on Joy Street (actually Smith Court, I think) has been extended. I don't know if there was a photographer when he gave the talk, but I'll try to find out.
https://www.npr.org/2018/07/04/623836154/a-july-4-tradition-npr-reads-the-declaration-of-independence
We were distracted briefly, wondering whether Ofeibea Quist-Arcton had recorded her section in Dakar (if you don't listen to NPR much, that might seem like an odd concern, but her pronunciation of her home town is so distinctive that it usually pops to mind, wherever the actual dateline of a story is).
I had seen part of "1776" on TCM recently, and while that helps remind me why they deleted the anti-slavery bits, it still makes me mad. In a conversation we had months ago, I said that subsequent horribleness was obvious to them at the time, and they were responsible. Arthur said something about kicking the can down the road, and of course I had to look it up (GW died before canned food, but TJ and therefore JA lived long enough for literal can kicking to be possible).
On the 3rd, I joined the Boston group reading Frederick Douglass's 1852 oration "What to a slave is the fourth of July?"
There were 53 parts, as set up by the printed version the Mass Humanities handed out. The first few readers were designated in advance (organizers, politicians), but after that we just lined up and took the next part as it came. We didn't run out of readers. I counted backwards enough to mentally rehearse my part a bit before getting to the microphone.
"What, am I to argue that it is wrong to make men brutes, to rob them of their liberty, to work them without wages, to keep them ignorant of their relations to their fellow men, to beat them with sticks, to flay their flesh with the lash, to load their limbs with irons, to hunt them with dogs, to sell them at auction, to sunder their families, to knock out their teeth, to burn their flesh, to starve them into obedience and submission to their masters? Must I argue that a system thus marked with blood, and stained with pollution, is wrong? No! I will not. I have better employment for my time and strength than such arguments would imply."
I’m in this photo, 3rd in line to read, partly obscured. White dress with blue flowers. I don't know whom to credit for the photo, but it was posted by Mass Humanities, I think.
https://pbs.twimg.com/media/DhM3URNWAAILc2l.jpg
I think the Boston event was the first, ten years ago, but now they happen all over the state and elsewhere. A great deal of it currently relevant. Also, I found some of it pretty snarky in a very rhetorical way. The exhibit of photographs of FD (claimed to be the most photographed person of the 19th century) at the African American Museum on Joy Street (actually Smith Court, I think) has been extended. I don't know if there was a photographer when he gave the talk, but I'll try to find out.
