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Dream a World
Anew
by the National Museum of African American History & Culture
c.2016, Smithsonian Books
$40.00 / $47.00 Canada
288 pages
By Terri Schlichenmeyer
The Truth Cntributor
There’s so much you wish you’d kept.
Of course, you never thought of that when things were thrown
out: your grandmother’s favorite skirt, a poster your uncle
hung on his wall, an autographed picture of a minor star
from the 1920s. You’d cherish them today, but they’re gone
forever – or are they? In Dream a World Anew by
the National Museum of African American History & Culture,
you’ll find those kinds of things – and more.
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The new Smithsonian Museum began, in essence, with slavery.
In looking at the world’s history, slavery was nothing new;
it was even practiced in Africa in earlier centuries. This
time, however – beginning with Portuguese slave ships in
about 1440 – it would lead to the largest forced migration
of humans, ever: more than 12 million “Africans of enormous
cultural diversity” were shackled, marched cross-country and
transported across the Atlantic Ocean. The numbers were so
high that, just three-and-a-half centuries after it began,
“black people formed 20 percent of the population of the new
United States.”
Those new citizens fought on behalf of America in the
Revolutionary War and, because of the “chaos of war,” were
often freed after service. Slaves, in fact, often found it
easier to demand release then, a “First Emancipation” that
didn’t last long; by the early 1800s, the plantation system
ensured that slavery continued.
Freed at the end of the Civil War, black citizens formed
schools, started businesses, created products and founded
small towns, despite the onus of Southern sharecropping.
Many migrated north, where discrimination still existed but
Jim Crow laws weren’t quite as burdensome as they were in
the South and lynchings weren’t nearly as common. They
fought the same battles alongside whites (or in
racially-divided military companies) in other wars, then
they came home to more discrimination – which ultimately, in
part, led to a national fight for civil rights. And through
the centuries, African Americans left a trail of culture:
songs from Africa; unique dance “styles and techniques;”
minstrelsy and vaudeville acts; music, literature, art and
poetry.
I have to admit: at first, I was a little disappointed in
Dream a World Anew. What’s inside – the narrative –
seemed like everything I’d heard before. So I flipped the
book over and started paging through it again…
While it’s true that familiar names are everywhere in this
book –Wheatley, Turner, Douglass, Truth, Tubman – readers
will also be absolutely treated to stories and
mini-biographies from regular people throughout history. The
familiar names are rightfully here, but it’s those everyday
tales that I couldn’t get enough of.
And then there are the items you’ll see here, and in the
Smithsonian National Museum of African American History and
Culture: a skirt worn by someone’s enslaved grandmother.
Handbills, photographs, pottery, and medals, ships logs and
shoes, quilts and posters and bric-a-brac that all tells a
story.
No more disappointment. I loved this book, and I think you
will, too. If you enjoy history or if you’re planning a
visit to our Nation’s capital, Dream a World Anew is
a souvenir you’ll want kept.
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