My rating: 4 of 5 stars
As America continues to grapple with its checkered past in the wake of recent and ongoing Black Lives Matter protests, one period that is seeing a resurgence of interest is the Reconstruction period. Between the end of the Civl War and the Compromise of 1876, America made its first tentative forays into multiracial democracy and equality. Eric Foner’s book Reconstruction: America's Unfinished Revolution 1863-1877 is a critically praised history of that period worth a look. But what Dr. Gates contributes in this book is a cultural history of Reconstruction and the immediate period afterwards known as Redemption. While the racist imagery in this book can be hard to look at at times, Dr. Gates does a great job of showing the violent and propagandistic origins of many of today’s racial issues, but also how important Black artistic movements, particularly the Harlem Renaissance, were to resisting these racist narratives.
The first thing you need to know about this book is that it is not a straight narrative history. There are not a lot of dates or explanations of key historical events during the Reconstruction and Redemption periods. Thus the narrative can often go back and forth through time. One minute Dr. Gates may be talking about something that happened in 1886, then move forward to something in 1903, then back to 1877. What the reader needs to keep in mind though is that this book is structured thematically, with the first three chapters showing the origin and perpetuation of violent and racist myths about this period in this period, myths that still plague America to this day. Each chapter also comes with a section of photographs and images from the period, much of which is incredibly difficult to look at. It includes some of the most racist images I’ve ever seen in a book and it even includes some gruesome photographs of lynched Black Americans. Anyone who is triggered by violent or racist imagery, be warned.
The best part about this book is how it is all tied up neatly at the end. The last chapter is about Black Americans’ response to the white supremacy that robbed them of their rights and lives. As Black Americans struggled to define themselves as a people after the collapse of Reconstruction and the violent rise of white supremacy, it led to incredible instances of artistic expression. If the Redemption period from 1876 to the early 20th century is the counter-revolution that overturned Black Americans’ gains during Reconstruction and established white supremacy across much of the South, then Dr. Gates makes a great argument for considering the Harlem Renaissance as a cultural counter counter-revolution that sought to overturn the racist imagery and mythology of the Redemption period. Through the great works of artists and scholars such as W.E.B. Du Bois, Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, Alain Locke, and others, the racist stereotypes of Black Americans perpetuated by white supremacists became much more difficult to uphold, thus paving the way culturally for the Civil Rights Movement of the mid 20th century.
While this may not be the narrative history of Reconstruction I thought it would be, Dr. Gates nevertheless offers a valuable contribution to our understanding of this vital period of American history. Though the racist and violent imagery may be difficult to see, I would highly recommend this book to anyone interested in learning more about this period in American history that now feels more relevant than ever.
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