Questions via zoom. When i was a kid growing up or 12 years old or so, i went to a flea market. There were people there selling objects. It,rchased it, and i broke and it was not a philosophical thing. I just did not like the object. I do not remember the second object or the word or the fourth, but i started collecting , and basically i have been collecting for several decades. I did not start out with the anticipation of creating a museum. Becoming not just a collection as teaching tools, i happened much later. Not everyone where you grew up was collecting these items. What was it that me to keep doing it . What was it that made you keep doing it . I dont know. I have been thinking about that a lot. My ancestry, there are people from the bahamas, from trinidad, spain, Indigenous People of this country. I was a multiracial, black identify person in the jim crowh a time when was not as strong as it has been, but there was more of a presence. Historically black my schools, my high school were all black. I just lived in a segregated environments. I left there and when i went , i think it was there that i started making the connection to satisfy some weird interest i had. Using this as a way to think about jim crow and Race Relations in the u. S. You mentioned jim crow. I imagine not everybody really knows the definition, what is jim crow . People come in the museum, peoplete frankly, most dont know the accurate story of jim crow. 1820s, a struggling white stage actor he was the first probably to become famous doing it. That hadt long before taken off in the united states. His stage name was jim crow. At some point it became a synonym for the way that blacks were mocked and belittled. Will share this with you if i had to do it again, i might not call this the jim crow. Ewseum of racist memorabilia im not sure what i would call that namee reason seemed so appealing at the time. Its a nice umbrella term. The more that these objects, these everyday objects were used weergird the jim crow will call this the Jim Crow Museum. We or four projects that are not from the jim crow era. That despite progress in the u. S. , that we still have , values, and behavior that are, white frankly, indicative of the jim crow mindset. Can you begin telling us about some of the objects you selected for this . I certainly will. I keep in mind that the Jim Crow Museum focuses on everyday objects. We do not typically spend a lot of time inking about racist organizations. Objects areour everyday objects. So here is one that blends both of those things. Because this represents andones memory of the kkk yet it is an everyday objects. I challenge you. What do you think the function of these are. Promoting a white supremacist mastic terrorism group. Where would you expect this to be in the home . Maybe on some kind of lamp . David not a bad answer. These were treetops for the christmas tree. That shows you how the ideas reflected in the object society. The entire this is an example. This doll here. I think this was the 2008 election. Doll plays into the idea that African Americans are not really human. More akin to sapiens, and this is a way of then candidate barack obama was actually a monkey. I am all for reading poetry from the classical people. And you think, this is so powerful. This really says something amazing about the human spirit, and then you are reminded he refers to black people as monkeys. We have those ideas morphing into the president. Let me give you an example. I went into a store and i will even tell you what it rhymes with. There were eight cookie jars and they were all animals. And when you opened the mouth of the dog, embarked. And when you opened the mouth of the pig, it made pig sounds, but when you opened the mouth of the alligator, it made this sound. That sure is some tasty cookies. David obviously, that went into this long history and culture and jokes and movies that black people are not actually people. They are food for other people. This is an everyday object sitting on store shelves. We do a lot over the years, we have done a lot of trainings or conversations with different groups, or corporate leaders. I had about six or eight leaders from the company where this was produced and i told them what this object was. I told them it is sold in the stores. And it was so horrifying that they went out and they almost immediately have that removed from the shelves of the stores. And so now im feeling like the worlds greatest activist, using education to make the world better, but what really happened is they became hot collectibles. And i tell that story because tores no real easy answer what we do with the object. Been ach is always objects like this should be destroyed or used as teaching tools. That is what we do here. We bring people. What is it you see. Cyndi at the museum here, we really focus on every day they perpetuate stereotypes, and ultimately how they influence peoples attitudes toward africanamerican old. The last few weeks, we have seen several companies wanting to rebrand. I have a couple boxes here of pancake flour mixes. And you see the imagery has changed over the years. This is more highly caricatured than others. , i think a lot of people are familiar with the tactic and we find this fairly often in the museum. People do not know exactly what jim crow was and the role that everyday objects played. It is an enslavement era caricature of black women. Shes unattractive by todays standards. She is smiling. She is content. For some people, this represents , but for a lot of other people it represents the vestiges of slavery. We often ask people what do they see. When we look at the aunt jemima that we do see, some people do see an image of slavery and that is the value of an object promoting a dialogue about Race Relations. That would be the first couple decades of the 1900. Thenext one would be more mid1900s. And that one, which looks like my actual hands would have been the most recent version. The brand was founded in the 1880s, so it does have a rich history. This was a recent nation to the museum. A grandmotherfrom who handmade these stalls in the 1940s. And i have a little tag that was included with the sad, and it says american family. It i found it interesting because this grandmothers thispretation includes caricature and you can see that she is holding the white baby. Then, that demonstrates character that aunt jemima was based off of. I definitely want to make sure that you talk about this, because there are fewer people that know about this, and yet in making the appearance in the , which this is a day, huge flea market and there were several tables with these stalls on them. So, dr. Pilgrim mentioned, its not the most wellknown caricature in the united states, but it is one of the most wellknown outside of america. And the origins come from 1895 when there is a book called the adventures of two little dutch girls. , veryere was a character dark skin, bulging white eyes. A caricature for the mouth. The dress looks very similar to the blackface minstrels and in very rude and menacing. It also showed up in other products. A company in the u. K. And they used this as their branding. Dr. Pilgrim we have had the same kind of controversies in european countries. Theyre people who say, its just a doll, letting go, and others say, look at this. This is a caricature of a caricature. Right . Heres another point we have to make. It also a slur. Pleased if be someone called me back. I would not be pleased if they gollywog. A wog or a one of the things i am most pleased about in the museum is we get people from other nations. Overhere has been a fight what should be used in childrens books, what should be removed from the label, should that accompany the rebrand. Conversations that are very similar to the one we have in the u. S. And whenaunt jemima, quaker announced they were , we have had conversations for years, even though we are mostly facilitators, they may not say that to the visitor to you that in, so they also hear , but it just did not seem likely that that was ever going to change. The other companies begin to put begin to change. The point that im trying to make in my own meandering way is aunt jemima, products like that, most of the products like that in the u. S. , that got dealt with in the 1940s, 1950s, 19. Were not wear reading this in school like an actual textbook. They had already chain. They refused for years and years and years. Changes are occurring. These of the conversations that go along with these changes. A bigt going to get into discussion about peoples motives. For our purposes, it represents its not so weird to say, but a validation, if not vindication, of the work weve been doing for many years. It cyndi golliwog when asked a question about the, when im asked the question about the created, since it was outside of the united states, they see that disconnect. Dr. Pilgrim one of my responses would be, even if you did not know the history, just the aesthetics are offensive. I saw this one table and it market, at the flea they had like 50 things. Inre were these stalls for fiveags selling dollars. He had a table with massproduced. Is, even a person itg down the aisles doesnt matter cause what they is the caricatured blocked all. That is one thing. It is the responsibility of the , and part of the challenge is a lot of the sociologists in the country, they dont know the history. Robots. Re not im certainly not a robot. Have struggled i only lost my balance may be a handful of times. One of those times, it was in the early 1980s. I was in indiana, and i went into an antique mall. It was a small antique mall. And i dont know. You can do the math on my age. I was obviously much younger and not as mature in some ways, i guess. We have pieces that are much worse than this in terms of the harshness of the caricature. And we hold the harshness of word. N word n we have a whole section on that. I walked up to the i think it was frank. It was the early 1900s. Clerk wrote down black print. What i was thinking about was, if you are going to sell things like this, write down what it is. I have not lost my balance a lot. Its not always easy. The person working there, they did not own the antique mall. They were just working there, right . And i was holding the person responsibility responsible in a very specific way. And i thought, i owe them an apology. And against all odds, i thought if i ever go back there again, the person will still be there and i will have a conversation. Im not trying to be melodramatic. Its actually hard to collect this stuff. Its hard to use it as teaching tools. Were not robots. I go back and the mall was no big of so theres ending on that. I went to make sure that i talked about that. Be an effective facilitator we have to distance ourselves a little bit emotionally. Sometimes that does gephardt. And having to help people and guide people through, it is a challenging aspect. I have to remind myself this is someones first time. And this is a particular object i mean, i have encountered the object and it is new to them, and there is some patients. That is why we used to have. Everal instructors who helped one of the Biggest Challenges was to not if you created safe, itt was free and would be uncomfortable. You have some discussions. They will say some things that they are aly victim because they represent or they have reflected a that is not democratic, not egalitarian. And so the big challenge for them wise, someone said reflected, again, ignorance, and they would need. O make that one challenge i find, too, liveseople go their whole being taught by family members or having experiences. And suddenly they are confronting their entire lives in a way. People are able to take on a new perspective and learn. Others are not. These are facilitators. I would like to talk a little bit about this one. I was a sociology professor and he was the department head. As much as that can be a supervisory relationship, if you , in higher ed, you know but we were friends. Nd we went to a conference and this was in new orleans. In the early or mid 1990s. And we gave a special on the jim was a largeto what and mostly africanamerican audience. , we we got to the questions offered an opportunity to engage theirstions, but also views, their voice. They said we understand that you are creating this will not be an africanamerican achievement museum. Those things are needed and valuable. If you are going to have a museum that has a lynching tree in it, that has these caricature objects in it, you have to have a space in their showing how africanamericans push back. You have to. And so its not enough to say we are a black history museum. Someone else is covering that part of the story. You also have to tell that part of the story and it cant just be a not. You have to really tell the story. And it really showed me up because i did not want our and i have to choose my words right here. I did not want our work to be diluted because it wasnt our mission, but after that conversation, you know why . We are right. We need a section on africanamerican achievement, which we have. We need a section on the Civil Rights Movement, which we have. A section on africanamerican artists using their art to deconstruct racial imagery, which we have. There used to be something called the black memorabilia doll show. I name for some of this stuff. We went there. I believe it was in dcf time. And i purchased i believe it was in d. C. At the time. And i purchased this. The reason i am showing it to you is this is the first nonracist piece i bought from another museum. We bought stuff over the years it should not surprise you that it allows me to reach into my back rocket and pull out buy things like this that had been for years and years. And the way that we open the museum when did you open the new museum. Museum . The result 500 foot square room. We were doing importing imported work in there. In some ways it was more overwhelming. There were hundreds and hundreds of pieces. Theres no escape. So, you really feel how pervasive these objects were. We moved into the space in 2012. And because we received so many , we recognize that there are new stories we need to tell. We are actually trying to move into a much larger facility, a standalone facility. This actually longs belongs here. Their other recreational games. Theres a caricature image at the end. You put it up like this. The idea that underpins this ise and the game behind us the pain. The idea that the pain tolerance was different for black and white people justifies the use of these games. A lot of these games were havets that children would played with as well. When you think about these objects, these objects were starting to sensitize people and normalized violence against lack folks. Dr. Pilgrim black folks. Like theim the games african dowager, where you throw of aall at the actual face black person. Its not just that africanamericans did not feel pain as much, but that cause of pain was entertainment. Cyndi it was public. Dr. Pilgrim think about that. I give you money, you give me a at thel and i throw it face of a human. Cyndi for fun. Dr. Pilgrim its not just the three of us. The person who sold balls, myself, and the victim, but people watching, screaming ing, you him, hit him, hit him, hit him. Else. Omething back to the original question. What is jim crow. The what about is jim crow . Is talking about the origins. It became a synonym for the racial hierarchy. Most historians say its another name for the hierarchy. Example,vidence, for of Frederick Douglass in the 1830s having to sit on a jim crow car. System, this, the racial hearts with whites are on top and people of color and blacks are at the bottom crystallized in this country. We asked people what is jim crow. Some of them will say they have some vague understanding. People are familiar with segregation and the jim crow law. They have the misunderstanding that these laws were created at a very specific place in time. And at very different points the laws are critical. Run ontem did not just laws. You may notes where have had any laws, you still practices,ow practices that support the racial hierarchy. When that failed, you had violence, the threat of violence or symbolic violence or actual, physical violence. The racial hierarchy system its without violence. The system was also propped up. With everyday objects. Postcards and ashtrays. And childrens games. The ideas that undergirded jim crow were reflected in those turn have toh in attitudes of africanamericans. It took me 400 minutes to answer your first question, but thats the answer. Cyndi is this a new idea . Dr. Pilgrim i think thats a great question. Im going to say no, they dont. Is showing challenge the relationship between an caricatures africanamericans as dumb or and the system that is supported by ideas about black people. There are those who refuse to heres the easy with answer the question. If you walk into this museum and you see all the ways africanamericans are and they accompany the caricatures. You have all of these nasty caricatures. And its aggressive, all the stuff. How is that not supporting a system like jim crow . Asey dont see propaganda a childs game. Were talking about these past. In a way as of the but anyone who goes to a yard sale or a flea market or an antiques are now, these things are still all around. What should people do . Cyndi that is actually a question i get quite frequently. Now that i understand a little bit more, it is in the real world. Millions of these objects out there. They are still being manufactured. Way i believe that we can remove them all from the market. My suggestion to people is the mission is to educate people. My suggestion to people is to go and tellt store owner them why is this not appropriate . Thing. Be a little that educating and sharing the true history is really not taught in many curriculums. People are lacking this knowledge, also about the danger and the hurt. My advice would be to use that as a learning or Teaching Opportunity and educate others. Dr. Pilgrim this is really tough for me. This is an area where i disappoint some of my colleagues , because they expect me to say, hey, you know what . Be very aggressive and confront people, and demand they do this. Case in point, about a dozen of my colleagues try to get ebay to remove socalled black listings. A from their and they wanted me to be part of it. And i said to them, i dont want to do that. I dont want to live in society where you cant buy these. I give the example earlier you celebrate removing something from stores. It did not remove them from stores. Thats one part of it. Hand, this is just me talking. I think it should be in a garbage can. But need to be careful. Naive, old college whoor who believes dialogue, who in Still Believes you can bring people in and listen and change peoples hearts and minds. He met me in western michigan. Students to university who presented as white americans. And we sat around in a circle and we passed around a doll. I dont know if it was like a golliwog, it wouldve been similar to a mandy doll. We just had simple rules. Let everyone finished talking. Dont attack anybody. Basic kindergarten type rules for everybody. And then the question was presented, this when you look at this, what do you see . Just tell everybody what you see . And we went around a second time with the question, why is it that you believe you see what you see . Was . Hen the last question so, what do you do with what that person saw . Who saw this thing differently than you did . Know, i wish i videotaped that conversation because it showed the power of objects as teaching tools. Special. O afterschool its still living in the real world. Get one of theo saw on the road to damascus experience is where the person is just enlightened and they are now a new person. But what we can do is present spaces where people in a thoughtful way can listen and talk. And i think that is what happened that day. So the depth of george floyd and black lives matter, big changes. What are your thoughts . We have always had social, what people call Justice Movements in this country. Sometimes it pains me people talk about the Civil Rights Movement starting in the 1950s and 1960s. We always had a Justice Movement in this country. Horrific killing of george floyd has challenged a lot of americans. A lot off them, but americans to ask themselves, what is it they believe the country does as Race Relations and it also challenges people to look at themselves. When i heard about the quaker in pleased. I was the only thing that would be people have been this and it seemed like it was never going to happen. Its not just corporations, but churches, neighborhood. Now, im not in those conversations, so i dont know i was listening to im not listening in a way that would thew people will to judge conversation, if you would, but i know there are more conversations happening in this country. That pleases me a lot. First aware of the quakers decision, it felt like a true goal trickle. Why is the museum there . Dr. Pilgrim im glad you asked that question. The Jim Crow Museum is in michigan. And if you know our history has an institution, you know our founder was committed to racial wasice long before that honored in the u. S. He brought the National Students here. Brought dozense of africanamericans here to be , and the first almost to an person those dozens of students became civil rights workers or leaders. Tradition, iof our assumeay many people ont a museum that focuses racism in the u. S. Should be added historically black College Board it should be in some big city. That does not make sense to me. First of all, i think that there should be museums like this all across the country. And unless you are bringing in certain political views, it really wouldnt it shouldnt matter where you are located as long as what you are doing is good work. Its one of those if you build it, they will come things. We have had people come from all over the world. Obviously, you get people doing that virtually, remotely, but we have people is a clean,. Henry louis gates is a friend of the museum. We work with people creating documentaries. Work with civil rights and human Rights Groups from all across the country. If you do good work, people will find you. If people want to know more about your museum now and they can visit, what would you recommend . Cyndi we have a lot of Information Online about the stuff. And some other so, we have the virtual tour. That is accessible to anyone at any time, and we are running a facilitated version where people. Hould sign up something that david says quite often is a testimony to the resiliency of africanamerican. Yes, that work is related to the racist caricature objects, to me,lly tells that is the resiliency. We are not a shrine to racism. When you walk through all of this and you realize the achievements of africanamericans, there is pride. Thank you very much. Thank you. President ialtv theaign ads aired during contest between eisenhower and Adlai Stevenson and hasnt have been essential to every president ial campaign. Here is a look. 1965, america in turmoil. Al gore graduates college. His father, a u. S. Sensor senator opposes the vietnam war. The last thing he thinks he will ever do is enter politics. He becomes an Investigative Reporter and then he decides to change what is wrong, he had to fight for what is right. , worked withngress reform party, fought to welfare with work requirements and time limit. Strengthen social security. Take on the big drug companies. 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