A historical musical that examines black identity in the 1901 World's Fair
-
0:03 - 0:05The archive.
-
0:05 - 0:09One may envision rooms and shelves
-
0:09 - 0:11stocked with boxes
and cartons of old stuff. -
0:12 - 0:15And yet, for those who are
patient enough to dig through it, -
0:15 - 0:18the archive provides
the precious opportunity -
0:18 - 0:20to touch the past,
-
0:20 - 0:22to feel and learn from the experiences
-
0:22 - 0:27of once-living people who now seem
dead and buried deeply in the archive. -
0:28 - 0:32But what if there was a way
to bring the archive to life? -
0:32 - 0:35Jon Michael Reese: "The world
is thinking wrong about race." -
0:35 - 0:38Melissa Joyner: "This country insists
upon judging the Negro." -
0:38 - 0:40JMR: "Because it does not know."
-
0:40 - 0:42AYGTK: What if one could make it breathe?
-
0:42 - 0:45MJ: "By his lowest
and most vicious representatives." -
0:45 - 0:46AYGTK: Speak.
-
0:46 - 0:48JMR: "An honest, straightforward exhibit."
-
0:48 - 0:49AYGTK: And even sing to us,
-
0:49 - 0:52so that the archive
becomes accessible to everyone. -
0:52 - 0:54What would performing
the archive look like? -
0:54 - 0:57A performance that is not
simply based on a true story -
0:58 - 1:02but one that allows us
to come face-to-face -
1:02 - 1:04with things we thought
were once dead and buried. -
1:04 - 1:05(Piano music)
-
1:05 - 1:08This is what "At Buffalo,"
a new musical we're developing, -
1:08 - 1:09is all about.
-
1:09 - 1:13Using collections
from over 30 archival institutions, -
1:13 - 1:19"At Buffalo" performs the massive archive
of the 1901 Pan-American Exposition, -
1:19 - 1:21the first World's Fair
of the 20th century, -
1:21 - 1:22held in Buffalo, New York.
-
1:22 - 1:24Now, if you've heard of this fair,
-
1:24 - 1:27it might be because this is where
then-US president, William McKinley, -
1:27 - 1:28was assassinated.
-
1:28 - 1:30For nearly 17 years,
-
1:30 - 1:33I've stayed inside the gates
and the archive of this fair, -
1:33 - 1:35not only because of that story
-
1:36 - 1:39but because of a real
life-and-death racial drama -
1:39 - 1:41that played out on the fairgrounds.
-
1:41 - 1:45Here, in a place that was like
Disney World, the Olympics, -
1:45 - 1:47carnivals, museums, all in one,
-
1:47 - 1:51there were three conflicting displays
of what it meant to be black -
1:51 - 1:53in the United States.
-
1:53 - 1:56The archive says white showmen presented
-
1:56 - 1:58a savage black origin
-
1:58 - 2:01in the form of 98 West
and Central Africans, -
2:01 - 2:03living and performing war dances
-
2:03 - 2:06in a recreated village
called Darkest Africa. -
2:07 - 2:09And across the street,
-
2:09 - 2:12a happy slave life,
-
2:12 - 2:16in the form of 150 Southern
black performers, -
2:16 - 2:17picking cotton,
-
2:17 - 2:19singing and dancing minstrel shows
-
2:19 - 2:24in a recreated antebellum attraction
called Old Plantation. -
2:25 - 2:27As a response,
-
2:27 - 2:31the black Buffalo community championed
the third display of blackness: -
2:32 - 2:33the Negro Exhibit.
-
2:33 - 2:37Codesigned by African American
scholar W.E.B. Du Bois, -
2:37 - 2:42it curated photographs,
charts, books and more, -
2:42 - 2:45to show black Americans
as a high-achieving race, -
2:45 - 2:47capable of education and progress.
-
2:48 - 2:51When I first encountered this story,
-
2:51 - 2:53I understood from my own life experience
-
2:53 - 2:56what was at stake to have members
of the African diaspora -
2:56 - 2:58see each other like this.
-
2:58 - 3:02For me, as the child of immigrant parents
from Ghana, West Africa, -
3:02 - 3:04born in the American South,
-
3:04 - 3:07raised in Manhattan, Kansas,
-
3:07 - 3:08(Laughter)
-
3:08 - 3:11and having attended the same
elite school as Du Bois, -
3:11 - 3:14I could see that the Buffalo fair
effectively pitted -
3:14 - 3:16the black Northerner
against the Southerner, -
3:16 - 3:18the educated against the uneducated,
-
3:18 - 3:21and the African American
against the African. -
3:22 - 3:23And I wanted to know:
-
3:23 - 3:28How did these three distinct groups
of black folk navigate this experience? -
3:29 - 3:33Unfortunately, the archive
had answers to questions like this -
3:33 - 3:35underneath racial caricature,
-
3:35 - 3:39conflicting information
and worse -- silence. -
3:39 - 3:42(Piano music)
-
3:42 - 3:47Still, I could hear musical melodies
-
3:47 - 3:48and see dance numbers
-
3:48 - 3:49and the rhythms of the words
-
3:49 - 3:52coming off the pages
of old newspaper articles. -
3:52 - 3:54And learning that this World's Fair
-
3:54 - 3:58had music playing everywhere
on its fairgrounds, -
3:58 - 4:02I knew that live, immersive,
spectacular musical theater, -
4:02 - 4:05with the latest technologies of our time,
-
4:05 - 4:09is the closest experience that can bring
the archival story of the 1901 fair -
4:09 - 4:12out of boxes and into life.
-
4:13 - 4:16Stories, like Tannie and Henrietta,
-
4:16 - 4:18a husband and wife vaudeville duo in love
-
4:18 - 4:22who become at odds over performing
these "coon" minstrel shows -
4:22 - 4:24while striving for their
five-dollar-a-week dream -
4:24 - 4:26in the Old Plantation attraction.
-
4:26 - 4:29Like African businessman John Tevi,
-
4:29 - 4:30from present-day Togo,
-
4:30 - 4:34who must outwit the savage rules
of the human zoo -
4:34 - 4:36in which he has become trapped.
-
4:36 - 4:39And stories like Mary Talbert,
-
4:40 - 4:42a wealthy leader
of the black Buffalo elite, -
4:42 - 4:43who must come to terms
-
4:43 - 4:46with the racial realities
of her home town. -
4:46 - 4:48MJ: "The dominant race in this country
-
4:48 - 4:50insists upon judging the Negro
-
4:50 - 4:53by his lowest and most
vicious representatives." -
4:53 - 4:55AYGTK: Like Old Plantation
and Darkest Africa. -
4:55 - 4:58MJ: "... instead of by the more
intelligent and worthy classes." -
4:58 - 5:01AYGTK: When fair directors
ignored Mary Talbert -
5:01 - 5:04and the local black Buffalo community's
request to participate in the fair, -
5:04 - 5:06newspapers say that Mary Talbert
-
5:06 - 5:09and her club of educated
African American women -
5:09 - 5:11held a rousing protest meeting.
-
5:11 - 5:13But the details of that meeting,
-
5:13 - 5:15even down to the fiery speech she gave,
-
5:15 - 5:17were not fully captured in the archive.
-
5:17 - 5:21So, "At Buffalo" takes the essence
of Mary's speech -
5:21 - 5:23and turns it into song.
-
5:24 - 5:27(All singing) We must, we are unanimous.
-
5:28 - 5:32We must, we are unanimous.
-
5:32 - 5:34MJ: We've got something to show --
-
5:34 - 5:38we're going to teach a lesson in Buffalo.
-
5:38 - 5:41It would benefit the nation
-
5:41 - 5:45to see our growth since emancipation.
-
5:45 - 5:51Colored people should be represented
in this Pan-American exposition, -
5:51 - 5:55it would benefit the nation
-
5:55 - 5:59to see our growth since emancipation.
-
6:00 - 6:06(All singing) They made a great mistake
-
6:06 - 6:12not to appoint someone from the race.
-
6:13 - 6:16We must, we are unanimous.
-
6:17 - 6:20We must, we are unanimous.
-
6:20 - 6:22We must, we are unanimous.
-
6:22 - 6:26AYGTK: Mary Talbert successfully demands
that the Negro Exhibit come to the fair. -
6:27 - 6:29And to have the Negro Exhibit in Buffalo
-
6:29 - 6:34means that the musical must tell the story
behind why Du Bois cocreated it ... -
6:36 - 6:40and why Mary and the black elite
felt it was urgently needed. -
6:42 - 6:45JMR: "The world is thinking
wrong about race. -
6:47 - 6:51They killed Sam Hose
for who they thought he was. -
6:52 - 6:54And more men like him, every day,
-
6:54 - 6:58more Negro men, like him, taken apart.
-
6:59 - 7:02And after that -- that red ray ...
-
7:03 - 7:05we can never be the same.
-
7:06 - 7:09(Singing) A red ray
-
7:09 - 7:10[A man hunt in Georgia]
-
7:11 - 7:12cut across my desk
-
7:12 - 7:15[Mob after Hose;
he will be lynched if caught] -
7:15 - 7:17the very day
-
7:17 - 7:20Sam's hands were laid to rest.
-
7:22 - 7:29Can words alone withstand the laws unjust?
-
7:29 - 7:30[Escape seems impossible]
-
7:30 - 7:36Can words alone withstand the violence?
-
7:38 - 7:43Oh, no, oh.
-
7:43 - 7:44[Burned alive]
-
7:44 - 7:46[Sam Hose is lynched]
-
7:46 - 7:51Oh, no, oh.
-
7:51 - 7:53[His body cut in many pieces]
-
7:53 - 7:56Oh, no, oh.
-
7:56 - 7:58[Burned at the Stake]
-
7:58 - 8:00[Ten Cents Slice Cooked Liver.]
-
8:00 - 8:02[Fight for souvenirs.]
-
8:09 - 8:12(Both singing) Who has read the books?
-
8:12 - 8:17Our numbers and statistics look small
-
8:17 - 8:22against the page.
-
8:22 - 8:26The crisis has multiplied.
-
8:26 - 8:28Our people are lynched and died.
-
8:28 - 8:31Oh, Lord.
-
8:31 - 8:37Something must change.
-
8:39 - 8:43AYGTK: Something must change.
-
8:44 - 8:48"At Buffalo" reveals
how the United States today -
8:48 - 8:51stands at similar crossroads
as 1901 America. -
8:52 - 8:55Just as the name of Sam Hose
filled newspapers back then, -
8:55 - 8:58today's media carries the names of:
-
8:58 - 9:00JMR: Oscar Grant.
-
9:00 - 9:02MJ: Jacqueline Culp.
-
9:02 - 9:03Pianist: Trayvon Martin.
-
9:04 - 9:05AYGTK: Sandra Bland.
-
9:06 - 9:08And too many others.
-
9:09 - 9:13The 1901 fair's legacies persist
-
9:13 - 9:16in more ways than we can imagine.
-
9:18 - 9:19MJ: Mary Talbert
-
9:20 - 9:22and the National Association
of Colored Women -
9:22 - 9:25started movements against lynching
-
9:25 - 9:27and the myth of black criminality
-
9:27 - 9:30just as black women today
started Black Lives Matter. -
9:31 - 9:33JMR: And some of the same
people who fought for -
9:34 - 9:35and created the Negro Exhibit,
-
9:35 - 9:37including Du Bois,
-
9:37 - 9:40came to Buffalo,
four years after the fair, -
9:40 - 9:42to start the Niagara Movement,
-
9:42 - 9:46which set the groundwork
for the creation of the NAACP. -
9:46 - 9:47AYGTK: It's not just black folks
-
9:47 - 9:50who had a peculiar experience
at the 1901 fair. -
9:50 - 9:53An official handbook informed fair-goers:
-
9:53 - 9:55MJ: "Please remember:"
-
9:55 - 9:57JMR: "... once you get inside the gate,"
-
9:57 - 10:00AYGTK: "... you are a part of the show."
-
10:01 - 10:03Performing the archive in "At Buffalo"
-
10:03 - 10:06allows audiences to ask themselves,
-
10:06 - 10:08"Are we still inside the gates,
-
10:08 - 10:13and are we all still part of the show?"
-
10:17 - 10:20(Music ends)
-
10:21 - 10:27(Applause and cheers)
- Title:
- A historical musical that examines black identity in the 1901 World's Fair
- Speaker:
- Amma Y. Ghartey-Tagoe Kootin
- Description:
-
In this lively talk and performance, artist and TED Fellow Amma Y. Ghartey-Tagoe Kootin offers a sneak peek of her forthcoming musical "At Buffalo." Drawing on archival material from the 1901 Pan-American Exhibition, a world's fair held in Buffalo, New York, the show examines conflicting representations of black identity exhibited at the fair -- highlighting unsettlingly familiar parallels between American society at the turn of the century and today, and asking: Are we all still part of the show?
- Video Language:
- English
- Team:
- closed TED
- Project:
- TEDTalks
- Duration:
- 10:40
Erin Gregory edited English subtitles for A historical musical that examines black identity in the 1901 World's Fair | ||
Erin Gregory approved English subtitles for A historical musical that examines black identity in the 1901 World's Fair | ||
Erin Gregory edited English subtitles for A historical musical that examines black identity in the 1901 World's Fair | ||
Krystian Aparta accepted English subtitles for A historical musical that examines black identity in the 1901 World's Fair | ||
Krystian Aparta edited English subtitles for A historical musical that examines black identity in the 1901 World's Fair | ||
Krystian Aparta edited English subtitles for A historical musical that examines black identity in the 1901 World's Fair | ||
Krystian Aparta edited English subtitles for A historical musical that examines black identity in the 1901 World's Fair | ||
Krystian Aparta edited English subtitles for A historical musical that examines black identity in the 1901 World's Fair |