Medieval History
Today is Columbus Day, a solemn occasion marked by parades, pageantry, and buckets of fake blood splashed on statues of its namesake. Activists have turned the commemoration of Columbus' landfall in the New World into an annual protest against "the celebration of genocide." What the protesters may not know, however, is that the holiday they are protesting once played a crucial role in forging a society capable of listening to their concerns. This is the curious tale of how Columbus Day fell victim to its own remarkable success.
Christopher Columbus has been, from the first, a powerful symbol of American nationalism. In the early American republic, Columbus provided a convenient means for the new nation to differentiate itself from the old world. His name, rendered as Columbia, became a byword for the United States. Americans represented their nation as a woman named Columbia, adopted Hail, Columbia! as an unofficial anthem, and located their capitol in the District of Columbia.
Italian-Americans, arriving in large numbers in the late nineteenth century, took note of the reverence which their famous countryman enjoyed. It was a far cry from the treatment they themselves received. Many Americans believed Italians to be racially inferior, their difference made visible by their "swarthy" or "brown" skins. They were often portrayed as primitive, violent, and unassimilable, and their Catholicism brought them in for further abuse. After an 1891 lynching of Italians in New Orleans, a New York Times editorial proclaimed Sicilians "a pest without mitigation," adding, for good measure, that "our own rattlesnakes are as good citizens as they."
Italians quickly adopted Columbus as a shield against the ethnic, racial, and religious discrimination they faced in their adoptive country. They promoted a narrative of national origins that traced back beyond Plymouth or Jamestown, all the way to San Salvador. How could a nation, they asked, reject the compatriots of its own discoverer?
Click here to read this article from The Atlantic
- Skeletons Point To Columbus Voyage For Syphilis Origins
Skeletons don?t lie. But sometimes they may mislead, as in the case of bones that reputedly showed evidence of syphilis in Europe and other parts of the Old World before Christopher Columbus made his historic voyage in 1492. None of this skeletal evidence,...
- Teeth Of Columbus?s Crew Flesh Out Tale Of New World Discovery
The adage that dead men tell no tales has long been disproved by archaeology. Now, however, science is taking interrogation of the dead to new heights. In a study that promises fresh and perhaps personal insight into the earliest European visitors to...
- A New World
This appeared today (11/13/08) in The Roanoke Times. I invite comments. ----- In 1492, a small Spanish expedition led by Christopher Columbus reached the Americas. These men were not the first to have reached the Americas from elsewhere ? we are now...
- Upcoming Assc Event
The Anglo Saxon Studies Colloquiumannouncesa lecture and seminar *Joshua Davies* *(KIng's College, The University of London)* ??Visions...
- Latinities In England, 894-1135
two workshops on "Latinities in England, 894-1135" Friday, October 23 both at New York University in the Great Room of 19 University Place *** Martin Chase (Fordham University) "Siðbót´: A Late Medieval Icelandic Trúarkvæði about the Judgment of...
Medieval History
How Columbus Day Fell Victim to Its Own Success
Today is Columbus Day, a solemn occasion marked by parades, pageantry, and buckets of fake blood splashed on statues of its namesake. Activists have turned the commemoration of Columbus' landfall in the New World into an annual protest against "the celebration of genocide." What the protesters may not know, however, is that the holiday they are protesting once played a crucial role in forging a society capable of listening to their concerns. This is the curious tale of how Columbus Day fell victim to its own remarkable success.
Christopher Columbus has been, from the first, a powerful symbol of American nationalism. In the early American republic, Columbus provided a convenient means for the new nation to differentiate itself from the old world. His name, rendered as Columbia, became a byword for the United States. Americans represented their nation as a woman named Columbia, adopted Hail, Columbia! as an unofficial anthem, and located their capitol in the District of Columbia.
Italian-Americans, arriving in large numbers in the late nineteenth century, took note of the reverence which their famous countryman enjoyed. It was a far cry from the treatment they themselves received. Many Americans believed Italians to be racially inferior, their difference made visible by their "swarthy" or "brown" skins. They were often portrayed as primitive, violent, and unassimilable, and their Catholicism brought them in for further abuse. After an 1891 lynching of Italians in New Orleans, a New York Times editorial proclaimed Sicilians "a pest without mitigation," adding, for good measure, that "our own rattlesnakes are as good citizens as they."
Italians quickly adopted Columbus as a shield against the ethnic, racial, and religious discrimination they faced in their adoptive country. They promoted a narrative of national origins that traced back beyond Plymouth or Jamestown, all the way to San Salvador. How could a nation, they asked, reject the compatriots of its own discoverer?
Click here to read this article from The Atlantic
- Skeletons Point To Columbus Voyage For Syphilis Origins
Skeletons don?t lie. But sometimes they may mislead, as in the case of bones that reputedly showed evidence of syphilis in Europe and other parts of the Old World before Christopher Columbus made his historic voyage in 1492. None of this skeletal evidence,...
- Teeth Of Columbus?s Crew Flesh Out Tale Of New World Discovery
The adage that dead men tell no tales has long been disproved by archaeology. Now, however, science is taking interrogation of the dead to new heights. In a study that promises fresh and perhaps personal insight into the earliest European visitors to...
- A New World
This appeared today (11/13/08) in The Roanoke Times. I invite comments. ----- In 1492, a small Spanish expedition led by Christopher Columbus reached the Americas. These men were not the first to have reached the Americas from elsewhere ? we are now...
- Upcoming Assc Event
The Anglo Saxon Studies Colloquiumannouncesa lecture and seminar *Joshua Davies* *(KIng's College, The University of London)* ??Visions...
- Latinities In England, 894-1135
two workshops on "Latinities in England, 894-1135" Friday, October 23 both at New York University in the Great Room of 19 University Place *** Martin Chase (Fordham University) "Siðbót´: A Late Medieval Icelandic Trúarkvæði about the Judgment of...