Drew University Library : University Archives : Theses and Dissertations
    
author Donna Thompson Ray
title Talkin' to Books: Photographing Black Education During Reconstruction and Its Aftermath
abstract With the advent of Reconstruction, a new photographic language failed to illustrate the self-determination and citizenship of African Americans entirely. While Black people embraced education and literacy as markers of freedom, Black citizenship and equal rights remained elusive. Images of the Black quest for education reveal their claims to political, economic, and social freedoms on one hand while battling White supremacy's denial of access on the other.

In this study, I claim that images of Black education mirror the liminal moment when Black self-determination, citizenship, and equal rights were evolving at the dawn of freedom. Focusing solely on the antebellum slave states of Georgia, South Carolina, and Virginia, which represented the earliest anti-literacy laws, this study reveals the categories of school and literacy- related photographs of Black people during Reconstruction, including images of Black students and teachers. Though photography historians categorize photographs of Black education as vernacular photography, an umbrella phrase used to distinguish fine art photographs from those used for various purposes, including governmental, personal, scientific, et al., I argue that photographs of Black education affirm Black achievement, and connect this sub-topic of visual culture to the changing landscape of Black citizenship during Reconstruction and its aftermath.

African American photography of the Civil War and Reconstruction period informs our understanding of scientific racism, portraits of enslaved people, plantation life, and Black freedom after emancipation. My work interprets the meaning of these often anonymous faces of Black education, and places them in conversation with portrait photographs of Black leaders, politicians, activists and intellectuals such as Sojourner Truth, Booker T. Washington, and Frederick Douglass; negative stereotypes about Black people that supported White supremacy; the photographic portfolios produced by Frances Benjamin Johnston at Hampton and Tuskegee Institutes; and W.E.B. Du Bois's album of American Negroes near the close of the nineteenth century. My research reveals the added value of consulting other forms of contemporary visual media, such as prints, ephemera, and paintings, to compensate for gaps in the photographic historical record and to provide a broader context for our understanding of Black visual representation.

school The Caspersen School of Graduate Studies, Drew University
degree D.Litt. (2024)
advisor Lillie Johnson Edwards
committee Joshua Brown
full textthis dissertation is offline