What is it about?
I trace African American journalist T. Thomas Fortune's government-sponsored journey to Hawaii and the Philippines in 1902-03. Fortune hopes that each new U.S. territory might become a home for African Americans seeking economic and social opportunities away from the Jim Crow south. Small, weekly black and ethnic newspapers had surprising power at this time, and watched Fortune's trip closely.
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Why is it important?
Scholars have explored Booker T. Washington's interest in exporting Tuskegee's "uplift" programs abroad, linking the educator and his projects to U.S. imperial efforts. These studies are convincing, yet I find that both Fortune and Washington also hoped that American "expansion" into the Pacific would destabilize racial constructions so harmful to non-white peoples in the United States and abroad.
Perspectives
I hope to contribute to scholarship on the Reconstruction, Jim Crow colonialism, and the history of black and ethnic newspapers. I welcome constructive criticism.
Dr. Brian H. Shott
Independent Scholar
Read the Original
This page is a summary of: FORTY ACRES AND A CARABAO: T. THOMAS FORTUNE, NEWSPAPERS, AND THE PACIFIC'S UNSTABLE COLOR LINES, 1902–03, The Journal of the Gilded Age and Progressive Era, April 2017, Cambridge University Press,
DOI: 10.1017/s1537781416000372.
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