The flags-monuments-memorials controversies of recent years are well known for many reasons, their inflection points starting well before the massacre staged in Charleston, South Carolina, by a white supremacist in June of 2015 and well beyond the racist rants by Neo-Confederates on the campus of the University of Virginia, August 2017. Within the context of so many emblematic manifestations of racist violence on the American social and cultural landscape, this presentation aims to go beyond the images of “statues under forklifts,” – as significant as they will remain – and extend the frames of reference to some broadly inspiring counterpoints: Between the events in Charleston and Charlottesville, the National Museum of African American History and Culture opened on the Mall in Washington, DC, in September 2016, –and drew 1.2 million visitors during its first six months (something like 7 million to date). More recently still, the Legacy Museum and the National Memorial for Peace and Justice in Montgomery, Alabama, have begun to offer maps of resistance to racism that engage the so-called “history wars” in the U.S..
Tellingly, both in their conceptualization and their presentations, these new heritage sites connect with innovative recent memorials and museums set up around the world, linking the modern Civil Rights movement and Black Lives Matter to cosmopolitan ideals of Equal Justice and Human Rights.
