Oral tradition preserved knowledge that Agassiz’s photographs inadvertently confirm

Evidence

This was another moment where I was overwhelmed by the power of my own oral history. Papa Renty was called the Black African. Louis Agassiz wanted a pure type. I knew, on so many levels, that the man in the picture was my ancestor, but his African origin was the ultimate confirmation. My ancestors proudly held on to that defining piece of information and passed it down from one generation to the next. My mother often said that the Africans were respected and revered among the slaves, and that was why they celebrated Renty’s African origins. Referring to him as “the Black African” was a term of endearment and makes me proud of the legacy that my family has retained and cherished. — Tamara Lanier, From These Roots, 748

Categorization

• QUESTION: The oral-history claim that the Africans were ‘respected and revered among the slaves’ is a striking counter to the standard assumption that African-born slaves were denigrated; worth pushing on the source of that valuation.