{"id":39185,"date":"2015-01-02T17:04:28","date_gmt":"2015-01-02T17:04:28","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mixedracestudies.org\/wordpress\/?p=39185"},"modified":"2015-02-07T19:32:03","modified_gmt":"2015-02-07T19:32:03","slug":"the-birth-of-a-nation-how-a-legendary-filmmaker-and-a-crusading-editor-reignited-americas-civil-war","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/?p=39185","title":{"rendered":"The Birth of A Nation: How a Legendary Filmmaker and a Crusading Editor Reignited America’s Civil War"},"content":{"rendered":"

The Birth of A Nation: How a Legendary Filmmaker and a Crusading Editor Reignited America’s Civil War<\/strong><\/em><\/a><\/p>\n

PublicAffairs<\/a>
\n2014-11-04
\n368 pages
\n6.300 x 9.500
\nHardcover ISBN: 9781586489878
\neBook ISBN: 9781586489885<\/p>\n

Dick Lehr<\/strong><\/a>, Professor of Journalism
\nBoston University, Boston, Massachusetts<\/em><\/p>\n

\"\"<\/a><\/p>\n

In 1915, two men\u2014one a journalist agitator, the other a technically brilliant filmmaker\u2014incited a public confrontation that roiled America, pitting black against white, Hollywood<\/a> against Boston<\/a>, and free speech against civil rights.<\/p>\n

Monroe Trotter<\/a> and D. W. Griffith<\/a> were fighting over a film that dramatized the Civil War<\/a> and Reconstruction<\/a> in a post-Confederate<\/a> South. Almost fifty years earlier, Monroe\u2019s father, James, was a sergeant in an all-black Union<\/a> regiment that marched into Charleston, South Carolina<\/a>, just as the Kentucky<\/a> cavalry\u2014including Roaring Jack Griffith, D. W.\u2019s father\u2014fled for their lives. Griffith\u2019s film, The Birth of a Nation<\/em><\/a>, included actors in blackface<\/a>, heroic portraits of Knights of the Ku Klux Klan<\/a>, and a depiction of Lincoln\u2019s assassination<\/a>. Freed slaves were portrayed as villainous, vengeful, slovenly, and dangerous to the sanctity of American values. It was tremendously successful, eventually seen by 25 million Americans. But violent protests\u00a0against the film flared up across the country.<\/p>\n

Monroe Trotter\u2019s titanic crusade to have the film censored became a blueprint for dissent during the 1950s and 1960s. This is the fiery story of a revolutionary moment for mass media and the nascent civil rights movement<\/a>, and the men clashing over the cultural and political soul of a still-young America standing at the cusp of its greatest days.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

The Birth of A Nation: How a Legendary Filmmaker and a Crusading Editor Reignited America’s Civil War PublicAffairs 2014-11-04 368 pages 6.300 x 9.500 Hardcover ISBN: 9781586489878 eBook ISBN: 9781586489885 Dick Lehr, Professor of Journalism Boston University, Boston, Massachusetts In 1915, two men\u2014one a journalist agitator, the other a technically brilliant filmmaker\u2014incited a public confrontation […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[11,8413,459,8,820,20],"tags":[18961,607,18960,18955,18958,18957,18956,18954,605,18959],"class_list":["post-39185","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-books","category-communications","category-history","category-media-archive","category-religion","category-usa","tag-birth-of-a-nation","tag-d-w-griffith","tag-david-llewelyn-wark-d-w-griffith","tag-dick-lehr","tag-kkk","tag-ku-klux-klan","tag-monroe-trotter","tag-publicaffairs","tag-the-birth-of-a-nation","tag-william-monroe-trotter"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39185","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=39185"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/39185\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=39185"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=39185"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=39185"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}