Focus on your research on "ITALIAN AMERICANS, NEW ORLEANS 1891, LYNCHING" and on SALVETTI's article (on the course homepage.)
What kind of insight did you gain into the practice of lynching?
Were you aware that it was not just an act of revenge or brute rage, but a method of repression exercised by the dominant class on a subordinate class?
Is anything similar happening today?
BE CONCISE: process your emotions and analyze your thoughts.
Then, give your answers. Handle with care.
I did know about the method of lynching as a form of punishment. Many movies I have seen about African Americans and times of slavery used lynching as their form of punishment. It is a awful way of punishment/death because it happens slow. I'm sure some sort of punishment more butial then this in the sence that it tortures the person more is happening somewhere in the world but I don't know of one particular method that I can think of now.
ReplyDeleteI was unaware of lynching being used so wide spread. I was under the assumption that it was practiced mainly on African Americans during the Civil War and post Civil War era in efforts to prevent their growth following their freedom. i am not conscious of it being practiced in modern times but would not rule it out.
ReplyDeleteI did not know it was a way to repress lower classes by the higher ones. To me it always seemed like the "eye for an eye" act. The insight I got was how it said that well to do people were often involved with it. I did not see that coming. Sadly yes, today they is still violent acts committed against people because of who they are. Maybe one day we can live on a more peaceful planet.
ReplyDeleteIn Salvetti’s Rope and Soap it revealed that lynching had a structure. I knew that not all lynchings were due to blindness fits of rage and hatred, but I didn’t know that it was in a way organized: first the mob captures a person collectively whether they have to drag them out of jail or not, then they do a ceremony, lynch the person, then it was over. The people who were doing the lynchings actually felt like they were doing a positive thing for the greater good in their white community, killing two birds with one stone, restoring justice and teaching the “inferior” a lesson/giving them a warning. Although there are still violent acts being committed towards people of color (not just African Americans), everything is more subtle now. Instead of massive mobs lynching people, the repression seems to be more systematic. The people higher up on the social ladder are keeping everyone else down and “in their place” without as much force as in the past.
ReplyDeleteI was so angry, I believe the racism in this country is so downplayed not only with the history but currently as well. The new current form of lynching I believe is the war on drugs, more and more Hispanics and African Americans are getting thrown behind bars, there's no effort to help those communities. It's lynching all over again, only the suppressed don't realize they're being suppressed. The people in charge have this face of heroism but they're just trying to keep minorities from building up and improving themselves. A African American or Hispanic may have a better interview and resume over a Caucasian person and the Caucasian will still get the job because of their skin color. It's sad that this is still occurring after all the work that has been done to give everyone the same rights, we are still not equal to the rich white male.
ReplyDeleteWhat I stuck to me the most from Salvetti's "Roap and Soap" was the fact that the people chanting on and joining these mobs which caused these lynches, were "good and honest" citizens who only wanted to defend their rights. According to Giovanni De Riseis, who Salvetti quotes, these individuals turn violent as soon as they join a specific mob and multiply in multitude.
ReplyDeleteI was aware that it isn't just an act of revenge. Nowadays, when societies feel threatened by a certain ethnic group or tribes, they make racist remarks, bully and segregate them. Back in the 19th and 20th century, people chose to lynch others; that was their immoral and insane way of dealing with minorities.
I personally don't believe that lynching or anything close to it happens in today's world, but I do think that the racism and segregation between different tribes is far from over. In "Anti-Italianism", the author states that just as recently as 2008, Reverend Wright was caught saying that "Italians looked down their garlic noses" at Galileans. The battle is far from over.
I wasn't aware of what the term "lynching" meant, up until I researched and read about it. Let alone did I know that lynching occurred in more than just one place. It's uneasy to hear that certain ethnic groups were mistreated the way they were. As it is mentioned in Salvetti's "Rope and Soap", Italians experienced their lives in a dark hole due to lynching. American historians focused their studies mostly on african american lynching, while not including Italian American lynching as much. Lynching was a very rough way to treat people and no group deserved to be treated in such a way. I understand that it wasn't just an act of revenge, but rather something the citizens of a country felt that they were "obligated" to do in order to defending the value of justice in their country.
ReplyDeleteI don't feel that lynching is occurring today. However, there is anti semitism and racism against certain ethnic groups. Even though (on a good note) there isn't the actual form of lynching, there still are protests and hate crimes going on; visibely and behind curtains.
I wasn't aware that lynch mobs were composed of law abiding citizens. These citizens view lynching as the highest justice. Taking part in the lynch mob was seen as a civic duty in those days. The only thing similar today in my eyes is the police department. Police officers are regular people just like you and me, but when given a gun and badge they take a lot of matters into their own hands.
ReplyDeleteWhen I attended the College of Staten Island, I took a class called African American Studies. It was one of my favorite classes. In that class I learned about lynchings and why they were happening. I never came to think that lynchings were used on Italian Americans also. After reading "Rope and Soap", I found I wasn't the only one who didn't know it was going on. I knew lynchings were never just an act of revenge. People truly believed that it was necessary to do at the time. To my knowledge, I'm not sure if lynchings still occur. I do not believe that they happen here in the United States, but I wouldn't be surprise to hear it happening else where in the world or even here in America.
ReplyDeleteI was outraged to find out that lynching was going on , and shocking that Italians were the second most lynched group in the US. I find it to be a disgusting form of punishment and the fact that it is used in certain countries in the middle east even today shows that it is still used. I dont believe that it is being used in the US anymore because people have taken notice that it inhumane.
ReplyDeleteI did not know that lynching was actually named after a specific person, I always knew what it was and that it existed but they failed to teach us that their was a person behind the term. I always that that lynching was a hate crime. Lynching during the Boston Tea Party, during Civil War times, etc. struck me to be a practiced exercise out of anger and hate. I did not know that lynching was common between social classes. I pray that lynching does not occur in the US today, I'm pretty sure if there was evidence of lynching here, it would be a big deal and all over the media. Although I do not believe lynching is going on in the US, I do believe that some racist people will bring up lynching. I know for a fact that my uncles coworkers mentioned "bringing him out back if he didn't start acting right". And this happened a few years ago because my uncle tried to show him how to properly fix a machine. I think it's just crazy that people still have that mentality or ever had that mentality.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading the article and doing the research, I am absolutely appalled by how Italian-Americans were treated. I had no idea that they were discriminated so harshly. I didn't know that Italians were lynched just as African-Americans were, or that they were sent to internment camps. Whenever I thought of lynching, I always pictured a small group of people like the KKK lynching someone in the heart of night. I know now that there are sometimes thousands of people that view lynchings and even cheer for it. I also didn't know that Italians were sometimes kidnapped from their jail cell and lynched and the police covered it up. I don't think that anything similar is happening today as far as the lynchings go. However, I do feel that we are treating the Middle-Eastern people that resemble those from the same country as Osama. As a whole, Americans treat Middle-Eastern people like they carry disease, like they're the scum of the earth and it is not right at all. That reminds me of the things I read about how Italians were treated.
ReplyDeleteBased on the research and the article, I was surprised to discover that lynching was something that occurred for multiple races, not just African Americans. I had no idea that Chinese were lynched, let alone Italians. I was not aware that the lynchings occurred as an act of oppression but, that does not surprise me. Even to this day, dominant groups constantly feel the need to assert their dominance on the subordinate groups and we see that even in present day when we look at police officers and the people they choose to victimize, sometimes for no good reason. Violence in general is usually unnecessary but the fact that things like the lynching of other human beings existed for reasons that had nothing to do with negative human emotion or unjust behavior, that's just disturbing to me.
ReplyDeleteOf course the act and crime of lynching is not nothing unheard of however, lynching being a common form of torture among other cultures is. Lynching being used to put fear into the hearts of african-americans to me is so no longer a crutch because apparently caucasians could've been lynched also. I think that is what bothers me the most the fact that lynching is related to a way of death for black people and the thought (to me) of white person being lynched is weird.
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