I don't think it's so much about political correctness as it is about
thoughtful historical analysis of source material.   In an oral
interview, the relationship between the two parties is always important
in determining what sort of information is to be gained.   Just to
suggest a mundane example: the answer you give your boss to a question
isn't necessarily the same one you give your spouse or your golfing
buddy.  So it would be with an elderly ex-slave: is the interviewer
white?  male or female?  do you kow them at all? -- by the 1930s the way
that African-Americans related to whites was bounded by the realities of
Jim Crow segregation and the dynamics of power.  This doesn't mean that
we dismiss everything as fabrication, it just means we need to recognize
the potential was there.   Good history seldom takes things at face
value.

David Kiracofe

David Kiracofe
History
Tidewater Community College
Chesapeake Campus
1428 Cedar Road
Chesapeake, Virginia 23322
757-822-5136
>>> Basil Forest <[log in to unmask]> 03/02/07 9:34 AM >>>
What's the basis for the belief that the WPA former slave interviewees
were  
dishonest in their views on slavery over fear of the "white man"?  Is
this  
the PC way to dismiss the evidence to the contrary on the treatment of
some  
slaves by their owners and the apparent benevolent feelings of the
slaves toward  
their previous lifestyle post-war and freedom?
 
 

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