William & Mary Journal of Race, Gender, and Social Justice
Abstract
Thirty-five states have enacted critical race theory (CRT) bans at the level of elementary and secondary public education, and eleven states have extended these to the university level. One way to resist these attempts to repress a healthy democracy by whitewashing history is through a pedagogy of anti-racism, including literary works. The question of what that would look like involves questions of cultural appropriation, which occurs when one takes from another culture, such as a writer creating a narrative about a character outside of the writer’s cultural identity. This Article considers the story of Ota Benga, brought from the Congo to the United States to be exhibited at the 1904 St. Louis World’s Fair as a pygmy, and in 1906 at the Bronx Zoo. In addition to discussing Benga’s physical appropriation for the purpose of demonstrating scientific views about the racial superiority of whites, this Article considers literature about Benga and the literary canon in general, in order to explore the complicated question of when does cultural appropriation harm the insider or marginalized community, such that the work should be deemed a failure or whether it can be recuperated. Literary works that succeed in depicting another culture are important and effective tools for a pedagogy of anti-racism because they offer empathic portrayals and social critiques of racism.