He fears Trumps plan to whitewash Smithsonian

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Academia vs. Trump

Will America’s democratic institutions survive Trump?

As unrest spreads, researchers and lecturers at universities are doing what they can to keep activities running as normally as possible. In laboratories and lecture halls, it’s business as usual. But the disruptions are mounting. What are faculty thinking about their situation—now, in the near future, and in the longer term? How are the students doing?

In a series of articles funded by the Fritt Ord Foundation, The University Newspaper and Uniforum will visit a number of universities in the United States this fall. We report on the situation as it is experienced on the ground.

Denne artikkelen er publisert både på norsk og engelsk. Den norske versjonen finner du her.

Early is former Assistant Secretary for Education and Public Service at the Smithsonian Institution. He also served as the acting director of the Smithsonian Anacostia Neighborhood Museum in a historically black community in Washington DC.

The National Museum of African American History and Culture (NMAAHC)  is one of the Smithsonian’s crown jewels on the National Mall, the vast green expanse stretching between the Washington Monument and the Capitol. The Mall is considered the nation’s collective memory. NMAAHC, among the newest of the Smithsonian museums and widely regarded as an architectural masterpiece, stands closest to the monument, which commemorates George Washington, the nations founding father. 

The visitor’s journey at the African American museum begins literally underground – in the lowest level, where the story of African enslavement begins. Visitors walk through the reconstructed hulls of slave ships, spaces that once confined enslaved africans during the Middle Passage. From there, a 500-year history unfolds chronologically and thematically, ending with President Barack Obama. It is a journey that leaves no visitor unmoved.

Museums as validating institutions

During the conceptual museological framing of NMAAHC, Early from his post as assistant secretary was tasked with advocating and organizing across all Smithsonian museums for meritorious cultural democracy employment of historically excluded citizen groups. Now 78, raised on a college campus in Florida, he speaks with the authority of a man who has spent a lifetime at the intersection of art, education, and activism.

- Museums are validating institutions, he explains. 

- They are more popular than universities. They are generally accessible – and in some ways, they are more influential in shaping ideas at a mass level. Universities teach from the vantage point of disciplines, training students with deep knowledge and specialized terminology. Museums, on the other hand, speak directly to the public.

He gestures toward a familiar example.

- They do object-based learning. You take an object – a shoe from the Holocaust Museum – and you tell stories about that.

For him, the civil rights movement was a movement for validation, for the right to be seen as full citizens, full human beings.

NMAACH in the line of fire

- Universities play a comparable role, in a different way, he adds.

But as universities are now being targeted – their knowledge, facts, and theories under siege — so too are the nation’s great museums.

- The Smithsonian is known for its museums, he notes:

- But historically it is a scientific organization – the Smithsonian Environmental Center in Panama, and so on.

The first museum in the line of fire is the Smithsonian’s African American Museum. Lindsey Halligan, former Special Assistant to President Donald Trump, launched a blistering attack on the Smithsonian for «overemphasizing» slavery, insisting that it should instead highlight «how far we’ve come since slavery.» 

A museum that receives more than 70 percent of its budget from the government, she argued, «shouldn’t be laboratories for political experiments.» Halligan has since announced a comprehensive internal review of selected Smithsonian museums and exhibitions. NMAAHC is explicitly named.

- This museum goes back as an idea to Black people in the Civil War who wanted some kind of monumental expression  – a kind of ‘me too,’ Early says. 

- We too want to be validated. 

Tror målet er å ta kontroll over styret

- The «Black question,» he insists, is central   – it’s what the Civil War was fought over.

- This is where white-skin privilege, even among poor white people who think they’re better, comes in. The Civil War is not over – it’s being revived. 

- Taking back America,’ Make America White Again – that’s what this is really about.

To Early, the attack on NMAAHC is only the first move.

- This racialized attack on the African American museum is the frontal strike that will go horizontal – across the entire institution, he warns.

The Smithsonian is, by law, «owned by the American people» and managed in trust for them (see fact box). Yet Early believes Trump is preparing a board takeover, similar to what he has attempted with the Federal Reserve.

- I saw Lonnie Bunch, the Smithsonian Secretary, a few days ago, Early says. 

- He’s a neighbor of mine; we go back to when we both first joined the Anacostia Smithsonian.  The African American community should be ready to act to protect his stallwart leadership of the entire Smithsonian institution, because in the next months, Trump will have had the chance to appoint enough members of Congress to gain a board majority. If this occurs, Early warns, the path to whitewashing history will be clear, Early predicts.

Culture and history central to MAGA

Culture and history, he argues, are central to the MAGA project.

- If we think of culture as I do – as socialized ways of knowing and doing – then culture doesn’t come from your genes, your skin color, the shape of your nose, or the texture of your hair. Those are things we assign value to. The MAGA movement assigns value to being white, European-descended, fundamentalist Christian, anti-immigrant, anti-people of color, misogynist, homophobic — men superior to women, by God’s will. These are the cultural values they are trying to re-institutionalize.

As the atmosphere grows more volatile, more people are buying guns. The psychological pressure, he says, is rising; anxiety is spreading. Lately, several of Early’s white friends have called him just to make sure he’s safe.

- ‘I’m concerned about you,’ they say. I ask why. They tell me, ‘Your profile is pretty high.’ A few months ago, my wife and I had dinner with friends — one a longtime colleague at the Smithsonian. I told her, I sit on my porch drinking coffee, and I get a little anxious. I just don’t know when an SUV might roll up and someone might snatch me off the porch for something I said on Facebook.

– Do you fear for your personal safety?

–  “No, I don’t fear for my safety, James Early replies. 

- But I am anxious that my liberties could be curtailed, could be taken.”