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Delia's Tears: Race, Science, and Photography in Nineteenth-Century America
In 1850 seven South Carolina slaves were photographed at the request of the famous naturalist Louis Agassiz to provide evidence of the supposed biological inferiority of Africans. Lost for many years, the photographs were rediscovered in the attic of Harvard’s Peabody Museum in 1976. In the first narrative history of these images, Molly Rogers tells the story of the photographs, the people they depict, and the men who made and used them. Weaving together the histories of race, science, and photography in nineteenth-century America, Rogers explores the invention and uses of photography, the scientific theories the images were intended to support and how these related to the race politics of the time, the meanings that may have been found in the photographs, and the possible reasons why they were “lost” for a century or more. Each image is accompanied by a brief fictional vignette about the subject’s life as imagined by Rogers; these portraits bring the seven subjects to life, adding a fascinating human dimension to the historical material.
384 pages, Hardcover
First published April 15, 2010
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November 9, 2019The woman on this cover is my 5th great-grandmother. My great aunt told me about her and I was so taken by her story.
August 1, 2011
This is a fascinating book. A combination of fiction and fact. It deals with the issues of slavery and racism in the mid nineteenth century. The impetus to this discussion is the discovery of fourteen daguerreotypes of African-American people in the attic of the Peabody Museum at Harvard Univ. These daguerreotypes were made n Columbia, SC, at the instigation of the famous scientist Louis Agassiz as he attempted to study the racial and physio-gnomic features of slaves from different African Tribes. The author deals with the unfortunate uses to which photography can be applied, the role of photography in science, and the impact of picture taking on the uninformed subject. A melange of history of photography, the societal impact of photography, the history of slavery and the lengths to which peole will go to justify clearly bad things.
April 5, 2021
Save yourself some time. This book is not about Delia's tears at all. Rather it celebrates many of the men who caused her tears. ...
December 12, 2015
A fascinating, sensitive, poignant study of how 19th century pseudoscience was used to validate racist ideologies and legitimize slavery.
Displaying 1 - 4 of 4 reviews