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By Avery

Newman presents an inspiring picture of black activist print culture in the early 19th century. He claims that black activists shrewdly and brilliantly made use of printed documents, especially pamphlets, to assert “black independence and control” (184). In Newman’s narrative, African-American freeman accomplish perhaps the ultimate evasion of the white American male panopticon. By making use of pamphlets, activists were able to subvert white definitions of space and bind the black community together. For example, the white landowner may not permit a free black to consort with enslaved people on his property, but when a small pamphlet slips onto the property, the author of the pamphlet and its readers have carved out their own space for communication, all unbeknownst to the landowner.

One of the most intriguing points Newman brings up is the advent of hierarchy in the black community. Newman claims that black advocates tended to rise to elite status and furthermore paints their rise as a calculated political move. In Newman’s view, black leaders differentiated themselves as “elite” so that they might mirror white structures of hierarchy. Doing so ensured that elite whites would be more willing to parlay with African-American leaders because they would be recognized as fellow elites. Now, I’m not sure I totally buy that argument considering the rarely egalitarian nature of humankind. I’m betting that blacks looking to define themselves as elite were also driven by at least somewhat selfish motives. However, Newman’s perspective does create an empowering vision of a marginalized group, even if it is a bit too rosy.

It is interesting to look at Newman’s argument beside our discussion of American Indian print culture. Newman focuses on the ways that black activists were able to stick it to the man, the ways that pamphlets proved black intellect and reified black history. As Sherwood points out, however, American Indian writers continued to face great scrutiny of their intelligence even after they had gained fluency in English. Obviously, later in American history, Jim Crow laws prove that black Americans also continued to be belittled and dehumanized, but at this point, just looking at Newman’s argument, it seems that black intelligence was more readily accepted than American Indian intelligence.