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A Career Romance For Young Moderns: Peggy Parker, Girl Inventor

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Novaload
05/30/09

In reply to A Career Romance For Young Moderns: Peggy Parker, Girl Inventor
If revisionism is going to be applied to books, movies, etc., on the basis of race, then I guess we need to do that for sexism too, no? Which means about 97% of old books, tv shows etc. will have to go.

How do you decide only some offensive material has to go, but not all of it? The writers were products of their times.
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Sister Toldja
05/30/09

@Novaload Misses Murilee: I don't advocate revisonist history, I just opt out of reading certain things. I feel that I have a very good grasp of what slavery's ills looked like (from both sides) and that a piece of fiction isn't going to do much for my understanding, nor my spirit. I'd rather read non-fiction books that delve into the slaveowner mentality than reading novels about it. I'd gladly read a novel, however, by a White person from that era who was anti-slavery/racism and if someone has one to suggest, I am all ears. And for everyone who feels that GWTW is such an important book, I'd be interested to know how many books by Black writers of that period you have read.
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Rare Affinity
05/29/09

In reply to A Career Romance For Young Moderns: Peggy Parker, Girl Inventor
This is why I always have a problem with people going on about how Gone with the wind was one of the greatest films of all times. Seems like we are supposed to root for a Southern family who tragically lost their wealth when slavery was abolished. It makes me wonder whether in a few decades time Germans will make a film about a family in the 1930s who prospered by appropriating property confiscated from the Jews only to lose everything when the Third Reich collpased.
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stacyinbean
05/29/09

@Rare Affinity: You can love a story without necessarily "rooting" for a character/group of characters, I think.
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bluebears
05/29/09

@Rare Affinity: actually I think that would be a really fascinating movie.
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Sister Toldja
05/29/09

@Rare Affinity: Im with you. I cant get past the slavery element of GWTW, I refuse to see it.
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bluebears
05/29/09

In reply to A Career Romance For Young Moderns: Peggy Parker, Girl Inventor
what is a "haint"?
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NellMood
05/29/09

@bluebears: A haint is a ghost. Like a haunt.
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Lilah
05/29/09

@bluebears: I think it's a bastardization of "haunt". It means a ghost.
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bluebears
05/29/09

@Lilah: @NellMood: was it a derogatory term for african-americans?
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Evie Havok
05/29/09

@bluebears: No, but I think what they're trying to say by haint, in this case, is "spook" which is a derogatory word for black people.
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NellMood
05/29/09

@bluebears: Not that I know of. Where I grew up a lot of people followed a gullah tradition of painting their window frames and door frames a color called haint blue, which was supposed to keep ghosts out of the house.
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bluebears
05/29/09

@Evie Havok: ah.
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casi nadie (loves MCC forever)
05/29/09

@bluebears: No. It's a holdover from a stereotype that slaves were superstitious and obsessed with ghosts. It's mocking African American speech patterns.
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wtfox?!
05/29/09

@Evie Havok: Oh, I thought it was that they were scared by the ghosts that were supposed to live on the farm (or plantation or whatever), because of how [begin sarcasm] black people are all uneducated and superstitious and stuff.
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bluebears
05/29/09

@NellMood: ok, I feel dumb but what is "gullah?"
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NellMood
05/29/09

@Evie Havok: I thought the implication was that the two people afraid of haints were black, and they were badly drawn caricatures.
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saintbernadette
05/29/09

@Evie Havok: I don't think it has anything to do with that connection. I think it's more of a slam to black people for being superstitious and incapable of proper pronunciation.
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bluebears
05/29/09

@wtfox?!: I sort of thought that might be the case as well but I have to say the "haunt" -- "spook" comparison did cross my mind as well.

on the other hand its sort of nice when racist sayings fall so far out of use that we have no idea what they're talking about.
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szielins
05/29/09

@bluebears: The first two paragraphs of

[en.wikipedia.org]

The Gullah are African Americans who live in the Low Country region of South Carolina and Georgia, which includes both the coastal plain and the Sea Islands. Historically, the Gullah region once extended north to the Cape Fear area on the coast of North Carolina and south to the vicinity of Jacksonville on the coast of Florida; but today the Gullah area is confined to the South Carolina and Georgia Low Country. The Gullah people are also called Geechee, after the Ogeechee River near Savannah, Georgia. The term Geechee is most commonly used in Charleston, South Carolina.

The Gullah are known for preserving more of their African linguistic and cultural heritage than any other African American community in the United States. They speak an English-based creole language containing many African loanwords and significant influences from African languages in grammar and sentence structure. The Gullah language is related to Jamaican Creole, Bahamian Dialect, and the Krio language of Sierra Leone in West Africa. Gullah storytelling, foodways, music, folk beliefs, crafts, farming and fishing traditions, etc. all exhibit strong influences from West and Central African cultures.
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NellMood
05/29/09

@bluebears: Don't feel dumb! Gullah (also Geechee) is an African American culture in the low country of South Carolina and Georgia. A lot of the traditions within it are preserved from African traditions brought over during the slave trade. There's also a language called Gullah.
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bluebears
05/29/09

@szielins: thanks! learn something new every day.
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Atomic Monkey Mouse
05/29/09

In reply to A Career Romance For Young Moderns: Peggy Parker, Girl Inventor
I'm afraid to google "'haint".
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casi nadie (loves MCC forever)
05/29/09

@Atomic Monkey Mouse: It's a ghost.
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Trulymadlyme
05/29/09

In reply to A Career Romance For Young Moderns: Peggy Parker, Girl Inventor
Sad. But not surprising. I actually think it's good that people read an accurate reflection of race in the past. Seemingly normal, good people were racists. And I think seeing that in print might remind all of us to check our own prejudices (see: prop 8).
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bluebears
05/29/09

@Trulymadlyme: so true. my great aunt was an elementary school teacher back in the day (if she was still alive she would probably be near or at 100) and I once saw some of her old text books she had taught from (and kept in her house, she was a pack rat) and woof! talk about RACIST. and they were textbooks.
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battleaxonista...is a humorless bitch
05/29/09

In reply to A Career Romance For Young Moderns: Peggy Parker, Girl Inventor
A minority group has always been capable, and always will be capable, of being a complete douchebag to other minorities.
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