https://www.frontpagemag.com/fpm/2021/05/1620-critical-response-1619-project-danusha-v-goska/
Recent years have seen eruptions of violence and hate in America: riots, looting, the tearing down of statues. Often those rioting are privileged white youth. One wonders, why are self-described “anti-racist” riots happening now? Today’s African Americans have power and wealth that would have been unimaginable to their ancestors. Americans have elected a black president, a black vice president, and there are many current and former black governors, senators, congressmen and women, SCOTUS justices, professors, journalists, entrepreneurs, millionaires and billionaires, bestselling authors, A-list film stars, influencers, trend-setters and adored entertainers and athletes. Interracial marriage is an accepted feature of American life; indeed, Prince Harry, Kim Kardashian, John Legend, Tiger Woods, Candace Owens, Clarence Thomas, George Lucas, Robert DeNiro, Serena Williams and Heidi Klum are just a few of the celebrities in current and former interracial love matches. Why then has race-informed rage inflamed so many?
One excellent guide through America’s agonized spasms is Peter W. Wood’s “1620: A Critical Response to the 1619 Project.” Peter W. Wood has a Ph.D. in anthropology and was a tenured professor at Boston University. He is president of the National Association of Scholars. He has written an easy-to-read guide to the 1619 Project. Almost like a pop-up book, “1620” expands into an anthology if one follows the many references to online essays that Wood provides.
Wood is never anything but courteous and cool-headed, but he also refuses to walk on eggshells. His prose is direct and unapologetic. For example, Wood writes that the 1619 Project is “an effort to destroy America by teaching children that America never really existed, except as a lie told by white people in an effort to control black people. It eradicates American history and American values in one sweep.” This effort to destroy America by distorting American history is of great import. “American history is important because … We Americans have so little to substantiate our common identity.” Similarly, Wood cites numerous scholars who are equally plainspoken. Allen Guelzo, for example, said “The 1619 Project is not history; it is ignorance.” Gordon S. Wood called the project “perverse and distorted.”
At the same time, Wood acknowledges that taking on the 1619 Project is a quixotic quest. “Criticisms of the 1619 Project seem as futile as moths beating their wings against a porch light.” Nikole Hannah-Jones is a celebrity and is “exempt from ordinary forms of accountability.” Regarding the 1619 Project’s slickly-produced advertisement, aired during the Academy Awards, Wood wrote, “Historians publishing articles that detail the numerous inaccuracies in the Times’ pseudohistory are up against a famous, popular, and distinctive singer-actress and a soundtrack that dictates what your feelings should be. It is no contest.”
The New York Times premiered the 1619 Project in August, 2019. The Project consists, inter alia, of newspaper and magazine articles, school curricula, live events, and a podcast. The 1619 Project, Wood notes, has, in a precious touch, its very own font. The goal of the 1619 Project is “to reframe the country’s history by placing the consequences of slavery and the contributions of Black Americans at the very center of the United States’ national narrative.” The 1619 Project is promoted by the National Education Association, The Zinn Education Project / Rethinking Schools, and The Pulitzer Center, among others.
