Episode 101: Born on the 4th of The Lie!

Family, friends, and listeners:

We gather virtually at a momentous historical threshold. The United States is engulfed in the pageantry, corporate sponsorships, and national choreography of its Semiquincentennial—the 250th anniversary of the signing of the Declaration
of Independence. Across the landscape, museum exhibitions are being mounted, monument plaques polished, and civic speeches drafted.

We are being summoned, collectively, to step into a grand civic liturgy: to
look back upon 1776 with an unclouded eye of pride, to venerate the so-called “Founding Fathers,” and to reaffirm a singular narrative of unfolding democratic progress. But as citizens of a deeply fractured landscape, we must ask the question that always haunts the perimeter of the American bonfire: 

Who is this celebration for?

Sources 

Primary Sources:

William Apess, Eulogy on King Philip, ed. Paul Royster, American Studies 39 (Published by the author, 1837; 2nd ed., Zea E-Books, 2022), https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/zeaamericanstudies/39

Frederick Douglass, “What to the Slave Is the Fourth of July?,” Oration Delivered in Corinthian Hall, Rochester (Rochester: Lee, Man, and Co, 1852), 14-37, https://loveman.sdsu.edu/docs/1852FrederickDouglass.pdf

Secondary Sources:

Patricia Bizzell, “The 4th of July and the 22nd of December: The Function of Cultural Archives in Persuasion, as Shown by Frederick Douglass and William Apess,” College Composition & Communication 48, no. 1 (1997): 44–60, https://doi.org/10.58680/ccc19973130

Drew Lopenzina, Through an Indian’s Looking-Glass: A Cultural Biography of William Apess, Pequot (University of Massachusetts Press, 2017), https://doi.org/10.2307/j.ctv346tn6

Drew Lopenzina, “What to the American Indian Is the Fourth of July? Moving beyond Abolitionist Rhetoric in William Apess’s Eulogy on King Philip,” American Literature 82, no. 4 (2010): 673–99, https://doi.org/10.1215/00029831-2010-041.

Mimi Yang, “What Does the 250th Anniversary of the Independence Mean to a ‘Browner’ America?,” On_Culture: The Open Journal for the Study of Culture(Germany) 15 (October 2023), https://doi.org/10.22029/oc.2023.1349

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Kurly Tlapoyawa is an archaeologist, ethnohistorian, and filmmaker. His research covers Mesoamerica, the American Southwest, and the historical connections between the two regions. He is the author of numerous books and has presented lectures at the University of New Mexico, Harvard University, Yale University, San Diego State University, and numerous others. He most recently released his documentary short film "Guardians of the Purple Kingdom," and is a cultural consultant for Nickelodeon Animation Studios.
@kurlytlapoyawa

Ruben Arellano Tlakatekatl is a scholar, activist, and professor of history. His research explores Chicana/Chicano indigeneity, Mexican indigenist nationalism, and Coahuiltecan identity resurgence. Other areas of research include Aztlan (US Southwest), Anawak (Mesoamerica), and Native North America. He has presented and published widely on these topics and has taught courses at various institutions. He currently teaches history at Dallas College – Mountain View Campus. 

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