‘Lawdy! I was sho’ happy when I was a slave!’ : Manipulations éditoriales dans les entretiens menés par la WPA auprès des anciens esclaves dans le Mississippi

Abstract

Examining the typescripts and manuscripts of interviews in the Mississippi state archives from the WPA project on former slaves reveals the often heavy-handed and manipulative editing that occurred before the narratives were published. Editing occurred on both the state and federal level, apparently aimed both at mitigating the evils of slavery as an institution, and at reinforcing minstrel-show stereotypes of African-Americans as ignorant and colorful. The impetus for collecting the interviews – more than 2,000 were done in 17 states – was to try to preserve some knowledge of the experience of slavery in the American South. In the end, it perhaps more accurately preserved the deep racial prejudice that continued to fester more than 70 years after emancipation. Revealing the editing changes made in these interviews, which are available on the Library of Congress American Memory website, is also a reminder to historians that even so-called primary documents can have an embedded agenda.