A Visual Analysis of Rosey E. Pool's Correspondence Archives. Biographical Data, Intersectionality, and Social Network Analysis

This paper explores the use of Social Network Analysis (SNA) for individual historians, by focusing on the correspondence archives of Rosey E. Pool (1905-1971). Pool’s position in her international network of writers and scholars will be examined through her contacts with Hoyt W. Fuller and Robert Hayden over the period 1966 to 1971. The different positions these three actors held towards The First World Festival of Negro Arts (Dakar, April 1966) will be examined. The Dakar Festival was an important and symbolic event in the transnational Négritude movement.Using the theories of ‘intersectionality’ and ‘collective identity,’ Pool’s network will be analysed by focusing on specific religious and personal features that have influenced the dynamics of her network. A deeper insight of this specific period will be provided by performing a close reading of key letters and by placing the correspondence in its historical context. At the same time, the use of distant reading will be discussed, by dissecting and inspecting a visualisation (made with Gephi) of a database based on Pool’s ego-centred network. I will argue that the two approaches of close and distant reading are inseparable in historical research that makes use of Social Network Analysis

De Sovjet-Unie, “the country without racism”. Een portret van de Afro-Russische historica Lily Golden (1934-2010)

Lily Golden werd in 1934 geboren als dochter van twee Amerikaanse sympathisanten van het communisme die in de jaren dertig uit idealisme naar de Sovjet-Unie waren geëmigreerd. Golden was daarmee een tweedegeneratie Afro-Sovjetburger. In haar autobiografie My Long Journey Home (2002) schreef zij over haar bijzondere loopbaan als professioneel tennisster, actrice, vertaalster, historica en Afrikanist. Golden schreef hierin herhaaldelijk dat de Sovjet-Unie, “the country without racism”, geen (rassen)segregatie of racisme kende. De afgelopen jaren kwam Rusland juist herhaaldelijk in het nieuws vanwege racistisch geweld, en ook ten tijde van de Sovjet-Unie waren er wel degelijk racistische incidenten.2 Met behulp van secundaire literatuur wil ik beargumenteren dat Lily Golden wel degelijk geconfronteerd werd met racisme, meer dan zij zelf toegaf. Tegelijkertijd zorgde haar intersectionele identiteit er ook voor dat zij kansen kreeg die niet waren weggelegd voor reguliere Sovjetburgers

Performances in the Theatre of the Cold War: The American Society of African Culture (AMSAC) and the 1961 Lagos Festival

In December 1961 the American Society of African Culture (AMSAC) organised a large music festival in Lagos, Nigeria. American celebrities such as Nina Simone, Langston Hughes, and Lionel Hampton went on AMSAC’s fully sponsored trip to strengthen African-American/African connections. The performances and AMSAC’s image-building will be examined through photographs of the Lagos festival. These photographs are records of staged acts – acts that were meant to generate positive images of Black America and to reinforce (unequal) power relations between Nigerians and (Black) Americans. The visit of the group provides an interesting case study on the intersecting histories of the Cold War, the American Civil Rights Movement and the decolonisation of the African continent