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PDF Download while on milit ary campaigns within Greece arc part of a "cover-up ," beyond even Oliver Stone's imaginings, of Soc­ BOOKS, ARTS rates' Egyptian sojourn . Plato derived many of his key doctrin es from "Mem­ phit e theolo gy" and plagiarized entire treatises that are now ascribed to him . This makes Socrates , of course , merely ~ MANNERS the "alleged teacher of Plato. " In sum , James denied that the ancient Greeks had any intellectual or creative powers of their own. They there fore stole from black Egyptian civilization all Corcyraeanization the cultural forms that , since the Ren­ aissance, we have considered part of our Greek heritage. James never explained THOMAS G. PALAIMA why a "co ntenti ous and nonc ontempla ­ tive people" would have go ne to all the N his case study of the horrors of civil strife within the Greek city-state bother that such colossal thi every and of Corcyra, Thuc ydides clinically describes how opposing factions, in deception would entail. But he argues I their pursuit of power and hatred of one another, dehistoriciz ed the that , for racist reasons, white European meanmg s of words and ideas and invented new ones. The Greek historian culture has hidden from black culture would consider it a small and predictable historical irony that recent factional the fact of thi s who lesale cultural pil­ warfare in the Balkan peninsula , where Corcyra itself is located, has made fering. Absurd . Prepos terou s. U ntil now in "Balkanized" the fashionable replacement for "Co rcyraean" or "Orwellian" in American society an intelligent person discussions of such phenomena. But with what measure of irony would could dismiss James's theori es as non­ Thucydides observe the process of dehistorici zation and intellectual "Balkan­ sense, and racist nonsense at that , with­ ization " within American higher education that is the subject of this book? out a second thought. Most intellectuals 1n the 1950 s, as Bob Co nnor has re­ still have never heard of Stolen Legacy. marked, the architects of Amer ican for­ facts about the beginnings of the West­ Unlike Socrates, non e of us wou ld have eign policy conceived of the conflict be­ ern intellectual tradition. Pre-Socratic known what we did not know , nor tween the United States and the Soviet philoso pher s deriv ed their ideas about would Mary Lefkowi tz have written the Union 111 Thuc ydid ean terms and the or igins of the wo rld from "Mem­ book under review, had not a Sinolog ist planned strategy for the Cold War ac­ phit e theology" transmitt ed throu gh at Co rnell University in 198 7, by self­ co rdin gly. They had studied the "father Genesis by Moses , who himself was an admission in response to a mid -life cri­ of scientific histo ry" at their prep initi ate int o a compl ete system of learn- sis, begun to argue an even more com­ schools , colleges, or uni versities, and prehensive Afrocentric case. Martin Berna l's two Black Athena volumes and Not Out of Africa: How Afrocentrism the publi c inter est they inspired lent le­ Became an Excuse to Teach Myth as gitima cy, within American higher edu­ History, by Mary Lefkowitz (Basic, cation , to the entire Afrocentrist int el­ 240 pp., $24) lectual movement of which Stolen Legacy is an imp ortant component . Like Stolen they under stood the value of his analy­ Legacy, Bernal's volumes satisfied the ses. At the same tim e, George G. M. social, psychological , and even political James, a college teacher in Arkansas , needs of Afrocentrists , but , unlike the was writin g Stolen Legacy : The Greelu earlier work , the y have ·a ll the trappin gs Were Not the Authors of Greeli Philosophy, of legitimate scholarship. Bernal's but the People of North Africa, Commonly "trickle -up" strat egy of makin g his radi­ Called the Egyptians. The boo k appeared cal and, as we see here, hardl y original in 1954 . I ts author disregards the prin ­ thesis a medi a event ensured that the ciples of historic al inquir y developed in academy could not ignore his theori es. Western culture from Thucydides on­ ;:;They have been examined , discussed , ward. He is thu s free to propose that - ]' and refuted by specialists , and most Aristotle sto le all of his philosophy from _ _ ~ wou ld have been consigned to decent Egypt-we' ll discuss the particular s ==----- ----- '- ·_·_· ·.......::A.ccN-'-"©'--' ~ obscurit y but for the stron g political below-and to narr ate other surprisin g ing known as the Egyptian Mysterie s. voltage in Afrocentrism. Any rational Socrates traveled to Egypt, where he discrediting of Afrocentrist theori es Mr. Pala ima is Dickson Centennial Profes­ learned about astrology , geology , jus- meets with immedi ate charges of rac­ sor and chairman of the Departm ent of tice, and the doctrine of self-knowledge. ism. Profes sor Lefkowitz's personal ex­ Classics at the University of Texas at The ancient sources indicating that Soc- perienc es at Wellesley, when she has Austin. rates traveled outside of Athens only tried to question the basic tenets of rad- 54 N AT I O N AL R EV I E W / M A R CH 2 5 , I 9 9 6 ical Afrocentrism, prove that "prepos­ myth of Eg ypt as the Jons et origo of all higher education , with littl e open chal­ terous " and "absurd" are no longer per­ Europea n learn ing and cultur e was in­ lenge . The unifying force of a shared missible responses , even when the y are vented in the eighteenth centur y in a belief in disp assionate , rigorous his­ supported by closel y reasoned historical popular Bildungsroman. It was th en em­ torical research has been replaced by argume nts. T he discipline of history is bedded in the lore of Freem asonr y, and factional advocac y of self-validating be­ itself racially suspec t and therefore re­ finally taken up by influenti al figure s in lief systems. What we have here is the jected. the struggle for black rights in the late Corc yraeanization of the very institu­ Why shou ld indi vidu als across the po­ nin etee nth and early twentieth cen­ tions in our soc iety th at shou ld offer litical spectrum read what Mrs. Lefko­ turies. By tracing an intellectua l pedi­ students of all backgrounds and persua­ wit z has wr itt en and care about the is­ gree from Terrasson throu gh Blyden , sions the int ellectu al tools ro examine sues she addresses? In a word , Du Bois, and Garve y to James , Mrs. together the wor ld, present and past . " Balkani zation " or , for the sake of nos­ Lefkowitz reveals that Afrocentrism is This collecti ve process ideally should talgia , "Corc yraeanization. " Readers not a passing fanc y of this half-century. lead , Professor Lefkow itz quotes who und erstand the significance of the It is lon g-estab lished doctrine in certa in Schlesinger as saying, to "respect for di­ latter word can take up Not Out of Afri­ black intellectual circles . Cha llenging its vergent cult ur es and traditions , and un ­ ca for the pleasur e of having their hard-­ premises by app lying Thuc ydide an his­ flinching protection for those unifying acquired knowledge validated. The y torica l method s will be just as effective ideas of tolerance , democracy , and hu­ may also derive a perverse amusement as appealing to Darwin in discussions man rights that make free historical from reading about the alternat ive tech ­ with creationists. inquir y possible ." Tolerance has now nique s used by an Afrocentrist speaker The frightening message of Not Out of taken on a wholly new meaning . His­ and by Mrs. Lefkowitz 's own co lleagues Africa , then , is that radically different tor y is what any particular faction de­ to dismiss her object ion that Aristotle modes now coexist wit h gen uin e histo r­ clares it to be. To find out where this is cou ld not have sto len Eg ypt ian Myster y ical thought and reasoning in American heading , go read Thucydides . • texts from the Librar y of Alexandria for the simple reason that he died before Ptolem y I Soter and Dem etrius of Phal­ eron even got going on the Library. The Art for an Empty Universe speaker outdoes Frank Llo yd Wr ight in master y of imperturbable disdain. A col­ league shows impatience with Professor HADLEY ARKES Lcfkowitz 's tiresome concern for histor ­ ical truth : "I don 't care who sto le what RI STOTLE remarked , in the the advantage at least of beginning with from whom. " Physics, that if the art were in the things nearest at hand , and with To her cred it, Mrs. Lefkowit z has not A the material , ships would be comp laint s th at are accessible to people seized the chance to wr ite a broad lam­ growing out of trees . The presence of of ord inary understanding: In this age po011, but addresses the serious prob­ art indi cated the presence of a shap ing of postmodernism , we have seen shows lems here seriously. She argues sympa­ hand. Art wo uld of course be governed at the Whitney Museum in New York theticall y that Afrocentr ist scholars do by the laws of matter , but plainly also exhibit ing simu lated vomit and excre­ themselves and their stud ents a disserv­ arr was somet hing apart from the wo rld ment .
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