From Underrepresentation to "Dual Heritage" and Beyond: Contemporary African American Monument-Building

Abstract:The years following the Civil Rights Movement witnessed the erection of African American monuments in traditionally white-dominated public spaces, especially in the South. While this terrestrial integration acknowledges the historic centrality of race, their juxtaposition with former Confederate monuments ironically created a parallel "dual heritage." Around the turn of the twenty-first century, newer types of counter-monuments contest prior memorialization and proffer a more nuanced history. Since the 2015 Charleston church shooting, calls for removal of old Confederate monuments have been dynamized by the Black Lives Matter movement, particularly following the murder of George Floyd. Using a framework contrasting dialogic with anti-monumental monuments, this essay analyzes the past half-century of African American monument construction to reconsider desegregation of the memorial landscape. In doing so, it further explores new ways of anti-monumental commemoration in the post-Floyd era.