Posted on 12/18/2005 12:08:30 PM PST by Rebelbase
FORT LAUDERDALE, Fla. - A "King Tut is back and he's still black" placard drew the gaze of visitors making their way to view the acclaimed exhibit at the Museum of Art in Fort Lauderdale Saturday.
Across from the entrance, about 25 demonstrators donning T-shirts marked with various pro-black slogans held up the placards. Waving the red, black and green African flag, at times moving to the beat of djembe drums on the sidewalk, they asked drivers in passing cars to honk in support of their goal: reminding people not to take the lighter-skinned portrait of King Tutankhamun on display as an accurate depiction.
"We're visual people, so whatever they throw at us, we're going to take it as a fact, when in reality it's just a theory," said demonstrator Asante Waa. "We're afraid of the implications that this recreation is going to have on kids, especially on black kids."
Particularly controversial in "Tutankhamun and the Golden Age of the Pharaohs" are computer-generated busts of Tut with a skin tone that critics say make him look Caucasian.
"For the Image of the Living God (as Tutankhamun represents) to be replaced with anything else but a black man's is a slap in the face," said Alicia Milligen, a Lauderhill, Fla., nurse.
Demonstrators passed out fliers with information about the Boy King who reigned over Egypt more than 2,000 years ago. They hope to educate others about King Tut by visiting schools, churches and libraries, said demonstrator Evie Iles.
"It's our history," said Iles, who viewed the exhibit and thinks the lighter skin tone may be a marketing strategy. "We encourage people to go and see the authentic artifacts and to challenge what's inauthentic."
Mary Lefkowitz, a retired classics professor and author of "Not Out of Africa: How `Afrocentrism' Became an Excuse to Teach Myth as History," said Saturday that the demonstrators had a point.
"Ancient Egyptians from Memphis (Egypt) would have had to go to the back of the bus in Memphis, Tennessee, during the days of segregation," the Wellesley, Mass.-based author said in a telephone interview. "The Egyptians were kind of copper-colored."
Museum of Art officials say they are talking to historians with different viewpoints about planning a forum on the topic, but no date has been set.
"It's an interesting conversation that needs to be held," Lynn Mandeville, director of community affairs, said.
Museum visitors said they know the ancient Egyptians were not white, but the demonstration did put the race question at the forefront of some people's minds.
Danielle Dyer, a West Palm Beach, Fla., mother who brought her two biracial daughters along, said she found herself looking more at the shape of the eyes, nose and other features.
"You have to be reaching pretty far to find anything racial about it," Dyer said.
Should be simple enough to settle this now to the satisfaction of anyone for whom this question is all that important.
IIRC some of the mummies of pharoahs have been found to have red hair.
Is that from National Geographic? I remember seeing that recreation somewhere.
I noticed this earlier but decided to pass. Now I have to respond. In case it comes up on your Jeopardy appearance, olivine is a volcanic mineral, generally yellowish-green. When it's transparent and of gem quality it's called peridot (pear-uh-doe) and was known to the ancients as chrysolite. Interestingly, the most famous source for it is St. John's Island in the Red Sea near the Egyptian coast. It's also found in meteorites called pallasites and is the only non-organic gemstone found in Hawaii.
"No! And you're a racist!" is their only reply.
I love it when race-baiting asshats react irrationally to reality.
I know, I know....read the caption, d48, read the caption before you post. geez
If Tut was black, and I sure dont know what color he was. What happened to blacks? How come they retro Darwin'ed? If black people ruled Egypt what happened to them? Now they cant even rule South Africa without starving half the population. Is there such a thing as reverse evolvement? Egypt was a powerful country , There is no such thing as a powerful black country today. What Happened?
Basically in 50 yrs or so me and Arnold Swartzenegger are gonna look pretty much the same. :)
Yes, and to Boy George.
And over a few thousand years, different groups were on top at different times
And regardless of what any afrocentric revisionist tells you, Cleopatra was not black. She was Greek/Macedonian
GAY!!
Tut's lineage?Ahkanenton was his dad and Queen Tiy was his mom.
Tiy was a Nubian woman and most defintely"Negroid"in appearance.Tut more favors his father but if you want to get picky then there IS some crediblity to the claim that Tut was"black",although that term menat something totally different to the ancient Egyptians than it does in modern America.
I raised the point on an evolution debate that it is racist where it was thoroughly derided by pro-evolutionary posters. Your post referencing "retro Darwin'ed" demonstrates that the idea that white is more evolved than black is an outcome of the evolution theory.
I think evolution is racist and I reject it. Each of us, black and white and all the colors between, are created in the image of God.
The fascist movements of the last century did not arise among the leading nations but in nations long divided (Germany, Italy) or isolated from the rest of the world (Japan) and thus reacting against an inferiority complex. One can't help but wonder if the Left would continue to impute "honorary leftism" to such otherwise rightwing attitudes if a genuine fascist pan-African movement were to arise.
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