Latest news with #LouisAgassiz
BBC News
5 days ago
- General
- BBC News
Harvard agrees to transfer photos of enslaved people to black history museum
Harvard University has agreed to hand over a set of historic photos believed to be among the earliest depicting enslaved people in the United agreement ends a long legal battle between the institution and Tamara Lanier, an author from Connecticut who argues she is a descendant of two people shown in the images, taken in 1850, will be transferred to the International African American Museum in South Carolina, where the people shown in the photos were said it had always hoped the photos would be given to another museum. Ms Lanier said she was "ecstatic" with the result. The images are daguerreotypes, a very early form of modern-day photographs and were taken 15 years before the 13th Amendment to the US Constitution abolished photos were rediscovered in storage at Harvard's Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology in 1976. The 15 images feature people identified by the Peabody Museum as Alfred, Delia, Drana, Fassena, Jack, Jem, and Renty. According to Ms Lanier, the settlement would mean the transfer of all the images not just the ones about Renty and Delia. The photos were commissioned by Harvard professor and zoologist Louis Agassizm as part of discredited research to prove the superiority of white people. He espoused polygenism, a now debunked belief that human races evolved case formed part of public debate around how America's universities should respond to their historic links to slavery. In 2016, Harvard Law School agreed to change a shield that was based on the crest of an 18th Century did not comment on the details of the settlement but a university spokesperson said it "has long been eager to place the Zealy Daguerreotypes with another museum or other public institution to put them in the appropriate context and increase access to them for all Americans."The spokesperson added that Ms Lanier's "claim to ownership of the daguerreotypes created a complex situation, especially because Harvard has not been able to confirm that Ms Lanier is related to the individuals in the daguerreotypes." Ms Lanier sued Harvard in 2019, arguing the images were taken without consent and accusing the university of profiting from them through large licensing 2022, the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court upheld an earlier ruling that dismissed Ms Lanier's claim to ownership. She was, however, allowed to claim damages for emotional distress. It ruled Harvard had "complicity" in the "horrific actions" surrounding the creation of the images."Harvard's present obligations cannot be divorced from its past abuses," it Lanier told the BBC, she was "ecstatic" about the settlement. "I have always known first of all that I could never care for the daguerreotypes at the level they would require," she said. "There are so many ties that bind Renty and Delia and the other enslaved people to that particular part of South Carolina that to repatriate them there would be like a homecoming ceremony."The South Carolina museum helped Ms Lanier with her genealogy claims but was not involved in the legal battle. Its president said they intend to hold and display the images "in context with truth and empathy.""These are not gentle images and the story behind how they came to be is even more difficult to hear," Tonya Matthews told the BBC. "So to be in a space that has already created room for conversations about the inhumanity of slavery and enslavement and how far those implications echo even to today is what we do and it's our mission."
Washington Post
7 days ago
- General
- Washington Post
Harvard relinquishes possession of slave photos after a 15-year dispute
Centuries-old images of an enslaved man and his daughter, believed to be the earliest-known photographs of enslaved people in the United States, were relinquished by Harvard University after a 15-year-long legal battle. Connecticut woman Tamara Lanier says she is the great-great-great-granddaughter of Renty Taylor, an enslaved man photographed nude alongside his daughter in the winter of 1850 in images commissioned by a Harvard scientist, Louis Agassiz. She sued Harvard for ownership of the photos in 2019.
Reuters
28-05-2025
- General
- Reuters
Harvard to relinquish slave photos to resolve descendant's lawsuit
BOSTON, May 28 (Reuters) - Harvard University has agreed to give up ownership of photos of an enslaved father and his daughter who were forced to be photographed in 1850 for a racist study by a professor trying to prove the inferiority of Black people to resolve a lawsuit by one of their descendants. The settlement was announced on Wednesday by the legal team representing Tamara Lanier, who had waged a six-year legal battle over what she alleged was its wrongful claim of ownership over photos that were taken without her ancestors' consent. The two photos will not go to Lanier as part of the settlement, but instead will be turned over along with pictures of five other enslaved people to the International African American Museum in Charleston, South Carolina. The settlement was first reported by the New York Times and confirmed by a spokesperson for Lanier's legal team. Cambridge, Massachusetts-based Harvard did not immediately respond to a request for comment. The settlement comes at a sensitive moment for Harvard, as the university fights in court against efforts by Republican President Donald Trump's administration to terminate billions of dollars in grant funding and end its ability to enroll foreign students. The lawsuit, opens new tab concerned images that depict Renty Taylor and his daughter Delia, slaves on a South Carolina plantation who were forced to disrobe for photos taken for a racist study by Harvard Professor Louis Agassiz. The photos were being kept at the Peabody Museum of Archaeology and Ethnology on Harvard's campus when Lanier, a descendant of Taylor, sued in 2019. A state court judge in Massachusetts initially dismissed the case. But the state's highest court revived it in 2022, saying she had plausibly alleged that Harvard was negligent and had recklessly caused her to suffer emotional distress. Justice Scott Kafker, writing for the court at the time, said Harvard had "cavalierly" dismissed Lanier's claims of an ancestral link and disregarded her requests for information about how it was using the images, including when the school used Renty Taylor's image on a book cover. He said Harvard's complicity in the "horrific" creation of the pictures meant it had "responsibilities to the descendants of the individuals coerced into having their half-naked images captured in the daguerreotypes."
