Sara Baartman And The Hottentot Venus: Crais And Scully
Ms. Kimberly Ryan Kirk
Book Review #1 Tuesday Feb. 9, 2010 3:30-4:45
Crais Scully, Clifton and Pamela. Sara Baartman and the Hottentot Venus. New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2010.
Crais and Scully, have meticulously and skillfully pieced together the life and times of Sara or Sartjee Baartman. The Authors have given us insight as to whom Sara Baartman the Gonaqua woman was opposed to the Hottentot Venus that she was worldly famous for. For centuries Sara Baartman has embodied westerner’s ideologies of the primitive, savage, and uncivilized Africans. The ghost of Sara Baartman will forever haunt history and our present day lives as long as beliefs in racial supremacy and anti-feminist theories are supported by her very existence. Crais and Scully, are both currently professors at Emory University. Clifton Crais …show more content…
Hendrik’s inability to pay Vos back the money he was lended caused Anna and him to think of other ways to make money, and what a better way to do it than exploiting your own slave. Hendriks began showing Sara to the sick sailors. “According to Anna Sara would “show herself” to those who wished to see her”(Crais Scully 2008 pg.50) It is here that the Hottentot Venus was born. A military doctor, by the name of Alexander Dunlop makes a contract with Henrik’s to show the Hottentot Venus to the world. Sara Baartman refused to go to Europe without Hendrik, and Hendrik was blackmailed into accepting the contract that did not specify any monetary gain for him or Sara Baartman. Arriving in England Dunlop, Hendrik Sara and the boys from the Slave Lodge lived in a Duke apartment. In England people would pay two shillings to view the Hottentot Venus, they would stare at her and even could get close enough to touch her butt. Hendrik was the ringmaster encouraging their audiences to come closer and ordering Sara to bend over for the men in the front Rows to examine her better. Sara was always cold and wore little clothing at
Book Review #1 Tuesday Feb. 9, 2010 3:30-4:45
Crais Scully, Clifton and Pamela. Sara Baartman and the Hottentot Venus. New Jersey: Princeton University Press, 2010.
Crais and Scully, have meticulously and skillfully pieced together the life and times of Sara or Sartjee Baartman. The Authors have given us insight as to whom Sara Baartman the Gonaqua woman was opposed to the Hottentot Venus that she was worldly famous for. For centuries Sara Baartman has embodied westerner’s ideologies of the primitive, savage, and uncivilized Africans. The ghost of Sara Baartman will forever haunt history and our present day lives as long as beliefs in racial supremacy and anti-feminist theories are supported by her very existence. Crais and Scully, are both currently professors at Emory University. Clifton Crais …show more content…
Hendrik’s inability to pay Vos back the money he was lended caused Anna and him to think of other ways to make money, and what a better way to do it than exploiting your own slave. Hendriks began showing Sara to the sick sailors. “According to Anna Sara would “show herself” to those who wished to see her”(Crais Scully 2008 pg.50) It is here that the Hottentot Venus was born. A military doctor, by the name of Alexander Dunlop makes a contract with Henrik’s to show the Hottentot Venus to the world. Sara Baartman refused to go to Europe without Hendrik, and Hendrik was blackmailed into accepting the contract that did not specify any monetary gain for him or Sara Baartman. Arriving in England Dunlop, Hendrik Sara and the boys from the Slave Lodge lived in a Duke apartment. In England people would pay two shillings to view the Hottentot Venus, they would stare at her and even could get close enough to touch her butt. Hendrik was the ringmaster encouraging their audiences to come closer and ordering Sara to bend over for the men in the front Rows to examine her better. Sara was always cold and wore little clothing at