A Bundle of Silences: Examining the Racial Representation of Black Founding Fathers of the United States Through Glenn Beck's Founders’ Fridays

Abstract

This article explores the discourse on Black Founding Fathers through Glenn Beck's television show, Founders’ Fridays. According to Beck, this 2010 summer television special was an opportunity to present Black American history in a more nuanced and truthful way. The theoretical framework, silencing the past, is used to highlight how the show presented a bundle of silences about Black Founders that changed their historical significance, which favored the show's purpose of silencing racial conflict, institutional racism, Black agency, and Black radicalism. This article extends the scholarship on how Black American history is misrepresented through various educational outlets, in this case, television.

Keywords:

• history education
• Black American history
• curriculum studies

Notes

Note. This article was accepted under the editorship of Patricia G. Avery.

¹Original television episode title.