A War Within a War : Canadian Reactions to D. W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation

Type of resource
Author/collaborator
Title
A War Within a War : Canadian Reactions to D. W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation
Abstract
American film producer D. W. Griffith’s wildly successful epic motion picture, Birth of a Nation was released in Canada, a nation at war, in 1915. The author points out that the film was based on the 1905 novel and play "The Clansman: A Historical Romance of the Ku Klux Klan" by Thomas Dixon Jr. The motion picture popularized a pro-Southern view of the U.S. Civil War and Reconstruction era, demonized African Americans and abolitionists, and made heroes of the first Ku Klux Klan. The author examines Canadian responses to the film in 1915 and 1916 in Vancouver, Winnipeg, Toronto, Montreal, Halifax, and Saint John, paying particular attention to protests by African Canadians, which usually were organized through church congregations. He points out that Birth of a Nation was a challenge for provincial film censors in a nation that supposedly frowned on American traditions of violence and supported British “fair play.” During wartime, African Canadians appealed to citizenship, patriotism, and Britishness, especially in Montreal where the silent film played with French and English titles, to mount an early, if largely unsuccessful, civil rights struggle against an invading American cultural product.
Publication
Histoire sociale / Social History
Volume
Vol. 47
Issue
no. 94
Pages
421-442
Date
June 2014
Language
en
URL
Citation
Marquis, Greg. “A War Within a War : Canadian Reactions to D. W. Griffith’s The Birth of a Nation.” Histoire sociale / Social History Vol. 47, no. 94 (June 2014): 421–442. https://hssh.journals.yorku.ca/index.php/hssh/article/view/40352.
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