“The Negro Digs Up His Past,” by Arturo Schomburg

In this 1925 essay, Arturo Schomburg, who devoted his life to the study and documentation of African and African diasporic contributions to history and culture, discusses the vital necessity of primary sources. Only with the “vindicating evidences” of documentation would it be possible, he argued, to examine and write the “first true” Black history and, indeed, to consider recasting American history.

Over the course of his life, Schomburg--a Puerto Rican American historian, writer, curator, and activist--assembled thousands of books, pamphlets, manuscripts, newspapers, and prints, which he placed at The New York Public Library in 1926. This foundational collection has since grown to more than 11 million items available at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture, the nation’s leading research library in the field of African American and African Diasporic studies.

The collection has supported a vast volume and reach of research, from projects undertaken by the Schomburg Center’s Junior Scholars (as young as 10 years old) to intellectual and creative work by prize-winning academics, public intellectuals, writers, filmmakers, and more. These projects are testaments to Arturo Schomburg’s guiding vision: that access to information engenders capable citizenship, powerful thinking, and ultimately the further dissemination of knowledge.  

Read the transcript