The Birth of a Nation (& the birth of a new type of 20th century racism)

D.W. Griffith’s film The Birth of a Nation is based on the racist novels of Thomas Dixon: The Clansmen and The Leopard’s Spots. The film follows two families: The Stoneman family from the North, and the Cameron family from the South first during the Civil War, and then during reconstruction. The film depicts the rise of the Klu Klux Klan (who are painted as heroes) and overall paints a picture of the antebellum south as an “ideal” period. l

Although I have heard of (and even studied) The Birth of a Nation, I was not aware of its widespread popularity in 1915 at the time of its release. Beyond this, I didn’t know the innovations it presented to American film and that it continues to be studied and debated as a turning point in the production of feature films. I was honestly surprised to learn that it reached national distribution in 1915 and was seen by nearly 3 million people. It was also the first movie shown in the White House under President Woodrow Wilson. 

Reception says a lot about the deeply rooted and institutionalized racism in our country. I know that a large majority of the South was (and still is) upset about losing the Civil War, but it’s alarming to me that this was nationally popular in 1915 regardless. 50 years after the end of the civil war, how is this sort of ideology and thought still being cultivated and also widely produced? If this was one of the most iconic silent films, it serves as another testament to American entertainment being built on racism. As summed up by Michele Wallace in her essay “The Good Lynching and “The Birth of a Nation: Discourses and Aesthetics of Jim Crow”: “The Birth of a Nation has stood not only as a dominant fictional account of Reconstruction but as an apologia for the nearly one hundred year-reign of Jim Crow segregation and white supremacist politics that followed in the South and effectively dominated social policies in the West and North.”  (101)

I’m not much of a silent film connoisseur, but I’m willing to bet I can find a better one in a few minutes of googling. I’m confused about what sort of appeal this presented, especially for citizens who did not reside in the South. Despite being a three-hour feature-length film, would it not be obvious that these are hyperbolic depictions? Particularly when whites are barred from voting in the south while African Americans stuff the ballot box? Or when slaves are more than happy to offer up their seats and perform for their masters? Wallace emphasizes that “Griffith accomplishes this in part by using black-and-white nitrate film, perhaps the most lovely medium ever invented, and by emphasizing classical whiteness as a racial idea.” (Wallace 88) In this way, whiteness is seen as right and beautiful, pushing a white supremacist perspective.