America I Am Exhibit

On Tuesday, April 12,2011, my class and I went to a National Geographic exhibit called "America I Am." It was an exhibit about African Americans in the US in history. I do not really know why the exhibit was named that, however I do have a couple ideas. My main idea is that African Americans have always been humans, they lived in the United States, but they were not Americans, at least not American citizens, and sure weren't treated like citizens either. The Founding Fathers may have written about how all men are created equal and should have certain things like a good shelter, happiness, and what they need, in important documents like the Declaration of Independence, and the Constitution, but African Americans certainly weren't given those things. They were slaves, in fact, many of the Founding Fathers had slaves, themselves! Cough cough hypocrites cough cough. They were later counted as 3/5 of a man when it came to voting and such, but still, they were not free, not citizens, and not Americans. It wasn't until after the civil war (which started 151 years before the day we were at the exhibit, coincidence? Nah) in which African Americans were freed by the war and the new 13th Amendment, no slavery. However they still weren't citizens and were not treated as fairly as they should have been. After a lot of fighting, African Americans finally got citizenship, from the 14th Amendment. Although at first they were still treated unfairly, that problem is pretty much gone, today. African Americans are now free, US citizens, and American, there are many famous actors, singers, other celebrities, great leaders, inventors and more, not to mention our current president. Finally, African Americans are treated the way they should have been all along, equal to everyone else. They are American. I really liked the exhibit, it was very fascinating and I learned a lot. I loved how there were chains attached to the floors and ceilings, and light effects to make the floors look covered in chains, it really made me think about how African Americans were treated like rats and dirt, locked up and not worth anything. The random noises in the background were kind of creepy, especially the sinister witch laughs. I did like the background noise of one part where the beginning of the Declaration of Independence was said. That was cool. It was very dark in the exhibit which made it even creepier, especially when you got to the Klu Klux Klan part where there was this creepy masked outfit, not to mention the red lighting. But all in all, it was a wonderful exhibit and I hope other people enjoy it as much as I did.