“I’m much too busy to die”.

November 30, 2021 11:18 AM

Dancer, singer … spy: France’s Panthéon honours Josephine Baker as the first Black woman inducted into the Paris mausoleum for revered figures.

You know, friends, that I do not lie to you when I tell you I have walked into the palaces of kings and queens and into the houses of presidents. And much more. But I could not walk into a hotel in America and get a cup of coffee, and that made me mad.

A life of resistance

Château des Milandes in the Dordogne, is where she hid countless resistance fighters and also bought up her adopted family.
Using her diva status to infiltrate the Nazi Party, she travelled Europe to target diplomats and military officials, feeding back to her confidants in Paris by writing messages in invisible ink on sheet music. Following the liberation of France, Baker was awarded the Croix de Guerre
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posted by adamvasco (14 comments total)

Thanks for this post. I've always been a big fan. She was a woman ahead of her time.
posted by shoesietart at 11:22 AM on November 30, 2021 [1 favorite]

“It does not mean that racism did not exist in France, but French racism has often been more subtle, not as brutal as the American forms of racism,” he added.

what

did the Algerian War and all of the myriad other colonial conquests/war crimes not happen in this reality or are we going extra hard on the French nationalism because France is busy trying to prove they're not incredibly, brutally racist in the perennial 'we're not as bad as the US' propaganda train that runs each time people start talking about institutionalized racism in France

this is on the same level as McConnell invoking Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. in his victory speech
posted by paimapi at 11:52 AM on November 30, 2021 [8 favorites]

That quote is from Pap Ndiaye, who according to Wikipedia "was one of the first researchers in France to compare the history of the African diaspora in France and in the United States" so he does seem qualified to comment on the subject.
posted by BungaDunga at 12:20 PM on November 30, 2021 [16 favorites]

I love Josephine Baker! I didn't know she was a spy, but clearly she was as great at that role as she was a singer and actress.
posted by pangolin party at 12:32 PM on November 30, 2021 [1 favorite]

The guardian isn't really a channel of French Propaganda but Joséphine chose to move to France in this reality, not another. I guess that choice means something. Thanks for setting the record straight, for France has its share of racists, that's obvious.
posted by nicolin at 1:18 PM on November 30, 2021 [3 favorites]

I think the Pantheon is a beautiful symbol and this is a worthy honor for Josephine Baker. The building was originally under construction as a neo-classical cathedral and then during the revolution was re-purposed as a humanist temple. Since them, the greatest French people are interred in its catacombs, with the tombs of Voltaire and Rousseau guarding the entrance.
posted by chrchr at 1:32 PM on November 30, 2021 [1 favorite]

Do the French lease out their Pantheon to tech bros?
posted by chavenet at 1:44 PM on November 30, 2021

France’s recognition of Blackness always seems to be trying to send the message that it is not the United States,” The reality is complex, It is at once the reality of racial discrimination, the legacy of French colonialism but also the promise of French universalism.”
posted by adamvasco at 2:19 PM on November 30, 2021 [3 favorites]

Great post thanks - NPR has a terrific segment on her today
posted by thecincinnatikid at 3:35 PM on November 30, 2021

Messy Nessy recently posted Seven Surprising Things You Probably Didn’t Know about Josephine Baker
posted by Rash at 4:51 PM on November 30, 2021 [1 favorite]

El Ministerio del Tiempo series 4 episode 4 was about her. There was also a cubist painter.
posted by polytope subirb enby-of-piano-dice at 8:57 PM on November 30, 2021 [1 favorite]

French honor for Josephine Baker stirs conflict over racism by Arno Dardam. Excerpt:

Baker represented France’s “universalist” approach, which sees its people as simply citizens and does not count or identify them by race or ethnicity. The first article of the constitution says the French Republic and its values are considered universal, ensuring that all citizens have the same rights, regardless of their origin, race or religion.

In 1938, Baker joined what is today called LICRA, a prominent antiracist league and longtime advocate for her entry in the Pantheon.

“She loved universalism passionately and this France that does not care about skin color,” LICRA President Mario Stasi told The Associated Press. “When she arrived from the United States, she understood she came from a ‘communautaurist’ country where she was reminded of her origin and ethnicity, and in France, she felt total acceptance.”

Universalists pejoratively call opposing anti-racism activists “communautarists,” implying that they put community identity before universal French citizenry. Radical anti-racist groups, meanwhile, say that France first needs a reckoning with systemic racism — a term that is contested here — and the specific oppression experienced by different communities of color.

The term “communautarist” is also used to describe American society, which counts race in official censuses, academic studies and public discourse, which is taboo in France and seen as reducing people to a skin color.

For Rokhaya Diallo, a French commentator on issues related to race, “universalism is a utopia and myth that the republic tells about itself that does not correspond to any past or present reality,” she told The AP. “For Black and non-white people, the Republic has always been a space of inequality, of othering through the processes triggered by colonization.”

posted by Kattullus at 12:29 AM on December 1, 2021 [3 favorites]

I'm not into the kind of military-grade sugarcoating used by French officials (and really, the Universalist approach is a tool that sometimes exemplifies Kundera's Kitsch) but framing things using a "France is trying to ..." kinda personification borders on caricature and doesn't really help to understand anything. On the topic of a perceived difference though (and not necessarily between France and the U.S.A., but between Europe and the U.S.A.) that could have contributed to a permanent move to the old continent, I think that the feelings of Sydney Bechet, Art Taylor, Dexter Gordon, Horace Parlan et al. were quite close to Joséphine's.
posted by nicolin at 1:23 AM on December 1, 2021 [2 favorites]

I think I've said this before here, but if you do get a chance to visit Château des Milandes then go. It's a pretty building in its own right, but the collection of her costumes, clothes, papers, photos and so on is fantastic. An incredible woman who lived a remarkable life.
posted by YoungStencil at 7:58 AM on December 1, 2021 [1 favorite]