On September 12, 2017, senators and representatives from both political parties, reporters, members of the Historical Society, and family, friends, and colleagues of Lin-Manuel Miranda crowded into the National Gallery Statuary Hall of the United States Capitol as Mr Miranda was presented with the United States Capitol Historical Society Freedom Award. House Democratic Leader Nancy Pelosi made congratulatory remarks before Senator Lisa Murkowski introduced Mr Miranda.
In a moving acceptance speech, Mr Miranda expressed confidence in the power of history to inform the future. "The opportunity to create the Hamilton Education Program1 with the Gilder Lehman Institute of American History, our producer Jeffrey Seller, and helmed by my dad Luis Miranda, has been the highlight of it all. It fills me with great pride to see the high school kids performing their original works on the same stage where Hamilton is performed*-and then to hear that they want to be teachers and historians as a result. That 250 000 kids from all over the country from Title 1 schools2 will have the opportunity to go through the program is a legacy for all involved. They're not all going to grow up and go into theater. But in engaging Hamilton's story in a real way, they begin to define their own. They begin to ask, what kind of country do we want to create for ourselves?"+
In thanking the Historical Society, Mr Miranda said, "Through its work, the Historical Society gives us the tools to wrestle with our history and to understand that the same philosophical disagreements about the proper role and size of government that underpinned the Constitutional Convention, and the battle over abolition, and so many other flash points in the American experiment continue to drive what happens in this building now."3
Former recipient of the United States Capitol Historical Society Freedom Award, Congressman John Lewis joined United States Capitol Historical Society Chairman, Don Carlson, to present the award to Mr Miranda. Congressman Lewis continued with an emotional tribute for the work he has done.
John Lewis: I am proud to join you Mr Chairman and congratulate Mr Miranda on receiving this great honor. You see, I was champion of the arts long before I was elected to congress. Those who really know me understand that I love history, and I adore the arts. Except on the occasion of music and trauma. The Civil Rights Movement would have been a bird without wings[horizontal ellipsis] Nina Simone, Tony Bennett, James Baldwin, Joan Baez, Harry Belafonte, Peter, Paul and Mary[horizontal ellipsis] These are just a few of the many who provided a movement, who translated our feelings into literature and recorded our pain and progress. Tonight, I join our friends and colleagues in thanking you for continuing the ongoing struggle to redeem the soul of America. Mr Miranda, we are in history to shape, to inform, to inspire, and to move our people. Your play In The Heights gave voice to immigration, to love and to the American dream. Through Hamilton, Lin-Manuel, you have inspired hundreds of thousands to be brave and courageous, to get in trouble, good trouble, necessary trouble, and I say thank you. Every day you move the souls of men and women, the young and old and people of all races and regions. Lin, you are so young, so gifted, and so talented. I know in my heart of hearts that your words and wisdom will inspire generations yet to come. I hope you will continue to create, to challenge, and to channel the voices, the hopes, and the needs of all people regardless of their race, religion, sexual orientation, gender identity. Together we must strive toward what Dr Martin Luther King, Jr, called the beloved community, where love, peace, and equality, and simple justice may infuse into the hearts and souls of all humankind. Lin-Manuel, with your inspired dedication, we are aroused and ready. We cannot give up, we will not give in, now more than ever before, we need your art to continue to be the wind beneath our wings. Again I congratulate you. Thank you. I salute you.3
Mr Miranda's acceptance speech and Mr Lewis' tribute to him give credence to the essential inclusion of the arts and humanities in the ongoing struggle to redeem the soul of America. What do we include in the arts? Painting, architecture, sculpture, music, performance, photography, theater, cinema. And the humanities? History, linguistics, literature, theology, philosophy, logic. In other words, the arts and humanities are how we process and document and understand the human experience. Isabel Wilkerson commented recently that "reading history could be a compassionate act." And Lewis, in his eloquent Across the Bridge, recounted that "The most important lesson I have learned in the 50 years I have spent working toward a better world is that the true transformation starts within. It begins in your own heart and mind, because the battle ground of transformation is really more than anything, the struggle within the human consciousness to believe and accept what is true."2
Recently, a movie adaptation of the Hamilton Broadway Musical was made available on the Disney streaming service. Since then, a controversy has arisen about the portrayal of certain characters, erasure of Black and indigenous people, and suggestions of revisionist history. As always, any art form is necessarily critiqued. Criticism is good; criticism is necessary; criticism is honorable when done thoughtfully and constructively. We learn much from our critics.
Herein are online critiques and responses (http://google.com/amp/s/datebooksfchronicle.com):
* Lin-Manuel Miranda speaks out after Hamilton faces heavy criticism (google.com/amp/s/ http://www.deseret.com).
* Hamilton Stars Daveed Diggs & Okieriete Onaodowan Address the Show's Slavery Issue (https://www.bustle.com/hamilton-cast-members-respond-slavery-criticism).
In April of this year, Miranda and the Gilder Lehrman Institute of American History launched EduHam, a free digital program for students and their families. The program uses a love of the musical to spark students' interests in creative pursuits and tie them to historical research. It asks students to research figures and events from American history and, as in Miranda's work, compose songs, poems, scenes, or hip-hop numbers based on what they have learned. In the Title 1++ version, students performed their work at the end of the unit; in the digital version, students will submit their work online. Cast members will choose the 10 best every week, to be featured on the website and shared through social media.
The instructional aspect of the program is to familiarize students with using primary source material. On the website, users will find an instructional video by Miranda, and 40 characters form the Revolutionary period; some of them figures in Hamilton, and others, such as Dolley Madison, wife of the nation's fourth president, James Madison. Fourteen historical events-for example, the Boston Massacre-are detailed, and a trove of original documents from the period will be available. It is the students' job to pick from among the references as an inspiration for their song, spoken word piece, or rap number (https://washingtonpost.com/coronavirus/rejoice-hamilton-fans-lin-manuel). Also of importance is "The Online Course Getting Kids Excited About History Outside of the Classroom (https://vimeo.com/blog/post/eduham-at-home-online-course-students/).
James Baldwin, in a 1962 essay titled "The Creative Process," reflects on the relationship between the artist and the nation, specifically in the context of American history. "In the same way that to become a social human being one modifies and suppresses and, ultimately, without great courage, lies to oneself about all one's interior, uncharted chaos, so have we, as a nation modified or suppressed and lied about all the darker forces in our history. Societies never know it, but the war of an artist with his society is a lover's war, and he does, at his best, what lovers do, which is to reveal the beloved to himself and, with that revelation, to make freedom real."4
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