Documentary Description
Only one hundred years ago, many of the world's leading scientists
agreed with A. C. Haddon, when he wrote in his 1898 book Study of Man,
that, "on the whole, the white race has progressed beyond the black
race." In the 19th and early 20th centuries, scientists were so
fascinated by race that thousands of 'exotic' and indigenous people from
all over the world were put on display in human zoos. They were not
intended as merely entertaining freak shows but also scientific
demonstrations of racial difference. Across the western world millions
gawped in fascination at these 'uncivilised savages' and would depart
convinced of the superiority of the white race. This documentary
explores the phenomenon of human zoos and tells the poignant story of
Ota Benga, a Batwa pygmy from the Belgian Congo, who was first put on
display at the 1904 St Louis World's Fair and then the Bronx Zoo where
he was labelled as the 'missing link'. As the film reveals, it
was only a short step from these human zoos to the horrors of Nazi
Germany as pseudo science that underpinned one, helped legitimise the
other.
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