White Mans burden

3/18/21 This is a bonus opportunity. I will score each question out of 5 points. For a total of 25 point of bonus to class work.

8.H.2.1 - Explain the impact of economic, political, social, and military conflicts on the development of North Carolina and the United States.
8.H.2.3 - Summarize the role of debate, compromise, and negotiation during significant periods in the history of North Carolina and the United States.

“The White Man’s Burden”: Kipling’s Hymn to U.S. Imperialism

In February 1899, British novelist and poet Rudyard Kipling wrote a poem entitled “The White Man’s Burden: The United States and The Philippine Islands.” In this poem, Kipling urged the U.S. to take up the “burden” of empire, as had Britain and other European nations. Published in the February, 1899 issue of McClure’s Magazine, the poem coincided with the beginning of the Philippine-American War and U.S. Senate ratification of the treaty that placed Puerto Rico, Guam, Cuba, and the Philippines under American control. Theodore Roosevelt, soon to become vice-president and then president, copied the poem and sent it to his friend, Senator Henry Cabot Lodge, commenting that it was “rather poor poetry, but good sense from the expansion point of view.” Not everyone was as favorably impressed as Roosevelt. The racialized notion of the “White Man’s burden” became a euphemism for imperialism, and many anti-imperialists couched their opposition in reaction to the phrase.

Take up the White Man’s burden— Send forth the best ye breed— Go send your sons to exile, To serve your captives' need,

To wait in heavy harness, On fluttered folk and wild— Your new-caught, sullen peoples, Half devil and half child.

Take up the White Man’s burden, In patience to abide, To veil the threat of terror, And check the show of pride;

By open speech and simple, An hundred times made plain, To seek another’s profit, And work another’s gain.

Take up the White Man’s burden— And reap his old reward: The blame of those ye better, The hate of those ye guard—

The cry of hosts ye humour, (Ah slowly) to the light: "Why brought ye us from bondage, “Our loved Egyptian night?”

Take up the White Man’s burden- Have done with childish days-The lightly proffered laurel, The easy, ungrudged praise.

Comes now, to search your manhood, Through all the thankless years, Cold-edged with dear-bought wisdom,

The judgment of your peers!

Source: Rudyard Kipling, “The White Man’s Burden: The United States & The Philippine Islands, 1899.” Rudyard Kipling’s Verse: Definitive Edition (Garden City, New York: Doubleday, 1929).

Questions:

1. According to Kipling, and in your own words, what was the “White Man’s Burden?”

2. What reward did Kipling suggest the “White Man” gets for carrying his “burden?”

3. Who did Kipling think would read his poem? What do you think this audience might have said in
response to it?

Bonus: Click the links for the other poems to make the comparisons. 

4. For what audience do you think George McNeill wrote his poem? How do you think those audiences
might have responded to “The Poor Man’s Burden?” Links to an external site.

5. For what audience do you think H.T. Johnson wrote his poem? How do you think those audiences
might have responded to “The Black Man’s Burden?” Links to an external site.

Recorded Lesson 3/18/21