| | '''The Story of Little Black Sambo''' is a short [[children]]'s book<ref>It has only 1,089 words.</ref> by Helen Bannerman, a [[Scottish]] national. Helen Bannerman went on to write many similar books. The book was first published in 1899 and features the hero, Sambo, outwitting four hungry tigers by trading his colorful clothes and umbrella in return for his safety. The tigers then are defeated by their own vanity, as each bites the next one's tale forming a ring. Objections which surfaced in the mid 20th century<ref> The anti-Little Black Sambo movement started in the 1930s and continued into the 1970s. Black educators and civil rights leaders organized numerous campaigns to get the book banned from public libraries, especially in elementary schools. [http://www.ferris.edu/jimcrow/picaninny/]</ref> are primarily to the illustrations and to the protagonist's name, not to the story itself.<ref> "Was Bannerman's Little Black Sambo racist? The major characters: Little Black Sambo, his mother (Black Mumbo) and his father (Black Jumbo) used standard English, not the bastardized English then associated with Blacks. Stereotypical anti-Black traits -- for example, laziness, stupidity, and immorality -- were absent from the book. Little Black Sambo, the character, was bright and resourceful unlike most portrayals of Black children." [http://www.ferris.edu/jimcrow/picaninny/]</ref> | | '''The Story of Little Black Sambo''' is a short [[children]]'s book<ref>It has only 1,089 words.</ref> by Helen Bannerman, a [[Scottish]] national. Helen Bannerman went on to write many similar books. The book was first published in 1899 and features the hero, Sambo, outwitting four hungry tigers by trading his colorful clothes and umbrella in return for his safety. The tigers then are defeated by their own vanity, as each bites the next one's tale forming a ring. Objections which surfaced in the mid 20th century<ref> The anti-Little Black Sambo movement started in the 1930s and continued into the 1970s. Black educators and civil rights leaders organized numerous campaigns to get the book banned from public libraries, especially in elementary schools. [http://www.ferris.edu/jimcrow/picaninny/]</ref> are primarily to the illustrations and to the protagonist's name, not to the story itself.<ref> "Was Bannerman's Little Black Sambo racist? The major characters: Little Black Sambo, his mother (Black Mumbo) and his father (Black Jumbo) used standard English, not the bastardized English then associated with Blacks. Stereotypical anti-Black traits -- for example, laziness, stupidity, and immorality -- were absent from the book. Little Black Sambo, the character, was bright and resourceful unlike most portrayals of Black children." [http://www.ferris.edu/jimcrow/picaninny/]</ref> |
| | The story takes place in a mythical India and the tigers racing around the tree are turned into [[ghee]], the [[Indian]] word for [[clarified butter]], used to make [[pancakes]] for his family's supper. | | The story takes place in a mythical India and the tigers racing around the tree are turned into [[ghee]], the [[Indian]] word for [[clarified butter]], used to make [[pancakes]] for his family's supper. |