W.E.B.

Du Bois Institute

White Humor
Author(s): Johannes Fabian
Source: Transition, No. 55 (1992), pp. 56-61
Published by: Indiana University Press on behalf of the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute
Stable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/2934849
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T R A N S I T ION Position
WHITE HUMOR
Johannes Fabian
The idea of the barbarousNegro is a Euro-
pean invention. -Leo Frobenius
We still carrythe markof the masterin our
mindsandspirits,like aform of tattooingcar-
riedout in the initiationceremoniesof the sa-
credgrove.
-Leopold SedarSenghoron Leo Frobenius
What I am going to report is neither great
news nor very entertaining, and certainly
not funny. In the end, it may not even be
illuminating. Still, it is something I have
been unable to consign to academic stor-
age to be analyzed later, calmly and ob-
jectively. I simply need to tell about an
extraordinary passage I came across in a
book written more than eighty years ago
(Im SchattendasKongostaates,Leo Frobe-
nius, 1907).
Two reasons make me believe that I
should try to express publicly the private
outrage I felt when I read this extraor-
dinary document. First, I assume that I
am not alone in my conviction that West-
ern imperialism and the atrocities of co-
lonial domination ultimately need to be
understood by asking how it was (how
56 TRANSITION ISSUE 55
it is?) that intelligent, sensitive people
(like you and me) came to accept the en-
terprise as, on the whole, justified and
noble. Second, I assume that the author,
the eminent German Africanist Leo
Frobenius (1873-1938), is known
widely, not just among his fellow an-
thropologists and other specialists.
Many think of him as precisely the type
of intelligent and sensitive student of Af-
rican culture who should make one won-
der how it was possible for him to iden-
tify with colonialism.
Often cited with approval and admi-
ration, Frobenius conducted his first field
expedition to southwestern Zaire be-
tween 1904 and 1906. Only a year after-
wards, in 1907, he published a 460-page
report, titled Im Schatten des Kongo-
Staates(In the Shade (or the Shadow?) of
Congo State). The book is packed with
information, not only ethnographic but
also historical, political, and, above all,
economic. It shows Frobenius as a sci-
entist driven by a desire to know and un-
derstand; he comes across as critical, hu-
mane, and often compassionate. The
modern reader is under the spell of this

powerful personality and willing to at-
tribute to the spirit of the times an oc-
casional expression of his racism, pater-
nalism, and repeated episodes of actual
violence toward his African helpers and
the villagers he encounters. Leaving the
stark contradictions unresolved rather
than selecting outrageous passages for
cheap effect seemed to me a more pro-
ductive way of reading this document of
colonial discourse (a reading which, at
any rate, was undertaken for a project
larger than exposing a single Africanist as
a colonial villain). At least that was my
resolve until I came to the sixteenth chap-
ter, "Among the Conquistadors of the
Kasai." The conquistadors in question
are the agents of the Compagniedu Kasai,
the semigovernmental trading company
specializing in rubber and ivory. Frobe-
nius accuses this company of arrogating
to itself powers that belong to the State.
He piles one example of the atrocious
conduct of its European employees on
another. Then he brings his story-quite
consciously, as is clear from the
context-to a climax (my translation):
However, the mostterrificandthesaddestin-
cidentwe weregoingto witnessourselves.On
October4, duringoursecondstop at Kabeya,
a sixth unfortunatepickaninny,Kaloshi Ua-
tobelle,was caught.He too was a Kapita [a
rubberbuyer] who had not quite coveredhis
advance.He was supposedto have been an
excellentfellow, a Christianeducatedat the
Mission in Luebo.He arrivedin the evening
and next morning he was thrown to the
groundand held there.A capitastoodon one
side, a Europeanon the other.Each wielded
a cane. It soundedlike a mill: whack-whack,
whack-whack.And when a cane broke,an-
otherone was quicklybrought,so that there
-
From Im Sch-allev
des Kongostaates,
Leo Frobenius,
1907. The legend
for the cartoon
says "Exercises in
fiitiutgenin ber tlumo- the humoristic
ritijfd?cn 23etracftung
bcs legers: Der 30y contemplation of
zuiilntl?t, ba~ Du il~n the Negro: The
als (rwtad?fenen be, Boy wants you to
kanmbelft. treat him as an
adult."
was no interruption of theperfectrhythm.Af-
ter this had beengoing onfor a while I still
heardanother53 whack-whacks,thatis, 106
blows. But there were certainly 150 alto-
gether. Whenthis hadfinished, thepoorfel-
low was unable to walk. He was carried
away, bleedingfrom five serious wounds.
That is what we saw with ourown eyes. Af-
ter the mostsimpleand harmlesspunishment
it is customaryto let thepeople take a bath.
In thiscase,thiswas notpermitted.Uatobelle
receivedthe samepoorfood as the otherpris-
onersand diedas a resultof this treatmenton
October5.
End of story; not a word about his
reaction-did he have the urge to inter-
vene, to help the victim afterwards?Not-
ing a feeling he had at least a day later,
Frobenius does tells us that he found La-
bryn, the European responsible for the
killing, "disgusting," quickly adding,
however, "I was in no position to inter-
vene. " This is hard to believe from some-
one who continually reports his initia-
tives in matters of "native policy" and
who acquired a reputation among other
WHITE HUMOR 57
Europeans as a most meddlesome nui-
sance.
But back to the text: Gruesome facts
are here proffered with a detachment
bordering on serenity. It made me want
to retch. That I reacted so violently was
certainly in part because I share with
Frobenius his native language. The literal
translation I gave cannot convey some of
the signals and connotations that make
worse what, by itself, is a disgusting in-
stance of "objective reporting." Objec-
tivity, like any other normative concept
used by social scientists, can become ab-
surd, depending on context and content
(think of the ledger of a concentration
camp as an "objective" record). Inciden-
tally, the "we" that seems to add credi-
bility to this passage includes Mr.
Lemme, the expedition's artist, who
presently will assume a major role.
Lest my reaction be dismissed as sen-
timental and moralizing, I shall now of-
fer suggestions for taking this episode as
a banal and therefore mind-boggling ex-
ample of the workings of the colonial
mind. Frobenius could not have reacted
the way he did, nor could he have written
about it the way he did-yet he did.
What happened in this sort of writing is
something that transcended and deter-
mined what the author perceived as well
as the manner in which he decided to re-
late his experience.
I begin with some comments on the
text itself and then place the passage in
the context of the chapter and the book.
Placing things in context often serves to
excuse them. In this case, interpretation
shall make matters worse.
Frobenius appears to use two strategies
58 TRANSITION ISSUE 55
designed to make bearable the horror in-
spired by his narrative. The first one is
clinical pedantry in the face of death. His
reporting seems strictly objective. There
is a phrase interjected between the main
story and his afterthoughts that must
have sounded quaint and solemn when it
was written: "That is what we saw with
our own eyes." The observer deserves to
be believed, even if what he observes is
unbelievable. Accordingly, the compo-
sition of the event as a tableau-as an
exhibit-is expected to convince a reader
who is put in the judge's chair. The vic-
tim is identified, even named!-not a
usual courtesy extended to Africans who
appearin travel accounts. Facts are given
that have a bearing on the case: Kaloshi
(Kalonji, we would write today) was a
buyer who failed to come up with a
quantity of rubber deemed to match the
advance he had received. That he was ed-
ucated and a Christian presumably was
mentioned to make the punishment ap-
pear all the more cruel. The beating is
done rhythmically, machine-like. Pun-
ishment takes on an impersonal, measur-
able character: At least 150 blows are
served, five serious wounds are inflicted
(did Frobenius count along silently; did
he get close enough to the victim to ex-
amine him?).
While realistic and objective report-
ing may have been just a distasteful
choice of literary genre, I found Frobe-
nius's second strategy simply sickening.
A native speaker of German cannot fail to
recognize in this passage two evocations
of folklore. Both are conspicuous viola-
tions of the dominant genre. Perhaps
Frobenius committed them because he
was a bad writer; more likely he used
them in an effort to ease the tension of his
account.
 The first slip into folklore is contained
in the phrase "a sixth unfortunate pick-
aninny" (ein sechstesunglucklichesNeger-
lein). It evokes a children's song, Zehn
kleine Negerlein ... a "counting" song
telling of the sad fate of ten "little ne-
groes" who go out to undertake various
things. One after the other is killed and
subtracted from the count. In the mouths
of millions of German children the di-
minutive suffix may have sounded en-
dearing, relativizing the stark message of
the story. Employed by Frobenius it is
condescending and insulting but, as we
shall see, meant to be funny.
A second allusion to, or rather actual
quotation from, a popular romantic song
is given in the phrase that imitates the
rhythmic sound of an old fashioned wa-
ter mill. Again, every German reading
this is reminded of "Es klappert die
Miihle am rauschenden Bach, klipp-
klapp, klipp-klapp" (a song about a mill
that is rattling away on a rushing creek).
It is impossible to determine whether
Frobenius simply followed an associa-
tion when he tried to represent the sound
made by the beating or whether he was
out to create a certain effect byjuxtapos-
ing colonial brutality with a rustic idyll.
Was he perhaps unconsciously regress-
ing to childhood images and sounds in
these songs because what he described
was too much to bear?
As I read it-taking account of the
context, to which we will turn
presently-Frobenius pursued in this
passage strategies whose subjective pur-
pose at the time he was writing may keep
us forever second-guessing. But there is
no second-guessing the effect he created:
when we read his report now, the au-
thor's literary strategies increase the hor-
ror. Brutality with frills, cruelty and
kitsch: these were combinations to
which imperialism was as prone as, later,
fascism.
If there is any doubt left about all this
being intentional, it is easily removed
when we look at the pages that surround
our passage. With three exceptions, the
seventeen illustrations used in this chap-
ter are cartoons. They are identified as
"exercises in looking at the Negro hu-
moristically." Drawn by the expedi-
tion's artist, Mr. Hans Martin Lemme,
they all depict Africans either breaking
European rules of etiquette or aping Eu-
ropean dress and attitudes (see three ex-
amples on the following page). Just in
case the reader misses the point of illus-
trating with funnies what is essentially a
catalog of colonial atrocities, Frobenius
tells us: "It is not for nothing that I il-
lustrate this tragic chapter with gay little
pictures from the life of the Boys. These
are sketches of funny experiences in daily
life drawn by the artist of the Expedi-
tion." "In Africa," he goes on somewhat
inconsequentially, "one cannot do
enough for self-control and self-edu-
cation. A person who gets to be bitter
(gallig) is in danger of losing himself."
"Therefore," he says, "I always tried to
see the comical in a situation and always
to emphasize the humor in it."
I think we all are inclined to see co-
lonial discourse as conspiratorial, trying
to hide its true motives and mechanisms;
I know I am. I also believe that, as a his-
torian, I should avoid easy recourse to
conspiracy when it comes to explaining
the conduct of colonials. It left me gaping
to see Frobenius, openly and without
compunction, declare that "humor" is a
WHITE HUMOR 59
 Frobenius's recommendation, how-
ever clumsy and tactless, is not about
Ubnnlen in her tunioriftifchen~3etracti
compassion for Africans. His "method-
trtui bes ZTe3ers:Der 30ovreict Dir
eineii ioffeI. ological" humor fits in with those rules
against boredom, idleness, and excessive
sleep, but also fraternization, neglect of
personal appearance, and so on, which
contemporary manuals of colonization
grouped under "hygiene." Health, es-
sentially defined as self-control, was nec-
essary in order to control others.
In sum, we have in this one short pas-
sage an instance of colonial discourse in
which domination is multiply encoded:
In the repetitive event of the beating it-
self, in Frobenius's callously quantitative
ltbunlien in her buiino account of it, in the repeated breaks of
riftifcenlcftracttlnng bes
ZTelers: Der 3oy rcicdt style or genre that occur through the
Dir eineu Secder. evocation of popular German songs, in
the graphic context of the illustrations
chosen for the chapter (each with a leg-
end part of which is repetitive), in the
"theory" of humor that is formulated to
make sense of it all and then backed up
with a multitude of anecdotes (not re-
More "Exercises in ported here) and, last but not least, in the
the humoristic con- vignette-like realistic depiction of the
templation of the
scene at the end of the chapter. Each is
Negro": the Boy
like another blow that startles us and pro-
hands you a spoon; claims the author's desire to show that he
the Boy hands you a r 3e-
Ubuntenl in her tlunoriftifcden was in control, no matter what hap-
tracbtunt bes tegers: Der 0oy pened.
cup; the Boy sifts
feitt Dir ben Kaffee burc? feinen Frobenius writes and reasons as a Her-
your coffee through fentbetfd?ur3.
his loincloth. renmensch,a human being destined to
rule. At the beginning of the book he
necessary virtue of the colonial agent- said:
not because it relativizes things, covers
distress with irony, makes inhumane sit- I shallfrequentlyhave the occasionto point
uations humanly bearable, but because it out that we mustsucceed,not only in under-
is needed to maintain "self-control," es- standingthe Negro; but also in meetinghim
sential if one wishes to maintain a posi- morethanhalf-way if we want to utilize his
tion of power over "the Boys," who laborpowerfully. But equallyfrequentlyI
stand of course for all Africans. shall show that the Europeanmust see to it

60 TRANSITION ISSUE 55
that the Negro race which, after all, is dis-
posedfor slavedom, recognizeshim as the
Herrenmensch.

This sort of cant is easily dismissed (and Vignette at the end

by some excused) as ideological jargon
that did not influence what Frobenius
and the likes of him (and the likes of us)
achieved as ethnographers. After all, we
seem to forgive Malinowski his racist
statements (admittedly never destined
for publication). But our reading of a
piece of factual reporting should have
shown that the imperialist frame of mind
can express itself in the same realistic
genre that was considered appropriate
for ethnography. We can never be sure,
until we face that question directly,
of the chapter: "Un-
der the rod of the
masters who do not
litnter ber Siucltec ber L?erren,bie ben
know humor: Poor
tlumior ntid)tfeilnenr:Der arile Ulatobetle
Uatobelle moans as
llt nbe enttcgeet.
miltinert feinc
he dies."
whether an ethnographer's "authority"
deserves credit as a contribution to
knowledge, or whether it merely repro-
duces the political force and violence it
often took to put ethnographers in a po-
sition to claim authority.

WHITE HUMOR 61