Swing Low: from slave spiritual to rugby anthem

An interesting article in today’s Independent by Jame Moore is titled: “I used to love ‘Swing Low, Sweet Chariot’ – until I found out what it meant”. With rugby’s Six Nations tournament currently being played, this song will be sung by many, but the New York Times has suggested that “it might actually be grossly offensive to turn a spiritual from the slave-owning era in America into something as trivial as a sporting anthem.” It consulted a number of academics about the use of the song and one commented that: “a group of people seemed to be free-associating with imagery largely disconnected from its history.” Considering the lyrics are about the release of death for a slave who has been cruelly mis-treated, Moore reflects on a recent trip to the American South: “The ugly legacy of slavery was everywhere. Some of what we saw in museums about how it operated was truly horrifying. Set against that, the use of the song in a sporting context? Well it makes me shudder, anyway.”
Read the full article here.