![\"\"](\"http:\/\/blog.uvm.edu\/vlbrenna-rel095fall2017\/files\/2017\/09\/masterT_ostow.jpg\")
<\/a>RFT dancing in his undergraduate class at Yale, photo by Mark Ostow.<\/p><\/div>\n
Thompson\u2019s central contribution to his field has been his insistence on understanding African art in context, understanding what it communicates on its home turf. Because of Thompson\u2019s keen interest in context, his take on art history encompasses not only visual art and architecture, but also anthropology, language, religion, ethnomusicology, dance history, and philosophy. His aim, says one former PhD student, is to map \u201cthe artistic geography of the African world\u201d; another says that Thompson studies \u201cthe diversity of blackness, of blacknesses.\u201d Cornel West, who teaches African American studies at Princeton, calls this white man from Texas \u201cmy dear brother\u201d and \u201cone of the greatest pioneers in the study of Afro-American culture and African culture.\u201d<\/p>\n
Thompson wants his students to recognize how aspects of African cultures infuse not only the music, art, and dance of the Americas, but also philosophy, religious practice, textile design, everyday gestures, and even vocabulary as quotidian as\u00a0Uh-huh<\/i>\u00a0(yes) and\u00a0Unh-unh<\/i>\u00a0(no). According to David Doris \u201902PhD, a professor of African art history at the University of Michigan, \u201cHe coined the term that became prevalent in academia: \u2018Black Atlantic.\u2019\u201d Says Thompson, \u201cWe can\u2019t know how American we are unless we know how black we are.\u201d<\/p><\/blockquote>\n