The focus of this chapter is on images of Blacks in children's books : images that were , images that are , and images of the times that lie in between . It is about children growing up in a land reading that “ all men are created equal ...
Author: Jessie Carney Smith
Publisher: Greenwood
ISBN: UVA:X001358939
Category: Art
Page: 416
View: 604
The 10 essays here explore the images of blacks in historical contemporary American culture. Negative and stereotypical images of blacks have been deeply embedded in our art, music, literature, film, theater, and other forms of expression. On the other hand, as the preface states, black artists and others have also celebrated `images of strength, beauty, and achievement.' Reflecting the complexity of the relationship between the races, these two elements are often intertwined. This reference work explores these images, both positive and negative, and their historical development and impact on both black and American culture. . . . Its unique qualities are the discussions and sources for studying and understanding those artifacts as well as the provision of a historical perspective on the images. Reference Books Bulletin This comprehensive work enriches and extends the subject matter and the scope of the leading books on the topic, and provides a ready reference for information published in scattered sources. It interprets the use of black images in a variety of media, such as works of art, popular titles, and other sources, and identifies the artifacts, books, films, and other materials that have been collected privately or in libraries. The ten chapters also discuss pertinent literature on the wide range of themes that they cover, and include a selective list of additional references for further study and research. Also included are numerous illustrations that provide an interesting pictorial perspective on this controversial topic.Featuring many compelling contemporary illustrations, Enter the New Negroes restores a critical visual aspect to African-American culture as it evokes the passion of a community determined to shape its own identity and image.
Author: Martha Jane Nadell
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 0674015118
Category: African Americans
Page: 236
View: 808
With the appearance of the urban, modern, diverse "New Negro" in the Harlem Renaissance, writers and critics began a vibrant debate on the nature of African-American identity, community, and history. Martha Jane Nadell offers an illuminating new perspective on the period and the decades immediately following it in a fascinating exploration of the neglected role played by visual images of race in that debate. After tracing the literary and visual images of nineteenth-century "Old Negro" stereotypes, Nadell focuses on works from the 1920s through the 1940s that showcased important visual elements. Alain Locke and Wallace Thurman published magazines and anthologies that embraced modernist images. Zora Neale Hurston's Mules and Men, with illustrations by Mexican caricaturist Miguel Covarrubias, meditated on the nature of black Southern folk culture. In the "folk history" Twelve Million Black Voices, Richard Wright matched prose to Farm Security Administration photographs. And in the 1948 Langston Hughes poetry collection One Way Ticket, Jacob Lawrence produced a series of drawings engaging with Hughes's themes of lynching, race relations, and black culture. These collaborations addressed questions at the heart of the movement and in the era that followed it: Who exactly were the New Negroes? How could they attack past stereotypes? How should images convey their sense of newness, possibility, and individuality? In what directions should African-American arts and letters move? Featuring many compelling contemporary illustrations, Enter the New Negroes restores a critical visual aspect to African-American culture as it evokes the passion of a community determined to shape its own identity and image.A "hip-hopera" inspired by Shakespeare's King Lear and 1980s prime-time soap Dynasty, the series is at the forefront of a black popular culture Renaissance--yet has stirred controversy in the black community.
Author: Joshua K. Wright
Publisher: McFarland
ISBN: 9781476673677
Category: Social Science
Page: 241
View: 616
FOX's musical drama Empire has been hailed as the savior of broadcast television, drawing 15 million viewers a week. A "hip-hopera" inspired by Shakespeare's King Lear and 1980s prime-time soap Dynasty, the series is at the forefront of a black popular culture Renaissance--yet has stirred controversy in the black community. Is Empire shifting paradigms or promoting pernicious stereotypes? Examining the evolution and potency of black images in popular culture, the author explores Empire's place in a diverse body of literature and media, data and discussions on respectability.First Published in 2001. Routledge is an imprint of Taylor & Francis, an informa company.
Author: Eileen Southern
Publisher: Taylor & Francis
ISBN: 0815328753
Category: Music
Page: 332
View: 266
Offers approximately 250 paintings, engravings, and drawings which depict scenes of music, dance, religious practice, and storytelling in the everyday lives of African-Americans.Through rigorous analysis, the book argues that American popular culture's representations of black men preserve racial hierarchies that imprison blacks both intellectually and physically.
Author: Linda G. Tucker
Publisher: Univ. Press of Mississippi
ISBN: 9781604731514
Category: Social Science
Page: 191
View: 219
Lockstep and Dance: Images of Black Men in Popular Culture examines popular culture's reliance on long-standing stereotypes of black men as animalistic, hypersexual, dangerous criminals, whose bodies, dress, actions, attitudes, and language both repel and attract white audiences. Author Linda G. Tucker studies this trope in the images of well-known African American men in four cultural venues: contemporary literature, black-focused films, sports commentary, and rap music. Through rigorous analysis, the book argues that American popular culture's representations of black men preserve racial hierarchies that imprison blacks both intellectually and physically. Of equal importance are the ways in which black men battle against, respond to, and become implicated in the production and circulation of these images. Tucker cites examples ranging from Michael Jordan's underwear commercials and the popular Barbershop movies to the career of rapper Tupac Shakur and John Edgar Wideman's memoir Brothers and Keepers. Lockstep and Dance tracks the continuity between historical images of African American men, the peculiar constitution of whites' anxieties about black men, and black men's tolerance of and resistance to the reproduction of such images. The legacy of these stereotypes is still apparent in contemporary advertising, film, music, and professional basketball. Lockstep and Dance argues persuasively that these cultural images reinforce the idea of black men as prisoners of American justice and of their own minds but also shows how black men struggle against this imprisonment.The American (January/February), 29–30. Wilkinson, Doris Y. 1988. “The Toy Menagerie: Early Images of Blacks in Toys, Games and Dolls.” In Images of Blacks in American Culture, edited by Jessie Carney Smith.
Author: Omari L. Dyson
Publisher: ABC-CLIO
ISBN: 9781440862441
Category: Social Science
Page: 940
View: 216
Covering everything from sports to art, religion, music, and entrepreneurship, this book documents the vast array of African American cultural expressions and discusses their impact on the culture of the United States. According to the latest census data, less than 13 percent of the U.S. population identifies as African American; African Americans are still very much a minority group. Yet African American cultural expression and strong influences from African American culture are common across mainstream American culture—in music, the arts, and entertainment; in education and religion; in sports; and in politics and business. African American Culture: An Encyclopedia of People, Traditions, and Customs covers virtually every aspect of African American cultural expression, addressing subject matter that ranges from how African culture was preserved during slavery hundreds of years ago to the richness and complexity of African American culture in the post-Obama era. The most comprehensive reference work on African American culture to date, the book covers topics such as black contributions to literature and the arts, music and entertainment, religion, and professional sports. It also provides coverage of less-commonly addressed subjects, such as African American fashion practices and beauty culture, the development of jazz music across different eras, and African American business. • Identifies influential aspects of African American culture through entries on topics such as African Americans in sports, in musical genres such as blues, gospel, hip hop, and jazz, and in religions such as Christianity, Islam, and Yoruba • Makes clear the numerous ways African Americans have produced, maintained, and evolved their culture in the United States • Enables readers to truly comprehend what "diversity" is by gaining substantive knowledge of how a particular group of persecuted people has learned to thrive artistically and culturally in the United States2007. ''Valley of the Dolls.'' The American (January/February): 29–30. Wilkinson, Doris Y. 1988. ''The Toy Menagerie: Early Images of Blacks in Toys, Games and Dolls.'' In Images of Blacks in American Culture. Jessie Carney Smith, ed.
Author: Jessie Carney Smith
Publisher: ABC-CLIO
ISBN: 9780313357978
Category: Social Science
Page: 1733
View: 368
This four-volume encyclopedia contains compelling and comprehensive information on African American popular culture that will be valuable to high school students and undergraduates, college instructors, researchers, and general readers. • Contains writings from 100 contributing authors, all identified in a separate listing • Includes a chronology placing pivotal events—such as the beginning of black baseball, the modern Civil Rights Movement, and the Harlem Renaissance—in historical context • Depicts key places, events, and people through photographs as well as words • Provides a list of black radio programs and moviesPrinted in the United States of America, North Mankato, Minnesota 092018 012019 Cover Photo: Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images Interior Photos: Keystone/Hulton Archive/Getty Images, 1; Lipnitzki/Roger Viollet/Getty Images, 5; ...
Author: Duchess Harris
Publisher: ABDO
ISBN: 9781532170539
Category: Juvenile Nonfiction
Page: 51
View: 158
After World War I, many African Americans found a welcoming home in Paris while the fight for civil rights continued in the United States. African American soldiers, writers, performers, and activists influenced French society. Blacks in Paris: African American Culture in Europe explores the legacy of African Americans in Paris. Aligned to Common Core Standards and correlated to state standards. Core Library is an imprint of Abdo Publishing, a division of ABDO.74 Blacks as a symbol of release from the unpleasant side of American culture functioned as a weak basis for a constructive work of cultural renewal. Because the image of blacks in America has historically been one of freedom from the ...
Author: Curtis J. Evans
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0199716544
Category: History
Page: 392
View: 952
Religion has always been a focal element in the long and tortured history of American ideas about race. In The Burden of Black Religion, Curtis Evans traces ideas about African American religion from the antebellum period to the middle of the twentieth century. Central to the story, he argues, was the deep-rooted notion that blacks were somehow "naturally" religious. At first, this assumed natural impulse toward religion served as a signal trait of black people's humanity -- potentially their unique contribution to American culture. Abolitionists seized on this point, linking black religion to the black capacity for freedom. Soon, however, these first halting steps toward a multiracial democracy were reversed. As Americans began to value reason, rationality, and science over religious piety, the idea of an innate black religiosity was used to justify preserving the inequalities of the status quo. Later, social scientists -- both black and white -- sought to reverse the damage caused by these racist ideas and in the process proved that blacks were in fact fully capable of incorporation into white American culture. This important work reveals how interpretations of black religion played a crucial role in shaping broader views of African Americans and had real consequences in their lives. In the process, Evans offers an intellectual and cultural history of race in a crucial period of American history.