Sophie Tucker, Racial Hybridity and Interracial Relations in American Vaudeville

2019 ◽  
Vol 44 (2) ◽  
pp. 153-170
Author(s):  
MARIA DE SIMONE
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
African American ◽  
Entertainment Industry ◽  
Historical Records ◽  
Interracial Relations ◽  
Racial Hybridity ◽  
Early Twentieth Century ◽  
American Artists ◽  
African American Artists

This article discusses Sophie Tucker's racialized performance in the context of early twentieth-century American vaudeville and black–Jewish interracial relations. Tucker's vaudeville musical acts involved mixed racial referents: ‘black-style’ music and dance, Jewish themes, Yiddish language and the collaboration of both African American and Jewish artists. I show how these racial combinations were a studied tactic to succeed in white vaudeville, a corporate entertainment industry that capitalized on racialized images and fast changes in characters. From historical records it is clear that Tucker's black signifiers also fostered connections with the African American artists who inspired her work or were employed by her. How these interracial relations contended with Tucker's brand of racialized performance is the focus of the latter part of the article. Here I analyse Tucker's autobiography as a performative act, in order to reveal a reparative effort toward some of her exploitative approaches to black labour and creativity.

On the Blackness of Post-Blackness

2019 ◽  
pp. 33-60
Author(s):  
Cameron Leader-Picone
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
American Art ◽  
Original Formulation ◽  
African American Art ◽  
Linked Fate ◽  
Racial Categorization ◽  
Individual Agency ◽  
Black Art ◽  
American Artists ◽  
African American Artists

This chapter argues that Colson Whitehead’s novel Sag Harbormirrors post-Black art’s emphasis on simultaneously rejecting and embracing the racial categorization of African American art. In doing so, Whitehead’s novel represents a qualified liberation for African American artists that optimistically imagines a freedom from racial categorizations that is still rooted in them. This chapter analyzes Whitehead’s novel in the context of the competing definitions of post-Blackness offered by Touré in Who’s Afraid of Post-Blackness? as well as in the original formulation by Thelma Golden. Employing a framework of “racial individualism,” the chapter argues that a loosening sense of linked fate has led to the privileging of individual agency over Black identity. In doing so, post-Blackness serves to discursively liberate African American artists from any prescriptive ideal of what constitutes black art without implying either a desire or intent to not address issues of race.

Contested Terrain

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Robert E. Weems
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
Economic Development ◽  
African American ◽  
African Americans ◽  
Black Business ◽  
Early Twentieth Century ◽  
National Bank ◽  
Contested Terrain ◽  
Business Person

This chapter examines the “contested terrain” associated with the founding of Chicago’s Douglass National Bank in 1921. Anthony Overton, one of history’s most prominent African American entrepreneurs, is widely regarded as the founder of the second national bank organized by African Americans. Yet, the evidence indicates that this distinction should go to Pearl W. Chavers, a relatively obscure early twentieth-century black business person. The story of Anthony Overton’s ascent and P.W. Chavers’ descent in the Douglass National Bank’s administrative hierarchy reveals the power of money and influence. It also illuminates the nuances of both group and individual entrepreneur-based strategies for African American economic development.

Douglas, Aaron (1899–1979)

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Catrina Hill
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Public Library ◽  
Langston Hughes ◽  
African Art ◽  
Illustrated Books ◽  
Claude Mckay ◽  
New York Public Library ◽  
Tribal Art ◽  
American Artists ◽  
African American Artists

Aaron Douglas was an African American artist and educator often referred to as the father of "Black Art." He was a leading figure of the artistic movement known as the Harlem Renaissance. Douglas is best known for his work of the 1920s and 1930s, which featured abstracted silhouettes combined with African tribal art and ancient Egyptian profile heads. European artists like Matisse, Modigliani and Picasso had been influenced by African tribal art for decades, but Douglas was among the first African American artists to blend African art with modern abstraction. Douglas produced illustrations for such magazines as The Crisis, Survey Graphic and Opportunity along with co-founding the short-lived Fire!! A Quarterly Journal Devoted to the Younger Negro Artists. He also illustrated books by several well-known literary figures, including Alain Locke, James Weldon Johnson, Langston Hughes, Countee Cullen, and Claude McKay. He is recognized for several public murals, including the Birth o’ the Blues at the Sherman Hotel in Chicago, Evolution of Negro Dance at the Harlem YMCA, and Aspects of Negro Life at the 135th Street Branch of the New York Public Library. As a professor of fine art Douglas encouraged generations of African American artists to create their own modern Black aesthetic.

A History of African American Artists from 1792 to the Present.

1996 ◽  
Vol 30 (1) ◽  
pp. 115
Author(s):  
Barbara Chase-Riboud ◽  
Romare Bearden ◽  
Harry Henderson
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
History Of ◽  
American Artists ◽  
African American Artists

Scenes and Scenarios

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Koritha Mitchell
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
African Americans ◽  
Black Community ◽  
Cultural Artifacts ◽  
Racial Hierarchy ◽  
American Artists ◽  
African American Artists ◽  
Historical Moment

This chapter argues that blacks living during lynching's height accurately read the discourses and practices of their historical moment, and their cultural artifacts reflect their insights. Namely, the plays by black dramatists contain specific characterizations of the nature of lynching, and they inspire black community practices that enable African Americans to continue to interpret their surroundings accurately. In an environment where their extermination was said to make the nation safe, African Americans perceived the truth behind the façade—that lynching was really master/piece theater, designed to reinforce racial hierarchy. African American artists therefore offered scripts that encouraged their communities to continue to rehearse an understanding of themselves as full citizens.

’Garde ici et ’garde lá-bas

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
Jared Snyder
Keyword(s):  
Twentieth Century ◽  
African American ◽  
Native American ◽  
Music Industry ◽  
Dance Music ◽  
The Core ◽  
Early Twentieth Century ◽  
History Of

This chapter explores the history of the Creole accordion. Black Creoles in Louisiana have created their own, distinctive accordion music adapted from French, Native American, and African cultures. While Creole musicians in the early twentieth century were often hired for Cajun dances, where they played Cajun dance music, at their own gatherings they played a uniquely Creole repertoire that drew from the African American blues—a repertoire later developed by accordionists such Clifton Chenier and Boozoo Chavis. Zydeco, as this music eventually was labeled, has become a symbol of Louisiana Creole culture. It is argued that despite the pressure on modern zydeco bands to adapt to the demands of the music industry, the traditional accordion and rubboard remain the core instruments, and zydeco accordionists keep playing in a distinctively Creole style.

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