A Right to Sing the Blues: African Americans, Jews, and American Popular SongHarvard University Press, 16/03/2001 - 288 páginas All too often an incident or accident, such as the eruption in Crown Heights with its legacy of bitterness and recrimination, thrusts Black-Jewish relations into the news. A volley of discussion follows, but little in the way of progress or enlightenment results--and this is how things will remain until we radically revise the way we think about the complex interactions between African Americans and Jews. A Right to Sing the Blues offers just such a revision. Black-Jewish relations, Jeffrey Melnick argues, has mostly been a way for American Jews to talk about their ambivalent racial status, a narrative collectively constructed at critical moments, when particular conflicts demand an explanation. Remarkably flexible, this narrative can organize diffuse materials into a coherent story that has a powerful hold on our imagination. Melnick elaborates this idea through an in-depth look at Jewish songwriters, composers, and perfomers who made Black music in the first few decades of this century. He shows how Jews such as George Gershwin, Irving Berlin, Al Jolson, and others were able to portray their natural affinity for producing Black music as a product of their Jewishness while simultaneously depicting Jewishness as a stable white identity. Melnick also contends that this cultural activity competed directly with Harlem Renaissance attempts to define Blackness. Moving beyond the narrow focus of advocacy group politics, this book complicates and enriches our understanding of the cultural terrain shared by African Americans and Jews. |
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... group, which was sustaining; I thank Tom Augst and Dan Morris for all their encouragement. Paul Franklin gets my thanks for challenging me to think through some of my conclusions as far as possible. I am also grateful to Dan Miller, a ...
... group, which was sustaining; I thank Tom Augst and Dan Morris for all their encouragement. Paul Franklin gets my thanks for challenging me to think through some of my conclusions as far as possible. I am also grateful to Dan Miller, a ...
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... groups: evidence was found everywhere, most of all in the reactions of African Americans to the 1967 Middle East war, the fragmentation of SNCC (Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee), and the Ocean Hill–Brownsville school crisis ...
... groups: evidence was found everywhere, most of all in the reactions of African Americans to the 1967 Middle East war, the fragmentation of SNCC (Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee), and the Ocean Hill–Brownsville school crisis ...
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... group publicity releases to the frequent discussions of why Don Byron,now generally known as an African American jazz ... groups. A laudable desire to see African Americans and Jews work together on a number of organized political fronts ...
... group publicity releases to the frequent discussions of why Don Byron,now generally known as an African American jazz ... groups. A laudable desire to see African Americans and Jews work together on a number of organized political fronts ...
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... group was indispensable to the creation of a vocabulary about their relationship, and analogy led to caricature as ... groups) has come to stand for the entire shared landscape of African Americans and Jews. But if Lewis is correct to ...
... group was indispensable to the creation of a vocabulary about their relationship, and analogy led to caricature as ... groups) has come to stand for the entire shared landscape of African Americans and Jews. But if Lewis is correct to ...
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... groups, as eastern European Jews immigrated to the United States in massive numbers and African Americans began to migrate to urban areas (and northern cities in particular). Before this, of course, a set of rhetorical usages had ...
... groups, as eastern European Jews immigrated to the United States in massive numbers and African Americans began to migrate to urban areas (and northern cities in particular). Before this, of course, a set of rhetorical usages had ...
Índice
The Racialness of Jewish Men | |
From Blackface to White Negro | |
African American Music and the Nation | |
Making Jews Sacred in African American Music | |
Epilogue | |
Notes | |
Index | |
Outras edições - Ver tudo
A Right to Sing the Blues: African Americans, Jews, and American Popular Song Jeffrey Melnick Pré-visualização indisponível - 2001 |
A Right to Sing the Blues: African Americans, Jews, and American Popular Song Jeffrey Melnick Pré-visualização indisponível - 1999 |
Palavras e frases frequentes
able According activity actual African American music Ameri American popular American Popular Music Americans and Jews appeared argues artistic attention become begin Black Black-Jewish relations blackface Blues Book called Cantor century Chicago City claim clear close colored comes composer course critic cultural described developed discussions early ethnic example explain expression fact father folk forms George Gershwin groups helped idea identity important instance interesting Irving Berlin jazz Jazz Singer Jewish Jews and African Johnson Jolson least major marked materials metaphor Mezzrow Michael move musicians Negro original Oxford particularly performers play popular music Porgy and Bess position productions published Quoted race racial ragtime reference relationship rhetoric seems sexual similar sing social song sounds spiritual stage story success suggested Tin Pan Alley tion United writing written York
Referências a este livro
The Uncrowned King of Swing: Fletcher Henderson and Big Band Jazz Jeffrey Magee Pré-visualização limitada - 2005 |