New Books in African American Studies show

New Books in African American Studies

Summary: Discussions with Scholars of African Americans about their New Books

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  • Artist: New Books Network
  • Copyright: Copyright © New Books Network 2011

Podcasts:

 Andra Gillespie, "The New Black Politician: Cory Booker, Newark, and Post-Racial America" | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 0:31:34

[Cross-posted from New Books in Political Science] Andra Gillespie is the author of The New Black Politician: Cory Booker, Newark, and Post-Racial America (NYU Press, 2012). She is an Associate Professor of Political Science at Emory University and earned her Ph.D. from Yale University. Her new book focuses on the rise of one of the most well-known mayors in the country, Cory Booker. Gillespie tracks Booker’s rise through the complex politics of the city of Newark, NJ. As one of the few US cities with a history of African American mayors, Booker’s story is unique, but also illustrative. By challenging long-time Mayor Sharpe James, Booker — a newcomer to the city — confronted a deep and protective political establishment. The strategies Booker used, some effective, others less so, help Gillespie explain a larger phenomenon of the “post-racial America”. The book’s clear and personal writing make this an engaging read for political scientists and those interested in urban politics.

 Stephen G. Hall, "A Faithful Account of the Race: African American Historical Writing in Nineteenth-Century America" | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 0:35:41

Historian Stephen Hall passionately engages in the history of nineteenth-century African American intellectual life in his first monograph, A Faithful Account of the Race: African American Historical Writing in Nineteenth-Century America (University of North Carolina Press, 2009). This work traces the long nineteenth-century and how black historical writers evoked various themes at different moments, including ancient African history, biblical history, the paradox of American slavery, and challenges to black citizenship during the Reconstruction era.  He unearths of a plethora of black historical sources in the nineteenth century in various forms, including speeches, sermons, newspapers, and literary texts,  which each serve as precursors to the black historical writing of the twentieth century.  His work reveals the complexities of African American intellectual history, and would be a great inclusion for undergraduate or graduate course, or for a general audience of readers who would be interested in learning more about the important history he illuminates. Listen in.

 Richard W. Leeman and Bernard Duffy, eds., "The Will of a People: A Critical Anthology of Great African American Speeches" | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 0:42:30

The Will of a People: A Critical Anthology of Great African American Speeches (Southern Illinois University Press, 2012) is a compendium of 22 orations delivered by African Americans over a span of over 265 years. Co-edited by frequent collaborators Richard Leeman and Bernard Duffy, both professors of communication studies, both interested in the American tradition of public address, have spotlighted the African American oral tradition in public testimonies, speeches, declarations, and jeremiads, among other possible categories of purpose in black oratory. Limited by such constraints as space and copy right law, the speeches included are those considered great, either because the speech itself is considered “famous,” like Sojourner Truth’s “A’n’t I a Woman?,” or because it is considered “the finest speech delivered by a an influential orator,” like Henry Turner’s “I Claim the Rights as a Man.” Whatever the reason for their inclusion, it’s no doubt the speeches collected are inspirational, informative, and worth studying as part of American cultural history, an oratorical history that continues to this very moment. In fact, capturing the contemporary milieu, the book also contains the first inaugural address by Barack Obama, the first U.S. president of color. Thus covering an impressive range, The Will of a People, will give readers much to think about, debate, and contemplate.

 Carla L. Peterson, "Black Gotham: A Family History of African Americans in Nineteenth-Century New York City" | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 1:09:24

Digging up our roots seems to be the thing these days.  There are a host of genealogy resources available for anyone who cares to (re)discover their familial past.  Still, in the Americas people of African descent who want to take part in this digging encounter barriers; often there are gaps in the family histories of those whose members were bought and sold on a whim.   As she takes readers on a remarkable historical journey, Carla Peterson, author of Black Gotham:  A Family History of African Americans in Nineteenth-Century New York City (Yale University Press, 2011), illuminates the challenges of (re)discovering family histories and along the way, readers glean much about US national history. Armed with determination, patience beyond measure, and with several doses of serendipity, Peterson, Professor of English at the University of Maryland, College Park, takes her desire to return and find elements of her past to the archives of the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture.  Her persistence reveals to readers a new view of nineteenth century Gotham, as Washington Irving called the city of New York.  For example, Black Gothamprovides support for social historians who would argue that the New Negro movement—often solely associated with the Harlem Renaissance—began in the ante-bellum era.  And, those interested in the education of free African Americans pre-1865 may find it fascinating that many of the 19th century’s black elite were a part of New York’s African Free School system—the Mulberry Street School, in particular.  Celebrated alumni include James McCune Smith, Alexander Crummell, Henry Highland Garnet, George Downing, the Reason brothers—Charles and Patrick—as well as Peterson’s great-great grandfather, Peter Guignon, and her great-grandfather, Philip White.  As Peterson rediscovers her paternal family’s New York history, she at times laments the obscurity to which the women in her family were relegated; she does her best to remedy this, however, as she uses facts and imagination to piece together their lives. While the book divulges new perspectives on freedom—or the lack thereof—for black New Yorkers in the nineteenth century, it also is instructive with regards to methods of research for those who seek to dress up the scraps of memory mothers, fathers, grand-aunts or grand-uncles choose to share. Needless to say, the acts of both forgetting and remembering are found not only in personal narratives of history; the journey upon which Peterson embarks also forces readers to consider how and whom institutions choose to forget and/or remember—indeed, how the nation selectively forgets and remembers. Sankofa is an Adinkra symbol of West Africa’s Akan people that means “to go back and take it.”  It describes one impetus for Dr. Carla Peterson’s journey for she indeed goes back to see; Black Gotham:  A Family History of African Americans in Nineteenth-Century New York City attests to the fact that her insistence pays off significantly—both for her personally, and for lovers of history alike.  Read alongside a virtual archive http://archive.blackgothamarchive.org/ wherein one can find documents and images of New York’s black elite of the nineteenth century, the narrative moves one steadily along, inspiring new critical questions and intrigue.

 Marcia Alesan Dawkins, "Clearly Invisible: Racial Passing and the Color of Cultural Identity" | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 0:47:38

Performance queen RuPaul once famously quipped that “we’re born naked; the rest is drag”—meaning everyone dons identity, performs one’s concept of self within our social networks, e.g., family, community, work. Marcia Alesan Dawkins takes RuPaul’s theory further in her new book, Clearly Invisible: Racial Passing and the Color of Cultural Identity (Baylor University Press, 2012). In it, she discusses (racial) passing as a performance that everyone, even social institutions, at one time or another, enact. In fact, she contends that we understand passing because we all might be required to do it, but also because we participate in rhetoric, ways of communicating and comprehending identity. Dawkins defines passing as “the phenomenon in which a person gains acceptance as a member of social groups other than his or her own, usually in terms of race, ethnicity, class, gender, sexuality, religion, citizenship, or disability status” (xii). She connects this to communication by discussing “passing as a series of rhetorical intersections where tropes and identifications meet texts, personalities, social situations, categories, and hierarchies” (xi). In the course of her theorizing, she distills intellectual concepts into accessible prose that every educated reader can enjoy. Listeners will not want to miss what she has to say about a phenomenon that many think should be passé due to the ends of slavery and Jim Crow segregation. And many more might be surprised at the ways in which passing persists and why. Please, listen in.

 Curtis Crisler, "Pulling Scabs" | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 0:47:15

Curtis L. Crisler is a prolific poet, novelist, and mix-genre author who writes about the American experience. In his work, Crisler turns a particularly keen eye toward the Midwest, masculinity, and jazz. It seems he has published a book a year since 2007, gaining the attention of critics and winning several major awards. Currently, he teaches creative writing in the English Department at Indiana University Purdue University Fort Wayne (IPFW). He has three books: Pulling Scabs (Willow Books; Aquarius Press, nominated for a Pushcart), Tough Boy Sonatas (Wordsong; Boyds Mills Press) and Dreamist (YA mixed- genre novel from Willow Books; Aquarius Press). His chapbook Spill won (the 2008 Keyhole Chapbook Award at Keyhole Press). He edited the nonfiction book, Leaving Me Behind: Writing a New Me (Lulu.com), on the Summer Bridge experience. He is the recipient of Cave Canem grants (a Cave Canem Fellow), also the recipient of the Eric Hoffer Award, the Sterling Plumpp First Voices Poetry Award, an IAC grant, Soul Mountain, and nominated for the Eliot Rosewater Award. His work has been adapted to theatrical productions in Chicago and New York, and he has been published in a variety of magazines, journals, and anthologies. You will certainly enjoy the conversation with this well-read, enlightened, and amiable poet.

 Sikivu Hutchinson, "Moral Combat: Black Atheists, Gender Politics, and the Values Wars" | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 0:31:04

Sikivu Hutchinson’s book Moral Combat: Black Atheists, Gender Politics, and the Values Wars (Infidel Books, 2011) is a brave examination of African American religious perspectives vis a vis progressive racial politics, gender relations, and cultural values. She tackles uncomfortable questions about the possibly excessive role of religiosity among African Americans, especially woman. And she wonders even as she offers a critique about the abundance of storefront churches in communities that need essential resources. Why so many churches? Why so few activist cultural institutions? A prolific cultural critic and writer, Hutchinson received a Ph.D. in Performance Studies from New York University and has taught women's studies, cultural studies, urban studies and education at UCLA, the California Institute of the Arts and Western Washington University. She is also the author of Imagining Transit: Race, Gender, and Transportation Politics in Los Angeles (Lang, 2003) and has published fiction, essays and critical theory in Social Text, California English, Black Agenda Report, Free Inquiry and American Atheist Magazine. She is the editor of blackfemlens.org and a senior fellow for the Institute for Humanist Studies. Readers can also look forward to the publication of her latest project, Godless Americana: Race and Religious Rebels. But for now, enjoy our conversation about Moral Combat.

 Karen E. Fields, "Racecraft: The Soul of Inequality in American Life" | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 0:41:44

[Cross-posted from New Books in Sociology] Racism is a process by which people are segregated and discriminated against based on their race, and race is defined as a set of physical characteristics which certain groups share. Or is it?  In Racecraft: The Soul of Inequality in American Life (Verso Books, 2012), Karen E. Fields and Barbara J. Fields argue that racism does not come from race. In fact, racism is the very act of creating race, by transforming it from something an aggressor does, into something the target is. So-called physical characteristics are red herrings in the discourse, conveniently there to justify certain kinds of racism, but certainly not necessary for them (anti-Semitism being an example). In this highly original book, the Fields' draw a fascinating parallel between our everyday concept of race and the outdated notion of witchcraft, two beliefs firmly held by the societies which birthed them, reproduced and recreated in daily life  by what was, in their time, "evidence,"  and both which are, quite plainly, false. This is a fascinating book about the power that racecraft and other delusions have on all of us, and more importantly, how to defeat them. In this interview, we talk with Karen E. Fields about this important new book.

 Michele Elam, "The Souls of Mixed Folk: Race, Politics and Aesthetics in the New Millennium" | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 0:59:00

“What are you?” The question can often comes out of nowhere One can be going about her quotidian activities, or she might have just finished a meeting at work. “What are you?” The question is disorienting for most, but for others who are racially ambiguous it is commonplace. The ostensibly benign question suggests that it is about the person being asked. However, one might argue that it is more about the one who does the asking. In The Souls of Mixed Folk: Race, Politics, and Aesthetics in the New Millenium (Stanford University Press, 2011), Michele Elam critically discusses the rise of the Mixed Race Studies. To demonstrate the new sub-genre of cultural studies in both art and academia Elam shows elements of what mixed-racedness looks like in the classroom, as well as in the public sphere here at the turn of the 21st century. One of the contributions of Elam’s Souls makes to Mixed Race Studies is her careful outline of the ways people of mixed biological ancestry have historically worked for the goal of social justice for all oppressed groups; moreover, she shows how those who look at mixed-racedness critically continue to do so. This, despite the trajectory in which some of mixed-race advocates are moving: people of mixed-race backgrounds are a separate group with separate issues, and most importantly, being both black and white—and that is most often the only definition many use of being “mixed”—their experience falls outside the purview of race studies. This notion of being separate and outside is often used to justify a view of race that essentially reifies notions of identity as being defined by blood percentage—a point of view that takes us back, not forward. While those who critically study mixed- raceness see that one’s movement through a society that continues to ask What are you? can result in alternate experiences, many show that the difference can work in a way to help all understand racial oppression. Dr. Michele Elam, Martin Luther King, Jr. Centennial Professor in the English Department at Stanford University, falls within the latter group. And, so do Lezley Saar, Danzy Senna, Philip Roth, Aaron McGruder, and Dave Chappelle, to name but a few. A mixed bag, for sure, Elam examines relevant works of the aforementioned artists as she considers the way in which they challenge what is quickly becoming conventional thought on mixed-racedness from the academic classroom to the public sphere. Whether one is fascinated with her critical reading of K-12 textbooks focused on mixed race curriculum or with her reading of artist Lezley Saar’s “Baby Halfie Brown Head”; with her insightful readings of Aaron McGruder’s Boondocks comic strips and/or the unforgettable episode “The Racial Draft” from The Dave Chappelle Show; whether one is interested in the ways that author Colson Whitehead and playwright Carl Hancock Rux ask their audiences to think critically about mixed-racedness in the 21st century one thing is clear: Elam first highlights and subsequently knocks down the notion that “fetishizing the box” of the racial categories on census forms or outlining one’s mixed family tree represents progression towards a most just society in the US.

 Reiland Rabaka, "Hip Hop's Inheritance: From the Harlem Renaissance to the Hip Hop Feminist Movement" | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 1:02:09

[Cross-posted from New Books in Popular Music] Cultural movements don’t exist in vacuums. Consciously or not, all movements borrow from, and sometimes reject, those that came before. In Hip Hop’s Inheritance: From the Harlem Renaissance to the Hip Hop Feminist Movement (Lexington Books, 2011), the first in a trilogy of books that cast a critical eye upon hip hop as a social and cultural movement, Reiland Rabaka traces the pre-history of hip hop as a series of separate yet connected movements that dealt with inequalities of race/ethnicity, gender, and sexual orientation. Using Africana, feminist, and queer critical theories as tools for understanding, Rabaka follows the history of black, women’s, and LGBT resistance to heterosexual white male hegemony in U.S. culture. Rabaka’s focus is always on the roles that art and artists (literary, visual, musical) have in people’s active resistances to oppression. The Harlem Renaissance, Black Arts Movement, Black Women’s Liberation, and Feminist Art Movements are just a few of the cultural happenings that Rabaka details as precursors to today’s “conscious” rap, feminist rap, and Homo-Hop, among others. All along, Rabaka’s message is not simply academic, he is also speaking directly to contemporary hip hoppers, urging them not to forget their past and to learn from the struggles of their forbears. Reiland Rabaka is an Associate Professor of African, African American, and Caribbean Studies in the Department of Ethnic Studies and the Humanities Program at the University of Colorado at Boulder, where he is also an Affiliate Professor in the Women and Gender Studies Program and a Research Fellow at the Center for Studies of Ethnicity and Race in America (CSERA). He has published ten books, including Hip Hop’s Amnesia: From Blues and Black Women’s Club Movement to Rap and the Hip Hop Movement (2012) and The Hip Hop Movement: From R&B and the Civil Rights Movement to Rap and the Hip Hop Generation (2013).

 Minkah Makalani, "In the Cause of Freedom: Radical Black Internationalism from Harlem to London, 1917-1939" | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 1:05:17

Minkah Makalani is the author of a new intellectual history on the efforts of early twentieth century black radicals to organize an international movement, one that would address both racial and class oppression around the globe. The book is called In the Cause of Freedom: Radical Black Internationalism from Harlem to London, 1917-1939 (The University of North Carolina Press, 2011). As the title suggests, the focus of the study is on two black radical groups: One in Harlem, the African Blood Brotherhood; and the other in London, the International African Service Bureau. The book examines among other things, “how they communicated across continents.” This is important not only because it illustrates that race was a concern outside of the U.S., but to show just how intricately race and class are linked; so much so that the two cannot be separated. This new study explores provocative questions, and also definitively adds to ongoing debates regarding: African Americans and communism Tensions about which is more important, race or class? Definitions of black radicalism International black figures of the Harlem Renaissance The relationship among artists, the arts and politics during the Harlem Renaissance How the Communist Party perceived race in relation to class oppression These and other insightful topics are addressed at length in this wonderful history. But you can find an appetizing introduction to them in this lively interview. Please, listen in.

 Charlotte Pierce-Baker, "This Fragile Life: A Mother’s Story of a Bipolar Son" | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 1:21:47

When a mother listens to the beats of her own heart, where angst, fear and fortitude compete, and then beautifully weaves emotion into a story about her ongoing journey to support a bipolar son, then you know something significant has happened in African American literature. At least I did, when I read Charlotte Pierce-Baker’s insightful memoir, This Fragile Life: A Mother’s Story of a Bipolar Son (Lawrence Hill Books, 2012). But what I didn’t know is why Pierce-Baker would “go there” again. I mean, she has already, once before, “gone there,” when she mined personal pain to write about trauma and black women’s narratives of rape. Yet, when I reflect on a line from her son’s poetry, which is what knits the narrative together, I understand. Her son Mark writes: “When mom is gone nothing is right and everything is wrong/A joke is not a joke, and the birds don’t sing their song.” The power of this book for me is that a mother has created a literary space for her son, a black man living with mental illness, to sing about being a father, a husband, a solid citizen, and yet struggling. Mark’s wrangles with his struggles are revealed in poetic opening lines like these: “In the padded room of my heart/ A madman suffers.” “Street vendors here do not sell soft pretzels/They trade toxic pebbles for pocket change until there is just lint left.” “I will love you until God dies.” This book is as much about a black man in America, as it is about a black man dealing with bipolar disorder, as it is about a mother, a family, learning to cope and ultimately to understand. This Fragile Life is a must read. Listen to the interview, and you’ll see why?

 Erica Edwards, "Charisma and the Fictions of Black Leadership" | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 1:11:32

Picture the familiar scene:  the visiting pastor thanks the local pastor for granting him the use of his pulpit; he sends out the call (“Can I just speak with you this morning?”) and the congregation responds (“Yessir!  Amen!”).  The disclaimer follows:  he is only the vessel through which the Lord will speak.  Should he say something with which one disagrees take it up with the Lord.  He pats his brow, grips the podium; throws away his notes, transitions to improvisation; cadenced speech follows, and the congregation responds in kind.  Erica R. Edwards describes the aforementioned as the charismatic scene in Charisma and the Fictions of Black Leadership (University of Minnesota Press, 2012).  The new author probes charismatic leadership and its interventions found in literature written by African Americans throughout the 20th century. The fundamental questions Edwards, assistant professor of English at the University of California, Riverside asks are:  What is the seduction of charismatic leadership?  And, how does it shape 20th century African American literary productions?  The rise of white supremacy coupled with sharecropping as a system of peonage made emancipation essentially a non-event. In the face of domestic terrorism singular, male leadership became a necessary survival strategy.  Still, there is apparent dissonance; reverence for the black male leader in African American culture does not translate to the literature. From W.E.B. DuBois’s stage pageant “The Star of Ethiopia” (1913) to Marcus Garvey’s speech performances in 1920s Harlem, NY; from George Schuyler’s  Black Empire (1936-38) to Zora Neale Hurston’s Moses, Man of the Mountain (1939); from Toni Morrison’s Paradise (1997) to postulations by Eddie (played by Cedric the Entertainer) in "Barbershop" 1 & 2 (2002, 2004, respectively) Edwards demonstrates when one depends solely on the convention of singular male leadership as the answer to solving the various communal needs of the people much is at stake: gender oppression; the violence of silencing; and, dismissal of all alternative forms of leadership, just to name a few.  “The dream” of singular black male leadership has translated to the nightmare for the masses—and women, in particular—time and time again. In the end the book leaves readers with a set of critical questions regarding charisma and leadership. Erica R. Edwards’s Charisma is a critical read for anyone who is interested in the relationship between literature and real life scenes of black leadership—particularly as it plays out in the black political sphere in the post-civil rights era.

 Koritha Mitchell, "Living with Lynching: African American Lynching Plays, Performance, and Citizenship, 1890-1930 " | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 1:01:46

Koritha Mitchell’s Living with Lynching: African American Lynching Plays, Performance, and Citizenship, 1890-1930 (University of Illinois Press, 2012) is, as described on the publisher’s webpage, “the first full-length critical study of lynching plays in American culture.”  Drawing from a diverse array of methods and disciplines including American studies, literary criticism, performance studies, and theatre, Mitchell boldly claims and astutely substantiates how early twentieth-century lynching plays provide a literary and even domestic and community space for African Americans to challenge and cope with erratic vigilante racism that threatened black life in America.  She also claims that reading these plays can inform our understanding of African American literature, politics, theatre, and the performance of everyday life today. Perhaps what’s most provocative and noteworthy about Mitchell’s study is her insistence that contemporary representations of lynching, such as well-known photographs, perpetuate lynching as a spectacle for white consumption. These representations serve as a buoy and less of a challenge to an ideology of white racial superiority.  On the other hand, the performance and readying of lynching plays written by African Americans places black humanity and community, instead of black degradation, at the center of spectatorship and thus serves as a challenge to anti-black ideologies and violence.  The assault on the black body is certainly noted in the plays, but the effect of lynching on the lives, families, communities, and even histories and futures of  the imagined victims and, from there, the real race, is considered in fuller ways that are limited by the iconic photographic representations of lynching.  That said, Mitchell’s discussion of Living with Lynching is a must to consider. Please listen in.

 Erin Chapman, "Prove It on Me: New Negroes, Sex, and Popular Culture in the 1920s" | File Type: audio/mpeg | Duration: 1:11:59

Whoever states the old adage, “A picture is worth a thousand words” grossly underestimates.  So Erin D. Chapman shows in Prove It On Me:  New Negroes, Sex, and Popular Culture in the 1920s (Oxford University Press, 2012).  Just consider the images of African Americans in US popular culture throughout the 19th and 20th centuries; consider the power they held in defining an entire people, and we know better—pictures evince far more than 1000 words.  Chapman explores what happens when African Americans use old sexist-racist images and/or create fresh ones to tout the Negro at the turn of the 20th century as modern and new.  Through an examination of advertisements at the time, the author makes it evident that many saw the commodification and consumption of the black female body as essential to achieving goals for racial advancement or self-determinism. Chapman, professor of History at George Washington University, offers readers something new: she demonstrates the push-pull dynamics of the image-making in the New Negro era.  For, as the new public desire for actual black bodies (as opposed to minstrel caricatures) opens space for the nation to view African Americans as human beings, it also allows for the continued dehumanization of those same bodies—particularly those of the African American female body. As Blueswoman Gertrude “Ma” Rainey demonstrates in the lyrics of her 1928 recording, “Prove It On Me”, to define the self through the use of images is tricky business for who one purports to be in their public persona does not necessarily reflect their private selves.  Moreover, in judging “right” versus “wrong” images one must consider the sex-race marketplace where selling and buying is the name of the game—regardless of who is selling to and/or buying from whom. If you want to learn more about New Negroes and how they used prominent ideas about gender, race and sexuality to sell and consume various ideas and products Erin D. Chapman’s fine book is what you’re looking for.

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