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Black folklore and the politics of racial representation /

Moody-Turner, Shirley,

Black folklore and the politics of racial representation / Shirley Moody-Turner. - 1 online resource (xi, 230 pages) - Margaret Walker Alexander Series in African American Studies . - Margaret Walker Alexander series in African American studies. .

Includes bibliographical references and index.

"By Custom and By Law" : Folklore and the Birth of Jim Crow -- From Hawai'i to Hampton : Samuel Armstrong and the Unlikely Origins of Folklore Studies at the Hampton Institute -- Recovering Folklore as a Site of Resistance : Anna Julia Cooper and the Hampton Folklore Society -- Uprooting the Folk : Paul Laurence Dunbar's Critique of the Folk Ideal -- "The Stolen Voice" : Charles Chesnutt, Whiteness, and the Politics of Folklore -- Conclusion.

Before the innovative work of Zora Neale Hurston, folklorists from the Hampton Institute collected, studied, and wrote about African American folklore. Like Hurston, these folklorists worked within but also beyond the bounds of white mainstream institutions. They often called into question the meaning of the very folklore projects in which they were engaged. The author analyzes this output, along with the contributions of a disparate group of African American authors and scholars. She explores how Black authors and folklorists were active participants - rather than passive observers - in conversations about the politics of representing Black folklore. Examining literary texts, folklore documents, and cultural performances, legal discourse, and political rhetoric, this book demonstrates how folklore studies became a battleground across which issues of racial identity and difference were asserted and debated at the turn of the twentieth century. The study is framed by two questions of historical and continuing import. What role have representations of Black folklore played in constructing racial identity? And, how have those ideas impacted the way African Americans think about and creatively engage black traditions? The author renders established historical facts in a new light and context, taking figures we thought we knew - such as Charles Chesnutt, Anna Julia Cooper, and Paul Laurence Dunbar - and recasting their place in African American intellectual and cultural history.--description provided by publisher.

9781617038860 1617038865 9781621039785 1621039781 1617038857 9781617038853

22573/ctt2n6m87 JSTOR

2013024094


African Americans--Folklore.
African Americans--Race identity.
Race--Social aspects--United States.
Literature and folklore--United States.
Folklore in literature.
African Americans in literature.
African Americans--Intellectual life.
American literature--African American authors--History and criticism.
African Americans--Folklore.
Noirs am�ericains--Folklore.
Noirs am�ericains--Identit�e ethnique.
Race--Aspect social--�Etats-Unis.
Litt�erature et folklore--�Etats-Unis.
Folklore dans la litt�erature.
Noirs am�ericains dans la litt�erature.
Noirs am�ericains--Vie intellectuelle.
SOCIAL SCIENCE--Folklore & Mythology.
African Americans--Folklore
African Americans in literature
African Americans--Intellectual life
African Americans--Race identity
American literature--African American authors
Folklore in literature
Literature and folklore
Race--Social aspects


United States


Criticism, interpretation, etc.

GR111.A47 / M66 2013

398.2089/96073