New Books In African American Studies

Recent controversies over integrating the military have focused on issues of gender and sexuality. In the 1940s and 50s, however, the issue was racial integration. As Christine Knauer shows in her new book Let Us Fight as Free Men: Black Soldiers and Civil Rights (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2014), the persistence of soldiers and activists of color forced the Truman administration to bar discrimination in the military. Even then, however, it took continued agitation — and the military crisis of the early days of the Korean War — to force the army to allow black soldiers to fight alongside their white brothers-in-arms. Let Us Fight as Free Men illuminates how agitation for Civil Rights did not begin with the Brown decision in 1954 or the Montgomery Bus Boycott several years later, but was a long-term struggle with its roots in the Second World War. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/africa

In linguistics, we all happily and glibly affirm that there is no “better” or “worse” among languages (or dialects, or varieties), although we freely admit that people have irrational prejudices about them. But what do we do about those prejudices? And what do we think the speakers of low-status varieties of language should do to overcome them? Take the case of African American English. An influential approach, code-switching, advises teachers to help their AAE-speaking students to identify the systematic differences between their variety and the prestige variety (“Standard English”), and eventually to be able to switch effectively between both varieties according to the circumstances. However, although code-switching seems to promote communicative effectiveness, Vershawn Young and colleagues argue that that approach is inherently problematic. By effectively labelling AAE as inappropriate for public contexts, code-switching runs the risk of promoting and reinforcing society’s prejudices against the language

How did jazz take shape? Why does jazz have so many styles? Why do jazz songs get longer as the twentieth century proceeds? Marc Myers, in his fascinating book Why Jazz Happened (University of California Press, 2014) examines the social and economic forces affected the growth of jazz between 1942 and 1972. Myers considers how the American Federation of Musicians ban on recording in 1942 changes the terrain for jazz musicians. He looks to how the G.I. Bill and suburbanization bring a new adult sophistication to the music. Myers also explores how changes in recording technology allow jazz artists a greater range of expression and permits the recording of longer songs and extended soloing. The book culminates with considering how jazz musicians responded to the challenge offered by rock music. Marc Myers is a writer for The Wall Street Journal and founder of the blog, JazzWax.com. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwor

Arica Coleman did not start out to write a legal history of “the one-drop rule,” but as she began exploring the relationship between African American and Native peoples of Virginia, she unraveled the story of how the law created a racial divide that the Civil Rights movement has never eroded. Virginia’s miscegenation laws, from the law of hypo-descent to the Racial Integrity Act, are burned into the hearts and culture of Virginians, white, black and Indian. That the Blood Stay Pure: African Americans, Native Americans, and the Predicament of Race and Identity in Virginia (Indiana University Press, 2014)  demonstrates how people continue to insist on racial discrimination and racial purity even though the legal barriers have been lifted and the biological imperatives of “blood purity” have been discredited. Dr. Coleman traces the origins the one-drop rule–that one African American ancestor made a person “colored”–from the days of slavery to the present. She shows how Indians came to disavow their African Amer

Each year, following the end of the NFL season, there is a blizzard of activity as teams with disappointing records fire their head coaches and look for the new leader who will turn things around. This year, seven teams fired their coaches and spent the next weeks searching for a replacement among the pool of qualified candidates. The league office imposes one rule on these searches: teams must interview at least one minority candidate for the head coaching position. Established in 2003 by owners of NFL teams, the Rooney Rule was intended to give African American coaches a shot at top coaching positions, at a time when a majority of the league’s players were black but only two of the 32 teams had a black coach. More than a decade later, the effectiveness of the rule is still subject of debate. Yes, two of seven teams hired new black coaches this year. But the total number of black coaches in the league is only four, down from a high of seven in 2011. And a look at fan sites shows that prejudice still rears it

Musician James Brown is famous for his civil rights slogan, “Say it loud; I’m Black and I’m proud,” illustrating the argument that Kevin Quashie makes in his new book The Sovereignty of Quiet: Beyond Resistance in Black Culture (Rutgers University Press, 2012)–that public expressiveness has become the dominant trope for thinking through and even theorizing blackness. As a result, public expressivity (think powerful oratory at mass demonstrations or spirited polemics, such as David Walker’s Appeal) is linked to resistance. In fact, contemporary activist-scholars, such as Omi Osun Joni L. Jones, have called on others, particularly whites, to engage in this kind of public expressiveness associated with blacks. One of Jones’ 6 Rules for Allies, encourages others “to be loud and crazy so black folk don’t have to” (see http://vimeo.com/78945479). Jones is asking for allegiances that allow black folk time and space for quiet. Although what Jones advocates it still a necessity, Quashie presents a history and present

When I was a kid in the 1970s, I really didn’t know anything about the “Civil Rights Movement.” I knew who Martin Luther King was, and that he had been assassinated by white racists (I knew quite a few of those). But to me all that was old history. The issue of the day–at least as it concerned African Americans–was something called the “Black Power Movement.” Of Rosa Parks, the Freedom Riders, and the Little Rock Nine I knew nothing. At the forefront of my mind were Stokley Carmichael, Huey Newton, and Bobby Seale. I followed the exploits of the Black Panthers. I read Eldridge Cleaver’s Soul on Ice. I really understood none of it. I was a suburban white kid in the Midwest. The world these angry men described was foreign to me, but nonetheless fascinating. At what point did the Civil Rights Movement become the the Black Power Movement?  Aram Goudsouzian tries to answer this question in his terrific, readable book Down to the Crossroads: Civil Rights, Black Power, and the Meredith March Against Fear (Farrar, S

Alex Haley’s 1976 book Roots: The Saga of an American Family still stands as a memorable epic journey into the history of African Americans during the enslavement period and after. The 1977 televised miniseries was a must-watch event of the day, and it remains an important production in television history. However, a little more than a decade after his success, Haley was in trouble. His wealth had dwindled and he had strained relationships with other writers. What happened? Adam Henig tells us in his new book Alex Haley’s Roots: An Author’s Odyssey (2014). Listen to this lively interview with the author. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/african-american-studies

Do black mayors face a different governing challenge than other mayors? Ravi K. Perry explores this question in his Black Mayors, White Majorities: The Balancing Act of Racial Politics (University of Nebraska Press, 2014). Perry is assistant professor of political science at Mississippi State University. Using the cities of Toledo and Dayton, Ohio as his starting point, Perry’s book investigates the ways black mayors govern in majority white cities. He compares how Jack Ford, mayor of Toledo from 2002-2006, and Rhine McLin, mayor of Dayton from 2002-2010, use targeted universalism to balance the need to represent black and white constituents. This balancing act is a tenuous one for black mayors with such high expectations and often limited authority to deliver the range of needs of the community. Perry’s research ranges from historical analysis of election results and rhetorical analysis of speeches to deliver a thoughtful look at two interesting political figures and an understudied area of political scienc

Cindy Hooper is a veteran of various local, state, and national political campaigns. She is the founder of a national organization for African American women that is headquartered in Washington, D.C. Hooper is also a member of the American Political Science Association. Her new book, Conflict: African American Women and the New Dilemma of Race and Gender Politics (Praeger Press, 2012), draws on all of her experiences. Please listen to our lively exchange.   Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/african-american-studies

Host Jonathan Judaken talks with author and professor Amy Wood about her book, Lynching and Spectacle: Witnessing Racial Violence in America, 1890-1940 (University of North Carolina Press, 2011). Wood discusses her book, the use of photography and media in the spectacle of lynching, religious justification for the practice, and the importance of honoring the legacies of anti-lynching Civil Rights Era leaders like Medgar Evers and Ida B. Wells. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/african-american-studies

“…when people were hearing us, they were hearing the avant-garde on the one hand, and they were hearing the history of jazz that led up to it on the other hand – because Miles was that history.” -Herbie Hancock, 1968 Professor of music and musician/composer Keith Waters at the University of Colorado, Boulder has produced a masterful analysis of the Miles Davis second quintet studio recordings in the years 1965 through 1968.  Waters analyzes the remarkable period of “controlled freedom” and collaboration between trumpeter Miles Davis, keyboardist Herbie Hancock, saxophonist Wayne Shorter, bassist Ron Carter, and drummer Tony Williams. Waters writes that “the role of analysis is to provide further, alternative, or nuanced ways into hearing the music, to consider how the moment to moment flow of improvisation resonates with or creates frictions with aspects of jazz traditions in which the players were so firmly rooted, and to hear how the recordings themselves participated in shaping that jazz tradition.” Wat

Christina Greer is the author of Black Ethnics: Race, Immigration, and the Pursuit of the American Dream (Oxford University Press, 2013). Greer is assistant professor of political science at Fordham University. In previous podcasts, authors have illuminated the immigrant experience of Latino and Asian Americans (Rouse, Masuoka and Junn), as well as the African American politics (Logan and Gillespie). Researchers have increasingly studied the opinions, political culture, and political institutions of each community. Greer uses this literature to explore an understudied population, who she dubs “Black Ethnics.” Green analyzes the public opinion differences between African Americans, African immigrants, and Afro-Caribbean immigrants in New York City. She finds that Afro-Caribbean immigrants held some of the lowest opinions of the American Dream. Their collective frustration with a lack of opportunities placed them below African Americans and African immigrants. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone

This is a very timely book, coming as it does in the midst of the 200th anniversary of the War of 1812 — the war that gave birth to the maroon community of Prospect Bluff, Florida. In his book The Maroons of Prospect Bluff and their Quest for Freedom in the Atlantic World (UP of Florida, 2013), Nathaniel Millett shows how an assortment of free African-Americans, escaped slaves, Africans, and Afro-Indians created a thriving, highly organized community in the shadow of the expanding slave empire of the southwestern United States. Inspired by the singular figure of Edward Nichols, and Irish-born British officer of staunch anti-slavery convictions, the men and women of Prospect Bluff forged a community that realized their deepest understandings of freedom in the midst of the era of Atlantic revolutions. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/african-american-studies

Julia H. Lee is the author of Interracial Encounters: Reciprocal Representations in African and Asian American Literatures, 1896-1937 (New York University Press, 2011). Dr. Lee is an Assistant Professor in the department of Asian American Studies at the University of California, Irvine. Interracial Encounters investigates the overlapping of African American and Asian American literature. By focusing on the diverse attitudes that blacks and Asian Americans had towards each other, Dr. Lee pushes against dominant conceptions of these groups as either totally cooperative or as totally antagonistic. Lee also explores how American nationalism was produced through this comparison, and shows how Afro-Asian representations allowed readers and writers to consider alliances outside of the American nation-state. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becoming a premium member! https://newbooksnetwork.supportingcast.fm/african-american-studies

Historians tell stories, and stories have beginnings and ends. Most human eras, however, are not so neat. Their beginnings and ends tend to blend into one another. This is why historians are often arguing about when eras–the Roman Empire, the Middle Ages, the Renaissance, etc.–started and stopped. One usually learns very little from these debates, primarily because the established beginnings and endings were agreed upon for good reason. Nothing really big had been missed, so nothing really big has to be changed. But there are exceptions, times when historians discover–or at the very least bring to light–evidence that truly moves the chronological bounds of an era or movement. One such exception is Susan D. Carle‘s excellent new book Defining the Struggle: National Organizing for Racial Justice, 1880-1915 (Oxford UP, 2013). I will only speak for myself, but I always considered the formation of the NAACP in 1909 to be the beginning of the organized, national effort to fight discrimination against African Ame

In the United States, World War II is now called “The Good War,” as opposed to bad ones, I suppose, like Vietnam. Moreover, the Americans who fought in World War II are now called “The Greatest Generation,” as opposed to lesser generations, I suppose. Now most of the Americans of “The Greatest Generation” who fought in “The Good War” were men. What made them the “greatest” was that they had proved not only their willingness pro patria mori, but also their masculinity. They were, well, “real men.” But what about those American men who, though of “The Greatest Generation,” did not actually fight in “The Good War?” There were millions of them. Early in the war Washington designated certain industries essential to the war effort and therefore exempted those who worked in them from the draft. These men “fought” on the Home Front, of course. But they knew very well that fighting on the “Home Front” was not the same as fighting on the actual front. As men of fighting age but not fighting, they were the object of a

Ask most educated people about the development of American slavery, and you’re likely to hear something about Virginia or, just maybe, South Carolina. In his far-reaching but concise and elegantly written new book A New World of Labor: The Development of Plantation Slavery in the British Atlantic (University of Pennsylvania Press, 2013), Simon Newman takes us to the tiny Caribbean island of Barbados to trace the beginnings of African slavery in British America. The cotton slavery we know from the killing fields of Mississippi and Louisiana can be traced back to the sugar regimen that developed in Barbados. And that slavery, Newman shows, must be understood amidst the larger trajectory of bound labor in England and Scotland, and even in the British forts on Africa’s Gold Coast. A New World of Labor shows how the regime of bound servant labor — not the institution of West African slavery — provided the foundation for slavery as it developed in Britain’s New World plantation colonies. Learn more about your ad ch

The story of the rise of Jim Crow in Jacksonville, Florida is in many ways illustrative of the challenges facing newly emancipated African Americans throughout the South with local officials erecting barriers to black participation; blacks building institutions to overcome those obstacles; then Southern bigots using the reaction of blacks as justification for both the initial barriers and further draconian measures. This usually involved labeling black political action as in some way primitive, corrupt or unfairly self-interested. For example, many in the white establishment in Jacksonville resented that blacks voted for Republicans out of loyalty, yet they also attacked blacks for voting for ‘reform Democrats’ out of self -interest. So, the solution? Political education of some kind? Outreach perhaps? No, instead they implemented what was called the ‘Australian ballot’: a subway map style list of candidates with intersecting names and titles intended to either confuse or disqualify many black voters. This

How could members of a movement committed to cosmopolitanism accommodate nationalism? How could men and women committed to non-resistance reconcile themselves to politics when the authority of even democratic polities depended ultimately upon the threat of force? How could activists committed to equality — the essence of democracy — deny that the democratic process produced policies that were manifestly unjust? Those are some of the main questions that animate W. Caleb McDaniel‘s important book The Problem of Democracy in the Age of Slavery: Garrisonian Abolitionists and Transatlantic Reform (Louisiana State University Press, 2013). The most deeply research study of the transatlantic networks of the radical antislavery movement to date, it raises questions about the tensions between cosmopolitanism and nationalism, peace and violence, and means and ends that continue to bedevil those struggling to achieve social justice. Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices Support our show by becomi