Africana Studies Commons^™

The Author And Apartheid: Building Pro-Blackness At Bgsu Through James Baldwin And The Anti-Apartheid Movement, Noah C. Fitch

Honors Projects

The stories of anti-apartheid and James Baldwin at BGSU provides a basis for a building of pro-Blackness in the on-campus community. Through the contextualization and narrative building through a historical sociological framework, these two events show the extent of activism in the 1970s and 1980s rather than the traditional narrative that is discussed. By expanding that narrative, it also expands the narrative surrounding the history not just of BGSU, but the way universities frame their own histories. Additionally, these events take place in the era when the transition from looking at Civil Rights to Human Rights is more prevalent and …

Lay It On The Line: The Life And Music Of Gladys Bentley, Bianki Torres, J.

Doctoral Dissertations

This work is a historical biography of Gladys Bentley and her blues music. She was a cross-dressing entertainer from the Harlem Renaissance and performed popular songs with added, sometimes improvised sexual innuendo. This study considers the performances of her recorded and written material as trans music, meaning, that black music provided a platform to determine racial, gendered, and sexual cultural expressions changing over time, however, always rooted in black vernacular culture. Using showbills, promotional material, studio recordings and short autobiography, this study follows Bentley’s career as “male impersonator” and the effects lesbian/gay (queer) culture had on her blues. Also, I …

Navigating Archival Silences: Black History At Purdue, Sammie L. Morris

Libraries Faculty and Staff Presentations

There are gaps in the historical record of Purdue University as evidenced in the lack of source materials in the University Archives. In particular, researching history on Black alumni, faculty, and staff and other people of color in Purdue's past is challenging due to the scarcity of source material. This presentation discusses gaps or archival silences in the University Archives and measures being taken to preserve and share access to Black history at Purdue.

Fatma's Promise, Husna Abubakar, Simone Khanyi Hadebe, Clarissa Guzman

Group Presentations

No abstract provided.

Wendigo, Raul Falcon, Zoe Gilmore

Group Presentations

No abstract provided.

Billie's Reflections, Billie Wynn, Melisa Achoko Allela, Movement Lab

Student Reflections

No abstract provided.

Raul's Reflections, Raul Falcon, Melisa Achoko Allela, Movement Lab

Student Reflections

No abstract provided.

Simone's Reflections, Simone Khanyi Hadebe, Melisa Achoko Allela, Movement Lab

Student Reflections

No abstract provided.

Sagian's Reflections, Sagian Shaw, Melisa Achoko Allela, Movement Lab

Student Reflections

No abstract provided.

Taira's Reflections, Taira Schurman, Melisa Achoko Allela, Movement Lab

Student Reflections

No abstract provided.

Skeleton Man, Billie Wynn, Sagian Shaw, Taira Schurman

Group Presentations

No abstract provided.

Rise, Ning Yen, Omar Abdelhamid, Erin Xi, Nicole Xu

Group Presentations

No abstract provided.

Death, Dreaming, And Diaspora: Achieving Orientation Through Afro-Spirituality, Liz Johnston, Jaime Elizabeth Johnston

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

Enslavement, colonization, and the systems that uphold racial injustice were and still are a series of new, unfathomable, and challenging experiences that prompt individuals within the diaspora to seek orientation. How does a human cope with centuries of attempts at the systematic destruction of their humanity, culture, and identity? How can they reclaim that identity, especially when so much of it seems lost? I address these questions by utilizing texts from the expansive body of work regarding ethnographic-historical-religious studies on Afro-spiritual practices to better analyze instances in literature in the ongoing practice of diasporic orientation. In this project, I argue …

Motion Capture For Orature Wintersession 2024 | Syllabus, Melisa Achoko Allela, Movement Lab

Course Materials

This winter session course invites students to explore motion capture through the lens of traditional oral storytelling practices. Students will actively identify the unique and distinguishing features of orature, and leverage their own cultural backgrounds, personal perspectives, and idiosyncrasies to create motion capture data that can be used in crafting an immersive digital retelling of a folktale.

Songa: A Mocap Database, Melisa Achoko Allela, Movement Lab

Course Materials

No abstract provided.

Session 1 | Orature: Setting The Foundation, Melisa Achoko Allela, Movement Lab

Course Materials

Presentation for the Motion Capture and Orature course offered during the 2024 Wintersession.

Session 3 | The Oral Storyteller, Melisa Achoko Allela, Movement Lab

Course Materials

Presentation for the Motion Capture and Orature course offered during the 2024 Wintersession.

Session 2 | Oral Storytelling Space / Place / Time, Melisa Achoko Allela, Movement Lab

Course Materials

Presentation for the Motion Capture and Orature course offered during the 2024 Wintersession.

Session 4 | The Talking Cloth As Prop, Melisa Achoko Allela, Movement Lab

Course Materials

Presentation for the Motion Capture and Orature course offered during the 2024 Wintersession.

Session 5 | Oral Storytelling Props And Costume, Melisa Achoko Allela, Movement Lab

Course Materials

Presentation for the Motion Capture and Orature course offered during the 2024 Wintersession.

Session 7 | Audience Role And Interaction, Melisa Achoko Allela, Movement Lab

Course Materials

Presentation for the Motion Capture and Orature course offered during the 2024 Wintersession.

Session 6 | Motion Capture For The Storytelling Performance, Melisa Achoko Allela, Movement Lab

Course Materials

Presentation for the Motion Capture and Orature course offered during the 2024 Wintersession.

Session 8 | Non-Verbal Storytelling: Facial Expressions, Melisa Achoko Allela, Movement Lab

Course Materials

Presentation for the Motion Capture and Orature course offered during the 2024 Wintersession.

Session 9 | Digital Immersion & Presence In Oral Storytelling: Being There, Melisa Achoko Allela, Movement Lab

Course Materials

Presentation for the Motion Capture and Orature course offered during the 2024 Wintersession.

Their Country: Black Women, Three Chords, And The Truth, Dmetri J. Smith

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

ABSTRACT

Country music has long overlooked and at times outright erased the contributions of people of African descent. The past and present contributions of Black women are particularly ignored. Country music— a racially contested space centered in Nashville, Tennessee— is imbued with themes referencing the “good ole days” that were dangerous times for anyone who was not White, male, cisgender, and heterosexual. The genre has only become slightly more welcoming to those who are not part of the dominant class. And yet, there are Black women who feel called to use country music as their storytelling medium. My research shows …

Playing Changes: Music As Mediator Between Japanese And Black Americans, E Taylor Atkins

Faculty Books & Book Chapters

Since the mid-twentieth century, music has played a central role in encounters and interactions between the people of Japan and those of African descent. It proved far more effective for pro- moting interracial dialogue and understanding than efforts in the early 1900s to foster an alliance against white supremacy and imperialism. This essay unpacks the ways that encounters with Black music transformed Japanese musicking and generated knowledge and empathy for people of African descent among Japanese. Personal interactions between Black and Japanese musicians constituted a process of “grassroots globalization” that circumvented the dominance of American mass media in representing African …

Review Of Afro-Dog: Blackness And The Animal Question, By Bénédicte Boisseron, Thomas Aiello

Between the Species

This review evaluates Bénédicte Boisseron's Afro-Dog: Blackness and the Animal Question. In the process, it tracks the development of the academic relation between Blackness and animality.

Call For Papers: Special Issue - "Beyond Borders: People, Politics, Conflict, And Recovery In Darfur And Sudan"

The Journal of Social Encounters

No abstract provided.

The Definition Of A Black Man: The Entanglement Of Race, Sexuality, And Space, Michael Moore

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis examines how Black queer men and transmasculine individuals navigate Black heteronormative and White queer spaces in New Orleans. Over the last few decades, articles, including anthropological and sociological, have focused on the relationship between race, gender performance, sexuality, and emotional expression among men such as Christian (2005), which analyzed how Black queer men expressed their masculinity within queer spaces (Christian 2005). This thesis builds on this literature to explore how societal and cultural pressures of masculinity can hinder Black queer men institutionally, socially, and romantically.

Black Women And Theoretical Frameworks, Laschanda Johnson

The Scholarship Without Borders Journal

Despite the upsurge in the number of woman students as well as novice faculty /administrators, there are still too few women leaders to inspire the shifting demographics. The growing number of female undergraduate students in most parts of the world has created the erroneous perception that gender equality in higher education has been attained. While women's contribution to higher education has increased, the attainment of leadership positions is practically unknown from the global perspective. Given that higher education is becoming a more complicated global enterprise, gender equality in leadership is not only an issue of impartiality but also a need …