African American Studies Commons^™

Ua68/17/1 Wku Dance: Creating | Thinking | Artists, Wku Theatre & Dance

WKU Archives Records

Newsletter by and about the WKU Dance Program. Articles:

• Dance on the Hill
• Potter College of Arts & Letters Collaborations
• Guest Speakers: Naila Ansari, Shyama Iyer, Jill Flanders
• Guest Artists: Tyler Gilstrap
• WinterDance
• Last Chance to Dance
• National Dance Education Organization

135th Street Branch: Librarianship And The Passing Fictions Of Regina Anderson Andrews And Nella Larsen, Caitlin Matheis

Department of English: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

In this thesis, I examine how two writer-librarians that worked in the 135^th Street Branch of the New York Public Library in the 1920's, Regina Anderson Andrews and Nella Larsen, grappled in their fiction writing with questions of classification, information, and knowledge that encompassed their daily work in the library. I begin by contextualizing the branch within the Harlem Renaissance and Arturo A. Schomburg's call for the preservation of Black history and literature at a time when the field of librarianship was being professionalized by implementing library schools and classification standards. I then provide readings of Andrews's one-act play …

Getting Back: The Chiffons’ Sonic Reclamation, Hilarie Ashton

Publications and Research

Sixties girl group the Chiffons are famous for their soaring 1964 hit “He’s So Fine,” a song in turn remembered almost as often for its plagiarism by George Harrison than in its own right. Much of the rest of their catalogue, including the tremendous “I Have a Boyfriend,” gets shunted into historical and critical gaps that paint rock music history as controlled by men. In this article, I examine the Chiffons in their own right, reframing a story of well-worn sonic theft to center on the group it obscured, through and alongside interpretative contradictions, assumptions, and historical lacunae. I show …

Sonic Femininity: The Ronettes' Transgressive Gender Performance, Hilarie Ashton

Publications and Research

Iconic sixties girl group the Ronettes are frequently (and justly) celebrated for anchoring the Wall of Sound and inspiring the Beatles, but in their own right, they transgressed social, gendered expectations in revolutionary ways. Framed by a notion I call the sonic feminine, a recuperative theoretical space for the revolutionarily transgressive work of female and femme artists, I argue that the Ronettes, and lead singer Ronnie Spector in particular, enacted a kind of cultural rebellion: they crafted their images to made-up heights that tease the boundaries of drag across the spaces of the stage, the recording studio, the bathroom, and …

Ua12/2/2 2019 Talisman: Balance, Wku Student Affairs

WKU Archives Records

2019 Talisman yearbook.

• Mohr, Olivia. Balance
• Lunte, Hailee. That Warm Feeling Autumn Took from Me
• Dozer, Claire. Mother Load – Savannah Ranney
• Hubbs, Annalee. Tap After Hours – Dance
• Lancaster, Emily. Opposites Attract – Maddie Rediker & Cameron Blankenship
• Jones, Sydney. Delving into the Dirty – Taylor Gossage, Lion’s Den
• Chu, Phi. Snow Song
• Gordon, Zora. Spells & Spirit – Kristen Dalby, Witchcraft
• Powers, Noah. What is Left – Kelly Meredith, Identity Theft
• Aklilu, Bethel. Uprooting – International Students
• Steffey, Raegan. The Dirty Art Kids
• Dieudonne, Nadia. Self Starteres – Entrepreneurs
• Bass, Morgan. Young & Partisan – Politics
• Powers, Noah. …

Place Of Joyful Gathering: The Story Of Cleveland's Karamu House, Jacey Kepich

Researchers, Instructors, & Staff Scholarship

Recognized as the oldest active African American theater in the United States, Karamu House is truly a ‘Cleveland collection’. Portions of its history are housed in several institutions: the Cleveland Public Library, Western Reserve Historical Society, and Cleveland State University. In 2021 Karamu donated its administrative and programmatic archives to Case Western Reserve University’s Kelvin Smith Library. CWRU is home to one of the first academic theater programs in the country, and given that the Karamu materials will live alongside KSL’s archives of Playhouse Square – a venerable institution that dominates the cultural spotlight – KSL will help make Karamu’s …

The Making Of A Raisin In The Sun, Judith E. Smith

American Studies Faculty Publication Series

Lorraine Hansberry’s play A Raisin in the Sun premiered on the Broadway stage in January 1959 just as the edifice of national segregation was cracking open. Response to the momentous 1954 Supreme Court decision in Brown v. Bd. of Education included both the important early challenges to long-accepted practices of white supremacy and the intensified mobilization of widespread white defiance to the ruling. Black Bus boycotters in Montgomery, Alabama, and their young minister leader, Martin Luther King, Jr., and Black high school students attempting to attend Little Rock’s Central High and their families faced organized harassment and dangerous forms …

Radical Black Drama-As-Theory: The Black Feminist Dramatic On The Protracted Event-Horizon, Jaye Austin Williams

Faculty Journal Articles

In this essay, I elaborate my present project, grounded in what I call drama theory, the critical theoretical dimensions of dramatic writing, and address the deeply troubling intramural tensions across Black Studies, between those who read blackness, and black cultural production, through largely futurist, celebratory lenses; and those who apply a structural analysis to blackness as the site against, upon, and through which the world coheres its soci(et)al apparatuses and machinations. I situate myself within the latter constellation, and sample here two plays by Suzan-Lori Parks to demonstrate how I translate the analyses of antiblack violence by black feminist …

Ua1c6/7 Entertainment Photos, Wku Archives

WKU Archives Collection Inventories

Images of entertainment events.

A Recipe For Black Girl Magic: A Critical Study Of The Mise-En-Scene In Beyoncé’S Visual Album Lemonade As A Radical Representation Of Black Women, Tatiyana Jenkins

Lawrence University Honors Projects

Lemonade, a visual album released by pop icon Beyoncé Knowles Carter in 2016, crafts a mise-en-scene that redefines the way that black women are allowed to feel and exist in media culture. Contrary to the negative stereotypes and misrepresentations perpetuated in media, Lemonade is a radical attempt to provide audiences with an alternative representation of the experiences of black women. For this honors project, I address the controversy surrounding the visual album’s radical representations of black womanhood. To inform my understanding of the visual album I examine the various creative contributions such as the film Daughters of the Dust directed …

Finding A New Home In Harlem: Alice Childress And The Committee For The Negro In The Arts, Judith E. Smith

American Studies Faculty Publication Series

Alice Childress’s performing career in the 1940s was primarily associated with the American Negro Theater, a collectively run professional theater company with a mission to nurture black talent and create compelling theater for Harlem audiences; as Childress would later comment, “We thought we were Harlem’s theater.” ANT made use of all available resources to accomplish this mission; producing plays written by black and white playwrights, hiring white teachers, and accepting white actors and technicians committed to its goals.

Friends Of Musselman Library Newsletter Fall 2016, Musselman Library

Friends of Musselman Library Newsletter

From the Dean (Robin Wagner)

Library Exhibits

GettDigital: Sports Reels

Research Reflections: The Gettysburg Superstar (Devin McKinney)

Remembering 9/12

Will Power: 400 Years After the Bard

Treasure Island (Robin Wagner)

Margin of Error

A Call to Activism in the Summer of '65 (Richard Hutch '67)

Digital Scholarship: The New Frontier (Julia Wall '19, Lauren White '18, Keira Koch '19)

Scrapbooks and Photo Albums: Snapshots of History (Clara A. Baker '30)

Soldiers' Scrapbooks (Laura Bergin '17)

A Book of Dreams (Alexa Schreier)

Who Do You Think You Are? (Timothy Shannon)

From Professor-Student to Collaborators (Jesse Siegel '16)

The Mysterious Easel Monument …

Staging Colorism, Mya D. Flood

Theater Summer Fellows

Colorism is a topic not frequently discussed in the African American community. My research focuses on representations of colorism in American drama. Using this research, I am workshopping a creative performance piece about this taboo topic to educate both Ursinus students and community members of all racial backgrounds. The research involves dissecting plays that confront colorism and the everyday struggles dealing with the stereotypes that come along with lighter and darker skin. My research takes the form of an annotated bibliography of plays about colorism and/or racism, a 20 page research paper about colorism in drama, and a draft of …

Staging (Within) Violence: A Conversation With Frank Wilderson And Jaye Austin Williams, Jaye Austin Williams

Faculty Journal Articles

No abstract provided.

Interview With E. Patrick Johnson, Bernadette Marie Calafell

Critical Race and Ethnic Studies Faculty Scholarship

No abstract provided.

Ua12/2/2 2016 Talisman - Life More Life, Wku Student Affairs

WKU Archives Records

2016 Talisman yearbook.

• Paris, Rachel. Dawn of Delta Zeta
• Ziege, Nicole. Kick It to the Limit – Soccer
• Paris, Rachel. Immersion: Band
• Houston, Emily. Immersion: Dance
• Paris, Rahcel. Immersion: ROTC
• Ziege, Nicole. Immersion: Theatre
• Holt, Delaney. Major Pride – WKU Majorette Style Dance Team
• Houston, Emily. Hollow Spike – Volleyball
• Moscoe, Carrie. The Intergallactic Tightrope – Elliott Talkington, Theatre & Dance
• Gilliam, Ashely. Tops on Top – Cheerleaders
• Young, Kreable. A Grand Adventure – Grand Canyon, Outdoor Recreation Activity Center
• Voorhees, Jessica. Home Team Advantage – Track & Field
• Homecoming
• Sproles, Katherine. Saddle School – Dylan Davis, Rodeo
• Sims, Bryna. …

Opening Remarks To Outing Lorraine At The Schomburg Center, Shawn(Ta) Smith-Cruz

Publications and Research

This article is an edit of the opening remarks for the event held on May 22nd, 2014 at the Schomburg Center for Research in Black Culture as part of the In The Life Series supplying Black LGBT programming coordinated by Steven Fullwood. Outing Lorraine included panelists: Alexis DeVeaux, Joi Gresham, and Steven Fullwood and was moderated by Shawn(ta) Smith-Cruz. Opening remarks provide a biographical description of Lorraine Hansberry's life, prepare the audience for a conversation on the implications for "outing" a black iconic figure, details the purpose for use of primary and secondary sources when, and provides a bibliography for …

The Emancipated Century: A Staged Reading Series, Robert Lublin, Clifford Odle, Barbara Lewis

Office of Community Partnerships Posters

A coordinated series of dramatic staged readings of the plays of August Wilson in theatres throughout greater Boston. This project aims to pay tribute to the 150th anniversary of the Emancipated Proclamation with a full presentation of August Wilson’s monumental 10-play cycle on African American life in each decade of the twentieth century. The accompanying Re-Visioning Tomorrow Forums explored ongoing themes in urban communities.

I Am Not Your Video Girl, Rashida Aluko-Roberts

SURGE

“We need girls who are willing to be up on stage with us and who are not afraid to go HAM dancing in front of a crowd. I know at least a few of you who have the confidence/jaw-dropping dance moves to pull this off.” [excerpt]

Fearless: Ratco, Center For Public Service

SURGE

If you haven’t noticed yet, we’ve had some really spectacular visitors from the south with us on Gettysburg’s campus the last few days! The Random Acts of Theater Company (RATCo) is a group that emerged from the Freedom Foundation in Denver, Colorado a few years ago. Their initiative involved using theater as a means for self-expression and communication, but RATCo spread because it was so successful and ultimately reached Selma, Alabama. Selma, although a major site for the Civil Rights movement, and also the site for the last battle of the civil war, has changed very little since the 1960s. …

"Spectacular Opacities": The Hyers Sisters' Performances Of Respectability And Resistance, Jocelyn Buckner

Theatre Faculty Articles and Research

This essay analyzes the Hyers Sisters, a Reconstruction-era African American sister act, and their radical efforts to transcend social limits of gender, class, and race in their early concert careers and three major productions, Out of Bondage and Peculiar Sam, or The Underground Railroad, two slavery-to-freedom epics, and Urlina, the African Princess, the first known African American play set in Africa. At a time when serious, realistic roles and romantic plotlines featuring black actors were nearly nonexistent due to the country’s appetite for stereotypical caricatures, the Hyers Sisters used gender passing to perform opposite one another as heterosexual lovers in …

Compulsory Homosexuality And Black Masculine Performance, Vershawn A. Young

English Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

The Angel And The Imp: The Duncan Sisters’ Performances Of Race And Gender, Jocelyn Buckner

Theatre Faculty Articles and Research

From 1923 to 1959 Vivian and Rosetta Duncan performed the show Topsy and Eva in front of thousands of audiences in the United States and abroad. This essay examines how the Duncan Sisters’ appropriation of blackness through a yin and yang performance of black and white womanhood, their sexualized but ultimately infantilizing routine as young girls, and their take on anarchistic comedy resulted in a particular spin on age, gender, race, and sexuality that reinforced their privilege as white women even while it pushed the boundaries of acceptable femininity in the swiftly shifting American culture of the first half of …

Passing For Black: Coon Songs And The Performance Of Race, Patricia R. Schroeder

English Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

Rhythms Of Rebellion: Artists Creating Dangerously For Social Change, Susan J. Erenrich

Antioch University Full-Text Dissertations & Theses

On December 14, 1957, after winning the Nobel Prize for literature, Albert Camus challenged artists attending a lecture at the University of Uppsala in Sweden to create dangerously. Even though Camus never defined what he meant by his charge, throughout history, artists involved in movements of protest, resistance, and liberation have answered Camus’ call. Quite often, the consequences were costly, resulting in imprisonment, censorship, torture, and death. This dissertation examines the question of what it means to create dangerously by using Camus’ challenge to artists as a starting point. The study then turns its attention to two artists, Augusto Boal …

Ua12/2/1 College Heights Herald, Vol. 76, No. 52, Wku Student Affairs

WKU Archives Records

WKU campus newspaper reporting campus, athletic and Bowling Green, Kentucky news. Articles in this issue:

• Moore, Brian. Another Meningitis Case Found on Campus
• Dawes, Jennifer. Boy Riding Bicycle Hit on Normal – Christopher Siegrist
• Walsh, Erica. Student Government Association Election Produces Low Voter Turnout
• Hall, Rex. Alcohol to be Served in Luxury Suites – Diddle Arena
• Training Needed to Avoid Rolling – Vans
• Grady, Brian. Editorial Cartoon – Rolling Vans
• NCAA Stepping on Mid-Major Schools
• Hiles, Tom. Naming Revenue Needed
• Murphy, Sean. Policing the Police
• Corbin, Brett. Concrete Canoe Team Rows to Sixth Regional Win
• Hoang, Mai. Dance Company Debuts …

Ua12/2/2 Xposure - Spring 1996, Wku Student Affairs

WKU Archives Records

1996 Xposure yearbook.

• Davis, Amanda. College Bands
• Witty, Patrick. Keeping His Composure: Award-Winning Conductor Visits – Karel Husa
• Noel, Anthony. Eyes in the Dark – Tara Higdon, Stalking
• Gamblin, Joe. The Thursday Night Ritual – Entertainment
• Portrait Gallery – Neal Thomas, Tamico Johnson, Elin Ramberg, Larry Danielson, John Hildreth
• Shain, Kimberly. Graves of Earthly Delights: Western Students Dig for Bones of Confederate Soldiers – Archaeology, Sons of Confederate Veterans
• Wade, Molly. College Habitats – Dormitories, Apartments
• Hieb, Dan. The Underground Club – Green River Grotto, Spelunking, Caves
• 35^th Annual Student Art Competition
• Gamblin, Joe. WWF . . . Or …

Ua12/2/2 Xposure - Fall 1995, Wku Student Affairs

WKU Archives Records

1995 Xposure yearbook.

• Contributors
• Meese, Ray. Ethnic Harmony – International Festival
• Frazier, Stephan. The Unspoken Me – Scott Foster, Musicians
• Thomas, Kim. From the Front Page to Fruit Loops – College Heights Herald
• Shain, Kimberly. Politics? Who Cares!
• Hutchins, Chris. Live, Learn & Intern – Chris Daniel, Lisa Vaught
• Hutchins, Chris. The Power of Prayer – Eastside Church of Christ, Newman Center
• Meese, Ray. Cutting Up on Campus
• Gamblin, Joe. Comic Craze – Comic Books
• From the World of Art – Paintings
• Noel, Anthony. Achieving Greatness – Theatre & Dance
• Noel, Anthony. Precious Moments with the Duke – Duke Orsino, …

Ua12/2/2 Xposure - Rites Of Passage, Wku Student Affairs

WKU Archives Records

1995 Xposure yearbook.

• Contributors
• Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. Day, 1996
• Frazier, Andy. My Cup Is the Cup of Life – Coffee
• Hinkebein, Dana. Behind the Curtains – Theatre & Dance
• Thomas, Kim. Rites of Passage – Mark Nethery, Jessica Nethery
• Cunnoe, James. College: Land of the Free & Home of Instant Pasta
• Thomas, Kim. The Search for Truth – Religion, Paul Miller, Native Americans, Clay Coleman, Candi Cabaniss, Atheism
• Meese, Ray. Confirmed in the Faith – Pam Page, Catholicism
• Broadbent, Stephanie. The Stigma Unearned: Virginity in College
• Davis, Amanda. Nontraditional Values – Nontraditional Students
• Spears, Brian. Turn On, Tune …

Ua12/2/1 College Heights Herald, Vol. 65, No. 39, Wku Student Affairs

WKU Archives Records

WKU campus newspaper reporting campus, athletic and Bowling Green, Kentucky news. This issue contains articles:

• Bricking, Tanya. Bill Aims to Rid Regent Selections of Politics
• Summers, Kaye. University Wants to Look Into Waste Management
• Kendall, Dale. Juggling Jobs for Ukrainians: Group Prepares for Immigration of 78 Soviets
• Ausenbaugh, Laura. Loan Default Rate Here Below National Average
• Play to be Performed Tonight – Theatre & Dance
• Public Relations Student Society of America Takes Second in National Campaign – PRSSA
• Franchising Seminar to be Held Thursday
• Poynter, Chris. Professor Julia Roberts Gets $750,000 Grant
• Houchens, Gary. College Republicans Gear Up for Re-Election …