African American Studies Commons^™

Despite The Blues: Richard Wright And Ralph Ellison’S Blues Based Works, Miranda Virginia Reale

Senior Projects Spring 2020

Ain't got no mother, ain't got no culture

Ain't got no friends, ain't got no schoolin'

Ain't got no love, ain't got no name

Ain't got no ticket, ain't got no token

Ain't got no god

–Nina Simone, “Ain’t Got No-I Got Life,” from the album Nuff Said (1968).

In between human intention and reality lies a disproportionate space that Albert Camus labels “the absurd.” Modern man’s affliction is thus absurd, as orthodox systems turn obsolete, the traditional virtues of the past cease to be familiar. The epistemology of the absurd may not have developed from American soil; but I …

In Her Own Hands: How Girls And Women Used The Piano To Chart Their Futures, Expand Women's Roles, And Shape Music In America, 1880–1920, Sarah F. Litvin

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

American girls and women used the parlor piano to reshape their lives between 1880 and 1920, the years when the instrument reached the height of its commercial and cultural popularity. Newspapers, memoirs, biographies, women’s magazines, personal papers, and trade publications show that female pianists engaged in public-facing piano play and work in pursuit of artistic expression, economic gain, self-actualization, social mobility, and social change. These motivations drove many to use their piano skills to play beyond the parlor, by studying in conservatory, working as classical and popular music performers and composers, founding and teaching at schools, working as department store …

The Passion Of Love Or The Love Of Passion In A-Minor, Brendan Whitt

ETD Archive

A-Minor is an one-act play that examines the relationship between a Black artist and the predominantly white society and industry he must assimilate into in order to be considered a success. The main character Jacque Bonnet is used as a vessel to interpret the life and career of Joseph Bologne Chevalier de St. George. Despite Bonnet and Bologne being from different eras (Bologne mid to late 1700’s, Bonnet Mid 1800’s) I used Bonnet as a device to investigate the lesser explored life of Bologne. By creating a meta-gothic world for Jacque Bonnet to exist in, the crowd can watch his …

Resonant Texts: The Politics Of Nineteenth-Century African American Music And Print Culture, Paul Fess

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Resonant Texts: the Politics of Nineteenth-Century African American Music and Print Culture, investigates musical sound as a discursive tool African American writers and activists deployed to contest enslavement before the Civil War and claim citizenship after Emancipation. Traditionally, scholars have debated the degree to which nineteenth-century African American music constituted evidence of black culture and marked a persistent African orality that still abides within African American textual production. While these trends inform this project, my inquiry focuses on the ways that writers placed elements of musical sound—such as rhythm, melody, choral singing, and harmony—at the center of their …

Laughing At Ourselves: Music And Identity In Comedic Performance, Peter Trigg

Masters Theses

Standup comedy actively performs and engages with constructions of self and social identity, especially in terms of ethnic difference and the negotiation of American race relations. Musical comedy, wherein standup comedians perform song onstage, represents one facet of this expression that configures musical texts and expectations in the service of cultural observation and critique. Bo Burnham and Reggie Watts characterize two disparate approaches to the practice based on their aesthetic tastes, existential anxieties, and racial experiences. The two present their respective identities onstage in relation to a changing American political landscape of the early 21st century that has seen widespread …

The World Is Yours: The Radical And Deterritorializing Nature Of Hip-Hop, Ethan Pearce

Honors Theses

Since its inception in the early 1970s, Hip Hop has been defined as a cultural movement that is firmly grounded on the principles of socio-political radicalism, subversion, and change. Rap, which is often synonymous with Hip Hop, is the most recent example of the disenfranchised African-American community’s attempt to gain equality through musical stylings.1 Hip Hop has followed in the footsteps of the negro spiritual, the blues, jazz, and rock and roll. While each one of these musical genres has undeniably black roots, Hip Hop, in the words of the influential sociologist Michael Eric Dyson is, “emblematic of the glacial …

And I Heard 'Em Say: Listening To The Black Prophetic, Cameron J. Cook

Pomona Senior Theses

This thesis aims to explore how conceptions of the black prophetic tradition, as discussed by thinkers Cornel West and George Shulman, might be expanded into the realm of African American musical traditions and genres. I argue that musical genres like the blues and hip-hop function as an affective discourse that aesthetically, politically and religiously function as sites of resistance to white supremacy and provide alternate pathways to liberation as compared to more canonical instantiations of the black prophetic. In particular I provide close readings of performances and art by Nina Simone and Kanye West.

Hip Hop Rhetoric: Relandscaping The Rhetorical Tradition, Roberto Jose Tinajero Ii

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

This dissertation is a rhetorical analysis of hip hop music and culture. Chapter 1 focuses on adding hip hop rhetoric to the discussion and terrain of rhetoric and writing studies and to the rhetorical tradition. Chapter 2 uses the rhetorical notion of kairos to discuss the ethos of hip hop culture and discourse. Chapter 3 uses hip hop rhetoric to discuss the tensuous-solidarity between Latinos and African Americans. Chapter 4 focuses on Latino/Borderland Hip Hop and discusses the multi-consciousness of Latino identity. Chapter 5 focuses on Christiian religious imagery in gangsta rap music. There is also a short conclusion.

Negro Art, Vera H. Richards

Electronic Thesis and Dissertation

In recent years, especially in America, the Negro has been the subject of wide and varied discussions. These discussions concerns the intellectual and religious phases of his life. The Negro is inter-nationally known for his expression of music and poetry, especially for his of rhythmical phasing which is so essential to the above named arts in viewing the origin of the race. it is found that valuable material was contributed to humanity by the ancient Ethiopian tribes which the Negro has come