American Studies Commons^™

On The Double: The Hidden (Queer And Jewish) Career Of Danny Kaye, Michael Bronski

Center for LGBTQ Studies (CLAGS)

Last year, in the early stages of applying for the Duberman Fellowship, I began by trying to discern a topic, a subject, that would involve me intellectually as well as emotionally. As a free-lance writer and cultural critic I am, more frequently than not, assigned subjects, books, movies, performances by my editors. If I received the Duberman I wanted to research and write about something that resonated with my life and current interests.

Excerpt From Wrestling With Rustin, Or The Left Will Rise Again, Maybe, John D'Emilio

Center for LGBTQ Studies (CLAGS)

Four years ago, CLAGS sponsored a conference on the state of gay and lesbian history. I was one of several presenters in a session on biography. None of us on the panel had consulted beforehand. But by the beginning of the third or fourth presentation, a common pattern had emerged, and the audience erupted with laughter. Each one of us had opened our remarks with a mixture of apology and denial: we each were not, we assured the audience, writing a biography!

The Pitchman In Print: Oral Performance Art In Text And Context, Joseph Ugoretz

Publications and Research

Oral performance art, patterned performative speech for an audience, is perhaps the oldest and most ubiquitous human art form. Specific instances of this art include the performances of griots and guslars, troubadors and shamans, as well as rappers and riddlers, preachers and politicians. While this art form is by definition oral, it is also the case that, frequently, literary art has represented oral performance art. There is written art which depicts oral art, which describes it, appropriates it, criticizes and co‑opts it.

In this dissertation, I define oral performance art as constituting a separate and unique artistic genre, one which …