Book Description
From the Introduction:
ghet-to n. (Merriam-Webster dictionary) Italian, from Venetian dialect ghèto island where Jews were forced to live; literally, foundry (located on the island), from ghetàr, to cast; from Latin jactare to throw
1: a quarter of a city in which Jews were formerly required to live
2: a quarter of a city in which members of a minority group live, especially because of social, legal, or economic pressure
3a: an isolated group
b: a situation that resembles a ghetto especially in conferring inferior status or limiting opportunity
ghet-to adj. (twenty-first-century everyday parlance)
1a: behavior that makes you want to say “Huh?”
b: actions that seem to go against basic home training and common sense
2: used to describe something with inferior status or limited opportunity. Usually used with “so.”
;
3: a quarter of a city in which members of a minority group live, especially because of social, legal, or economic pressure.
4: common misusage: authentic, Black, keepin’ it real
As current and all-consuming as “ghetto” is in these days of gold teeth, weaves (blond and red), Pepsi-filled baby bottles, and babymamas, ghetto has a long history. The original ghetto was in the Jewish quarter of Venice, a Catholic city. Before it became the Jewish quarter, this area contained an iron foundry or ghèto, hence the name. These days, ghetto no longer refers to where you live, but to how you live. It is a mindset, and not limited to a class or a race. Some things are worth repeating: ghetto is not
limited to a class or a race. Ghetto is found in the heart of the nation’s inner cities as well as the heart of the nation’s most cherished suburbs; among those too young to understand (we hope) and those old enough to know better; in little white houses, and all the way to the White House; in corporate corridors, Ivy League havens, and, of course, Hollywood. More devastating, ghetto is also packaged in the form of music, TV, books, and movies, and then sold around the world. Bottom line: ghetto is contagious, and no one is immune, no matter how much we like to suck our teeth and shake our heads at what we think is only happening someplace else…
From an award-winning journalist and cultural commentator comes a provocative examination of the impact of “ghetto” mores, attitudes, and lifestyles on urban communities and American culture in general.
Cora Daniels takes on one of the most explosive issues in our country today in this thoughtful critique of America’s embrace of a ghetto persona that demeans women, devalues education, celebrates the worst African American stereotypes, and contributes to the destruction of civil peace. Her investigation exposes the central role of corporate America in exploiting the idea of ghetto-ness as a hip cultural idiom, despite its disturbing ramifications, as a means of making money. She showcases Black rappers raised in privileged families who have taken on the ghetto persona and sold millions of albums, and non-Black celebrities, such as Paris Hilton, who have adopted ghetto attitudes and styles in pursuit of attention and notoriety. She explores, as well, her own relationship to the ghetto and the ways in which she is both part of and outside the Ghettonation.
Infused with humor and entertaining asides—including lists of events and people that the author nominates for the Ghetto Hall of Fame, and a short section written entirely in ghetto slang—Ghettonation is a timely and engrossing report on a controversial social phenomenon. Like Bill Cosby’s infamous, much-discussed comments about the problems within the Black community today, it is sure to trigger widespread interest and heated debate.
Customer Reviews:
(RAW Rating: 4.5) - A Mindset.......2007-09-29
Author Cora Daniels gives us her take on what she believes is ghetto. She states that ghetto is a mindset and no one is immune from it be it, inner city or suburban residents. While this is not a critical analysis of the ghetto phenomenon, Daniels does site some sociological ills and possible blame. That in itself is cause for debate.
Often portrayed with humor, the author interviews an array of people on what their take is of the term ghetto; what ghetto is to one may not be ghetto to another, be it children or adults. She speaks with boys hanging on street corners, boys and girls who are doing well academically and have college set in their minds and those who have done well financially, but chose to stay in the inner city, further demonstrating that ghetto is a mindset and running to suburbia does not eliminate the ghetto mentality, nor the chance you may see not ghetto. While GHETTONATION by Cora Daniels can cause a serious debate, it is also a reality check for many.
Reviewed by Dawn R. Reeves
of The RAWSISTAZ(tm) Reviewers
A great book even though some readers miss the point!.......2007-08-29
A Great book that will have a broad appeal to people of all ages! To those of you who feel like the book didn't offer you enough, I think that you miss the point that this book is written not just for the highly educated but its also written in a style that is of interest to the young men and women on the street corner. BrotherMan on the corner is not interested in black socialism or a book about black culturalism. This book is a wake up call to all people in the sense that it's asking you to think about what it is that you do and why you do those things that are considered to be ghetto. On that note, Mrs Daniels hit the mark. Pass it on to those that are ghetto fabulous and see if you have something worthwhile to talk about! Peace!
'Should be on Oprah's Book Club list.......2007-08-25
Some weeks ago I watched as a mainstream television newscaster referred to the police as the "po po's," a term that is, at this moment used by inner city youth. It's obvious that when such language becomes "accepted" by the mainstream, the words are on their way out...or are they?
Author Cora Daniels would probably say that such usage is further indication of the ghettonization of America and she's more than likely correct. In her amusing and thought-provoking book, the writer exposes all the aspects of American society that reflects how the ghetto mentality flourishes. She sites the entertainment industry, Madison Avenue, professional sports, as well as the everyday instances wherein that which we once thought was only a part of the inner city has become commonplace.
As entertaining as the book is, she hits hard when she challenges readers to consider her words and take action in order to stop or, at least, slow down the spread of "ghettoism" in this nation.
This is a definite "must read" for all Americans that want to understand what's going, not just with the young people, but among us all as we fall further and further into the rationale of the street.
Finally, someone who articulates the problem!.......2007-08-21
Suffering for sometime from the notion that the end is nigh for American civilization, being assaulted daily by the sights, sounds and stories of angry babbymammas and the gangstas who did 'em wrong, mysogynistic rap, the objectification of the female figure everywhere; girls as young as ten wearing t-shirts that read "If you surf I'm available" and crusted with bling, picking visible thongs out of their exposed cracks; young folk with the crazed look of meth/crack/coke in their eyes; fearless pedophiles defiant both about their sickness and civil rights; celebrities crashing and burning; and wondering who and where were the new role models, and where were our real poets and music makers -- and please don't tell me its Fall Out Boy, The White Stripes, or Pussy Cat Dolls or Beyonce or Timblaland or Timberlake-- I wearily picked this book up at my local library and began to read, and continued, and couldn't stop. In fact, I read Ghettonation in two readings, stopping only to pick up my kids from school and make a (rather ghetto) meal of hotdogs and canned beans. I had to rush back to this book.
I've been wrestling with American notions of class, race, identity, the decline of Western civilization, economic disparities, greed and respect, what constitutes illegal immigrants, education, environmental devastation, pitbulls, drugs, babymammas, and rap and hip hop music for a decade and more. I see how lowering the bar, for all of us, has resulted in a free fall for relationships, in parenting, manners, basic common sense, civility, charity, and even basic human discourse. In Ghettonation, Ms. Daniels finally articulated my inchoate thoughts and theories.
When Gwenyth Paltrow called her baby Apple that was a ghetto move. What a concept! This patrician looking, some would say Aryan, blonde with blue eyes doing something other than the classy she generally projects, but it's an absolute spot-on observation. An ah-hah moment, and this book has no shortage of other such examples to remind us all that ghetto isn't a class thing, it's not a race thing, it's simply about not being the best of what we can and should be.
The section on ghetto literature is terrifying. Proceed with caution. I had no idea these books were B. available and B. popular. I also had no idea that high profile music industry figures, such as Snoop Dogg (and more recently Dave Navarro) were getting involved in porn and doing well with it. Yes, we've come a long way from Bob Dylan, the Beatles, and MoTown. Yes, we are much more morally bankrupt than we used to be, even compared to the anything goes 70s days of decadence.
This is an important book, it's a wake up call to all who care about the world and our human family, that we need to be smart, we need to be kinder, we need to take care of our children, our business, our schools, and our world. It's the only one we have.
Thanks, Ms. Daniels, for this eye opening and cogent analysis of the most urgent problem facing America today. You managed to walk the fine line without resorting to snobbery, elitism, and also without giving an inch.
Ghettonation is essential reading.
Long on Examples, Short on Analysis.......2007-07-26
This book offers a blend of opinion, autobiography, and ethnography to ask why "ghetto" (and its adjectival uses, as in "That's sooo ghetto") has become an accepted "mind-set" in this country. Daniels does well to catalog the many ways in which ghetto culture is organized by "low expectations" and fosters carelessness, irresponsibility, and general unpleasantness. Her examples can be illuminating, including the website Gizoogle.com, which translates any webpage into "ghettospeak."
The problem with this book is its complete lack of organization and argumentative structure. I second one reviewer's claim that Daniels tends to substitute her own rambling musings for critical social analysis. Her back-and-forth rhetoric about "I'm ghetto, I'm not ghetto" typifies this problem: Daniels seems to think her examples are so self-evident that we should already know WHY she supposedly "is" or "isn't" ghetto. This sleight of hand is inexcusable for a book that means to delineate the properties of the "ghetto mind-set." We expect explanation here, not self-indulgent "you know it when you see it" joking.
The book also suffers from having an overly expansive definition of the ghetto mind-set. Daniels's examples are so wide-ranging and far-fetched (even referencing the heir to the throne of Monaco's philandering) that she loses sight of the specific (social, cultural, historical) reasons why "ghetto" has become fashionable among American youth. At times it seems Daniels interprets ghetto as signifying anything (or anyone) that thrives off "low expectations." Such an abstract definition means very little when applied to concrete examples.
In the end, I wanted more critical focus in this book. (A little less authorly self-indulgence would have helped.) The examples are sometimes illuminating, as I noted, but Daniels's basic theme is tackled more pointedly in black sociological criticism and black cultural studies.
Book Description
This book reveals how five distinct African civilizations have shaped the specific cultures of their New World descendants.
Customer Reviews:
brilliant and insightful look at the interconnectedness of the Diaspora with the world............2007-08-31
I had the privilige to see Robert Farris Thompson, when the FACES OF THE GODS exhibit came to the Seattle Art Museum. Dr. Thompson came to speak about the history of the orishas (gods and goddesses) in the santeria and vodoo religious practices amongst the Afro-Cubans, Afro-Brazilians and African-Americans. What sets Thompson apart from other scholars is his genuine passion for the subject matter he has well-researched, as well as his vast knowledge of the Diaspora, and the cultural interconnectedness of people of African descent throughout the globe.
FLASH OF THE SPIRIT examines on a closer, more intimate level the cultural significance of the gods and goddesses depicted in mythology and art of those who are practitioners of (among other religions) Yoruba, Santeria and Voodoo faiths. We see beautiful and powerful illustrations and photographs of the jewelry, textiles, plates and figurines used in worship, and we also get insight into the characteristics of the gods and goddesses, their meaning in the lives of those who pray to them, and how this plays into other parts of society, human interaction and behavior. I come away from this book feeling that we are lot closer than we think, and that while "African-American" and "African" are important distinctions to recognize in terms of cultural definition, they are also at times parallel and quite similar to the indigenous Native cultures of South and Central America, as well as other parts of the world. This is fascinating material and Farris Thompson's writing style is pure poetry. I guarantee that once you start reading this book, you won't be able to put it down.
Enjoyed Immensely.......2006-12-22
I really enjoyed reading this book. It is very educational and it really takes me back to my grandma nem' time.
Seminal, Uplifting, Beautiful.......2003-03-11
If I could give this book 6 stars I would. Robert Farris Thompson presents our rich, ancient history making it quite clear that African Americans are not an isolated group but a group intimately connected to particular cultures and societies in West Africa and the African diaspora. The rich text is generously supported by illustrated plates. Essential reading for those who wish to gain an understanding of African cosmology, philosophy and art in relation to the African diaspora (North and South America, copious information on Brazil, the Carribean etc) Great reference material for students, artists, writers, researchers and thinkers. As an educator, writer and author I highly recommend this book.
An eye-opening look at the African soul in America.......2000-06-08
I enjoyed this book when I first read it as much for the kinds of bridges it seemed to make as for his own writing style and subject matter. R.F. Thompson, who I had the pleasure of meeting once in the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York, is someone who along with being highly knowledgeable cares a great deal for the subject. Where the book could be considered lacking I would say is it's way of seeming dated. It bares some cultural prejudice which, considering the cultural remoteness of the subject matter when compared to the intellectual/cultural arena of the writer(African and African-American, Afro-Cuban/Hispanic culture vs. Post-World War II Ivy League) - and how well he did anyway- is forgiveable, but present nonetheless. If you are expecting some pretty powerful things to be said about Coltrane, or the early days of Rap music and Hip-hop dance (now in its third decade of existence already), or Modigliani, or other things that are in the forefront of the present culture's mind, to a certain degree you will be disappointed. However, if you had no idea other than the Alex Haley "Roots" era rhetoricals about the derivation of many African-American and Hispanic/Hispanic-American cultural paradigms, this will enlighten you in ways that will have you going to the bookstore to see what else he and many others have written on the subjects. I recommend it- particularly for lovers of European modern art, studies of religion, and other things influenced by the Mother country.
African threads in Diasporan artforms.......2000-03-30
Thompson's work on African retentions in New World artforms is seminal in the field of African Diasporan art history. However, Flash of the Spirit reads more like a best seller than a textbook. Fascinating details and insights into the meanings of art from Haiti to Georgia to Brazil, with excellent context for all objects. Great for anyone at all curious about African heritage, religion, and art. Occasionally thick reading, as one must trace entire cosmologies, but well layed out, full of illustrations, and textually easy to follow. Thompson makes an obscure genre easily accesible to readers of varied backgrounds.
Book Description
This pathbreaking study of region, race, and gender reveals how we underestimate the South's influence on the formation of black masculinity at the national level. Many negative stereotypes of black men-often contradictory ones-have emerged from the ongoing historical traumas initiated by slavery. Are black men emasculated and submissive or hypersexed and violent? Nostalgic representations of black men have arisen as well: think of the philosophical, hardworking sharecropper or the abiding, upright preacher. To complicate matters, says Riché Richardson, blacks themselves appropriate these images for purposes never intended by their (mostly) white progenitors.
Starting with such well-known caricatures as the Uncle Tom and the black rapist, Richardson investigates a range of pathologies of black masculinity that derive ideological force from their associations with the South. Military policy, black-liberation discourse, and contemporary rap, she argues, are just some of the instruments by which egregious pathologies of black masculinity in southern history have been sustained. Richardson's sources are eclectic and provocative, including Ralph Ellison's fiction, Charles Fuller's plays, Spike Lee's films, Huey Newton's and Malcolm X's political rhetoric, the O. J. Simpson discourse, and the music production of Master P, the Cash Money Millionaires, and other Dirty South rappers.
Filled with new insights into the region's role in producing hierarchies of race and gender in and beyond their African American contexts, this new study points the way toward more epistemological frameworks for southern literature, southern studies, and gender studies.
Book Description
The phrases “hip hop” and “activism” aren’t always heard together, but it’s a marriage that must be made if black empowerment is to succeed. In Stand and Deliver, Bynoe eloquently advocates replacing charismatic but ineffectual black leaders who beg for crumbs from the white power structure with “citizen-leaders” who actively engage in a policy-centered relationship with that structure. Bynoe shows how hip hoppers can create a more sophisticated dialogue about what constitutes leadership, politics, and political action. This understanding, she argues, comes from influence, and influence comes from the ability to deliver — or deny — money, votes, or both to a political candidate, legislator, or political party. In the words of MC Lyte, all the rest is “chitter chatter.”
Customer Reviews:
Hip Hop vs. Old School?.......2004-07-26
It is probably obvious to any thinking Black American that the movement toward an equitable society is lacking in leadership today. The old school civil rights leaders are not connecting with the Hip Hop generation and the Hip Hop generation does not relate to where the civil rights leaders from the sixties and seventies are coming from. Yvonne Bynoe explores the reasons for this disconnect in the Black community. Her book, STAND AND DELIVER, is rich with the history of the civil rights era and also delves deeply into the psyche of the Hip Hop generation. She is equitable in placing responsibility for shortcomings from both generations where they belong and gives credit where it should be given. Bynoe thoughtfully explores the history and the reasoning behind each generation and gives reasonable explanations about why people do the things they do.
What makes her book an outstanding read is that she doesn't just ask the questions; she also provides reasonable solutions and outlines exactly how activism can once more be a part of the Black community. She gives concrete suggestions for the questions the Hip Hop generation must ask, such as how do we make America an equitable society. She even gives information on how to disagree without destroying a movement. In addition, she reminds those from other generations that they must come to the Hip Hop generation as equals, not with a snobbish attitude that suggests that they know without a shadow of a doubt, how to solve the problem of inequality in America. Bynoe also reminds us that in the new century, we can no longer exclude people from the movement because of race, class, or economic condition but we must find a common ground to insure that all Americans have an equal chance to be the best that they can. I frequently found myself nodding in agreement as I read her words. She is a voice to be reckoned with.
Reviewed by alice Holman
of The RAWSISTAZ Reviewers
Reader from PA.......2004-04-16
This is an excellent and timely book! Ms. Bynoe provides new and important insights about how we should critique and engage political leaders and activists. She is truly an independent thinker who is more interested in people improving their communities than in them propping up ineffectual Black leaders, young or old----based on out-dated rules about party or race unity. Her thoughts about Hip Hop activism are on the money. It is time that the Hip Hop generation move beyond the rhetoric of political activism to actually implementing the tried and true, long-term organizing and mobilizing strategies that actually helped us to make progress years ago. Registration drives without plans to get folks to the polls are not effective! People who talk about problems but who have no solid plans to solve them are irrelevant! Read "Stand and Deliver," Yvonne Bynoe is definitely a new and important voice that we should pay heed to.
Book Description
In this bold bombshell of a book, Bakari Kitwana argues that hip hop has broken down more racial barriers than any other social development of the past three decades.
Our national conversation about race is ludicrously out of date. Hip hop is the key to understanding how things are changing. In a provocative book that will appeal to hip hoppers both black and white and their parents, Bakari Kitwana deftly teases apart the culture of hip hop to illuminate how race is being lived by young Americans. This topic is ripe, but untried, and there is a plethora of questions that he is the first to articulate.
* Does hip hop belong to black kids?
* What in hip hop appeals to white youth?
* Is hip hop different from rhythm, blues, jazz, and even rock 'n' roll for previous generations?
* How have mass media and consumer culture made hip hop a unique phenomenon?
* What does class have to do with it?
* Can a culture belong to a race in the first place?
How do young Americans think about race, and how has hip hop influenced their perspective?
* Are young Americans achieving Martin Luther King, Jr.'s dream through hip hop?
Kitwana addresses uncomfortable truths about America's level of comfort with black people, challenging preconceived notions of race. With this brave tour de force, Bakari Kitwana takes his place alongside the greatest African American intellectuals of the past decades.
Customer Reviews:
response to lack of culture.......2006-08-13
You're an idiot. It would literally take me 3 days to write about how wrong you are. So instead I'll paraphrase for your simple, narrow mind.
To say that hip hop is all about blaming whitey over a congo beat might be the most ignorant thing I have ever heard. HIP HOP is a culture, RAP is a genre of music. You are referring to RAP, not hip hop. But even then, not all RAP is what you are describing. Also, if it was, what is wrong with blaming Whitey? You mean to tell me that artists shouldn't use music as a medium to spread a message? Was N.W.A wrong for telling the world about the aubsive LAPD in the late 80's/early 90's? Any way, I doubt you actually read the book, and if you did, your mind obviously is incapable of accepting black people outside of some bubble you have put them in. Grow up, wise up and get a clue.
You're an idiot.
Lack of Culture.......2006-07-05
Why do some white kids like hip hop? probably the same reasons why children have tried to shock their parents for ages. Hip hop (what a name)is the product of cultural nihilism, a direct result of the black underclass which seeks to return to the "good old days" of blaming whitey. After all it's whitey who told us are BAD-so Bad we will act.
So there you have it, instead of Black Americans working hard to become successful, many prefer to follow a congo beat while fondling their fake bling-bling while watching underclothed women gyrate their rotund bodies.
Those writers who claim that hip-hop is another culture whites want to steal are delusional at best. When I'm stopped at a stoplight and the car next to me is shaking with a loud bass, all I can think of is: "thank God I lack their culture"!
But let's think about this! Remember the days when the world "culture" actually meant something. If one studies the culture of the Greeks or Romans we see a the long history of a particular society. A history built on art, language, law, philosophy, religion,music, architecture and myth. Hilarious enough, the so-called hiphop culture began with a myth:"the myth that poor latinos and blacks created hiphop out of nothing: (this was a direct quote from a misguided latina at an education conference at UNC.
And the myth continues, according to another site, the author claims that hiphop is instrumental in making social/cultural changes in the larger society.
A recent hiphop conference (pretending to be a political entity) presented the (world),or at least their "hood" with a list of demands, including full reparations for blacks, free education, free health care, all in a beligerant and hostile "gimme" tone.
The angry person who referred to me as an idiot may need to remember the words of the rapper Tony Yayo who raps:" I'm in that brand new range:when I pull up, kid, I turn your brains into red concrete stains." I ask you-and others-is this a culture-or is it verbal poison?
An Original Look at Hip-Hop and Whiteness.......2005-10-13
Why White Kids Love Hip Hop by Bakari Kitwana is a very well-written book which discusses why white kids, even upper-middle class and upper-class ones, love hip hop, specifically its musical component. I believe Bakari Kitwana puts a completely new spin on this question due to his clear enjoyment and understanding of hip-hop. He is able to look at hip-hop with less prejudice than many authors who have attempted to tackle this question. Kitwana uses convincing reasoning, such as whites' decreasing sense of racial privilege, and strong opinions to advance his arguments on why white kids love hip-hop.
I recommend this eloquent book to any hip-hop enthusiasts especially those interested in the question "why do white kids love hip-hop?" Not to say that this book is by any means perfect, Kitwana has his own unique set of prejudices like anyone and he has a tendency to belittle the work of some less hardcore hip-hop fans. Overall it is a wonderful book, a true must-read in my opinion. This is an adult book but it is not terribly long or difficult to read and while it does feature some necessary racial epithets it doesn't uselessly throw around foul language. A great book for the avid hip-hop listener or anyone who has ever wondered just why white kids love hip-hop.
Why Authors Need Copyeditors.......2005-09-30
I think that the issue Kitwana attempts to explore in Why White Kids Love Hip-Hop is interesting. But his approach to taking on this topic was both sloppy and simplistic. It starts in the preface, where he says that the hip-hop generation (which in reality covers two generations) is the first one to grow up without experiencing de facto segregation. I'm sure that White suburbanites in Scarsdale and Orange County would be interested in knowing that there are phantom people of color floating around their communities.
Kitwana also overemphasizes the impact of hip-hop on the emergence of African Americans in popular culture and their impact on young Whites during the 1980s and 1990s. He concentrates so much on Michael Jordan and his first Nike ads with Spike Lee that he forgets about Dr. J, Mean Joe Green, and a host of others that paved the road for Jordan in the first place.
But Kitwana's biggest error is in glossing over the distance between Whites embracing hip-hop culture and Whites living anti-racist, social justice oriented lives. Like John Tuturro's character in Do the Right Thing, there are at least as many Whites who are hip-hop lovers but have as stereotypical an opinion of Blacks and other people of color as Whites who listen to honky-tonk. I don't that everything Kitwana says in Why White Kids Love Hip Hop is incorrect -- his book is just selectively incomplete.
No substance, No evidence, Not much fun.......2005-09-24
*sigh*... I'm always on the lookout for books about hip-hop (as a music form, culture, and generation) as it relates to American culture. More specifically, I'm interested in the social ramifications of the culture as a whole. Thus, when I was given this book by a friend, I was hoping for a good social science read. Unfortunately, I was highly dismayed, finding this particular selection to be a sloppily written manuscript with virtually no empirical evidence anywhere.
For much of this book, the author makes vague statements which are supposed to be evidence (I.E. - "First and foremost among the reasons white kids love hip-hop is the growing sense of alienation from mainstream American life they experienced in the 1980s") but then makes little or no effort to show proof of such theories. This is discouraging.
What makes matters worse is that the author later goes on to dismiss the limited evidence that does exist showing whites are the dominant purchasers of hip-hop albums, and instead of inserting evidence which shows otherwise, he launches into page upon page of bizarre hypothesis' for potential ways blacks might still be the majority purchasers (ironically mentioning bootleg CDs). Ultimately I grew tired of reading his writing which became increasingly less academic.
His "expert" sources are also questionable - while at times he does move towards legitmate figures in the hip-hop community - I felt he vastly stretched for some of the opinions gathered for this book. For instance, I seriously wonder whether it was wise to include a very long section on a 19 year-old white female for who "hip-hop has been mainstream culture" for her entire life. Her priciple credits for being mentioned appear to be that she once dated a black guy, doesn't mind the b-word, and got hooked on hip-hop when she heard "Hypnotize" while developing film. I was not impressed.
If you are looking for an actual intelligent and informed book on hip-hop, please look elsewhere. Reading this, you'll mainly come away with disjointed personal theories of the author, as well as numerous plugs for THE SOURCE magazine.
1/5 Stars
Book Description
In this groundbreaking work of cultural history, Alice Fahs explores a little-known and fascinating side of the Civil War--the outpouring of popular literature inspired by the conflict. From 1861 to 1865, authors and publishers in both the North and the South produced a remarkable variety of war-related compositions, including poems, songs, children's stories, romances, novels, histories, and even humorous pieces. Fahs mines these rich but long-neglected resources to recover the diversity of the war's political and social meanings.
Instead of narrowly portraying the Civil War as a clash between two great, white armies, popular literature offered a wide range of representations of the conflict and helped shape new modes of imagining the relationships of diverse individuals to the nation. Works that explored the war's devastating impact on white women's lives, for example, proclaimed the importance of their experiences on the home front, while popular writings that celebrated black manhood and heroism in the wake of emancipation helped readers begin to envision new roles for blacks in American life.
Recovering a lost world of popular literature, The Imagined Civil War adds immeasurably to our understanding of American life and letters at a pivotal point in our history.
Customer Reviews:
The first comprehensive look at C.W. literature.......2006-05-03
This book brings out the significance of popular culture during war. Aside from the soldiers who fought in both armies, and the politicians who attempted to build their respective nations, the true meaning of the Civil War came from those on the home front. It was these "citizens," of both the North and South, who through war-related literature such as books, newspapers, poems, magazines, and pamphlets, challenged the ideological pose of war. This "imagined war" was meant to bring inspiration or to put events or certain characters into context.
Fahs focuses primarily on the contributions from female writers who composed numerous short stories, poetry, music, letters, and novels in the war. Literature from men is not excluded as the author brings in the influences of Walt Whitman, Oliver Wendell Holmes, and others who contributed mightily to the written aspects of the war. Few military and political materials are presented in this work, and the author generally excludes much of the religious substance found in antebellum literature. Though Fahs incorporates several avenues of African American writings, no publications devoted to emancipation are included in this book.
The depictions of blacks during the war's first two years in the widely known Harpers Weekly and Frank Leslie's was meant as humor but portrayed as degrading. However, after Lincoln's Emancipation these images gave way to illustrations of black manhood and heroism, a point made clear in The Imagined Civil War as "tentative and halting."(13) It emphasized that even though this war represented "black freedom," blacks were still seen as the lesser race, and this further exemplifies the constant changes of the popular images of African Americans. Southern literature remained committed to portraying blacks as satisfied with slavery. This would turn later from a role of subordination to a celebration of Southern heritage that was clearly fictional from the beginning. Not surprisingly, Fahs fails to incorporate much literature written by blacks (especially from females), as not much material was printed during the war. As seen Margaret Creighton's Colors of Courage, remembrance of the soldiers who fought and died for "black freedom" took preference over these people of color in the memory of the war.
Another recurring theme presented is the importance of gender in Civil War literature. Interestingly enough, northern depictions of a mother's emotional sacrifice as the same as men's heroism gave rise to women as "active heroines"-though gender differences still existed. Fahs does illustrate the South as less willing to incorporate women into its literature, because most there failed to see women outside of the home. These portrayals further demonstrate that during wartime women were generally perceived in a different light, but would soon fall back into their domesticated settings once the men returned home.
Also, the changing face of nationalism in Civil War publications further illustrates continuous struggles, even today, of how much support existed for the war effort. Fahs sees a transformation of this phenomenon into one of diversity. Heroic white and black soldiers, women, and children gave way in the postwar years to just white men and Southern white women. This signified the social and cultural realities of war. An incorporation of religious literature would have further explained the nationalistic attitudes of these people.
A glaring omission from this book is the contributions from individual soldiers. Because of their long and frequent stay in camps, these men yearned for literature to keep them occupied. Though Fahs does acknowledge a general feel for newspapers, more insight into particular soldiers' tastes would have explained why periodicals and magazines were a common audience on the war front. Also, but not surprisingly, the author does appear to have a gender bias because much of the literature given was written by women. Though a minor flaw, it would have been slightly better to incorporate more of men's contributions into the "imagined war." Moreover, another minor flaw is the author's ability to over-explain her topics. The introduction of the book was so well written that one could have summarized the book's contents from that section alone. Additionally, the chapters were presented with numerous examples-possibly due to the high volume of material collected-that sort of dragged the reader throughout the book. Finally, even with these minor flaws, Fahs creates the first real collaboration of Civil War literature that will add considerable knowledge to Civil War historians.
Book Description
Sensationalized and reviled as black America's Hell's Angels, The Five Percenters (also known as the Nation of Gods and Earths) began as a cluster of outcasts from the Nation of Islam's Harlem mosque in the 1960s. Led by a man named 'Allah', the Five Percenters originally believed that all black men were gods. From their marginalized beginnings, their history has been charged with drama: the war between Malcolm X and Elijah Muhammad, the Attic prison revolt, Brooklyn turf gangs, the 1980s crack empires and now counting high profile hip-hop stars such as RZA, Rakin and Lord Jamar among their members. With unrivalled insider access to the movement's elders, oral tradition and community literature, Knight reveals the hidden reality behind the myths, rumours and hearsay, and explores the origins and development of this misunderstood community.
Book Description
As a public school teacher, Joe Marshall grew sick and tired of watching his most promising students fall prey to the lure of gangs, drugs, and crime, and end up either dead or in prison. Finding that neither the justice nor school system seemed willing even to try to address the underlying problems--to give the kids the kind of information and assistance they really needed--he leapfrogged right over the system and co-founded the Omega Boys Club, based upon the belief that young people of the inner city want a way out of the life they're in, but just don't know how to get out. Since the club's inception in 1987, with a handful of kids in a community center basement, he and his small army of street soldiers have already helped 600 kids out of gang-banging and drug-dealing, and pushed, tutored, driven and even funded 140 inner-city kids into colleges around the country.
Four years ago, to direct kids at risk to the Boys Club, he started a weekly radio call-in program called "Street Soldiers" that is now broadcast throughout California to an audience of over 200,000. His callers ask tough questions about gangs, drugs, teen pregnancy, and the multiple pressures of life in the inner city today. "Street Soldiers" not only provides callers with a lifeline and listeners with a practical resource for hope, but has repeatedly averted gang warfare and stopped "payback" violence before they occurred.
Street Soldier is the story of Joe Marshall's success and, as virtually the only good news coming out of the inner city today, it is incumbent upon all of us--citizens, parents, legislators, and teachers--to listen. From Marshall's own college days in the turbulent sixties and his early years as an idealistic young teacher, the book moves to the heartbreaking lessons that compelled him to do something. Street Soldier then takes readers through the day-by-day trials and tribulations of his efforts in the `hood, searching for effective ways to convince gun-toting crack dealers and gang members to take pride in their race, take responsibility for their actions, and take charge of their lives. Along the way the book goes inside the minds and lives of a handful of the kids who transform themselves in the mast dramatic way possible--and a few who sadly cannot. In the end, Street Soldier is a call to each of us to help shape the future of this generation at risk, to help our children grow strong--to be street soldiers in our own communities.
Filled with tense confrontations and joyous celebrations, Street Soldier is an uplifting story by and about one man who makes a difference--and the cure his story may well provide for the cancer eating at our nation today.
Customer Reviews:
Easy to follow. Must Read........2006-03-03
Thank you Dr Marshall for writing the story of the Omega Boys Club. I think you have outlined here, very well, how anyone with knowledge, dedication and insight can touch the hearts of our youth!
The Black man is becoming extinct and we, as a nation, are allowing it to happen. Thank you for not tolerating it!
Can you name the risk factors for youth violence?.......1996-12-28
Marshall has succeeded where others before him have failed.
Street Soldiers offers all the "urban reality" stories to get
you out of your comfortable chair, but doesn't simply stop
there. Outlining a clear and concise approach for dealing with
youth violence, Marshall has put forth the solution for
tackling one of our nations hidden epidemics. Whether your
a frontline worker with youth or not, you will find this a must
read book to find out how you can best help stem this incidious
disease impacting all of us.
Average customer rating:
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The Cowboy: Representations of Labor in an American Work Culture
Blake Allmendinger
Manufacturer: Oxford University Press, USA
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Book Description
What are the connections between cattle branding and Christian salvation, between livestock castration and square dancing, between rustling and the making of spurs and horsehair bridles in prison, between children's coloring books and cowboy poetry as it is practiced today? The Cowboy uses literary, historical, folkloric, and pop cultural sources to document ways in which cowboys address religion, gender, economics, and literature. Arguing that cowboys are defined by the work they do, Allmendinger sets out in each chapter to investigate one form of labor (such as branding, castration, or rustling) that cowboys perform in their "work culture." He then looks at early oral poems that cowboys recited around campfires, on trail drives, at roundups, and at home in their bunkhouses, and at later poems, histories and autobiographies written by cowboys--most of which have never before been studied by scholars. He discovers that these texts not only deal with work but with larger concerns, including art, morality, spirituality, and male sexuality. In addition to spotlighting little-known texts, art, and archival sources, The Cowboy examines the works of Twain, Steinbeck, Cather, Norris, Dana, McMurtry, and others, and features more than 60 historic photographs, many of which have not been published until now.
Book Description
Decades before Georgia became the cradle of the modern Civil Rights Movement, generations of its African Americans waged a historic struggle to abolish the institution of slavery. Now Michael Thurmond presents this unique, fascinating story of black Georgia from the early eighteenth century until the end of the Civil War.
Customer Reviews:
New Ground Plowed.......2004-08-30
Thurmond's book argues that Georgia was founded on high moral principle, although all practical arguments for a slave free Georgia, including its role as buffer for Carolina plantations, were used by its founder, Oglethorpe, to "sell" his idea.
Against the assumption that only a slave economy could succeed in the South, Thurmond describes Darien and Ebenezer, successful settlements without slaves. Their residents, unlike those of Savannah (the clamorous malcontents), supported Oglethorpe in his resistance to the change in charter.
"Oglethorpe took particular exception to an assertion by David Hume, the Scottish philosopher, that dark skinned people were genetically inferior to white Europeans and incapable of civilized behavior. `What a historian!' he exclaimed, `He must never have heard of Shishak, the great Sesostris, of Hannibal, or of Tirhaka, king of Ethiopia, whose very name frightened the mighty Assyrian monarch.' "Oglethorpe was certain that if Hume had studied the matter, he would have discovered `that Africa had produced a race of heroes.'", page 41.
Oglethorpe predicted that if slaves were allowed in Georgia, that institution would one day destroy Georgia. He was right, and we've been rebuilding ever since 1865.
"The knowledge of letters even in the lowest degree, is too often supposed to carry with it a sort of qualification for an easy life, and an exemption from a laborious one and the latter being the Negroes lot, they might perhaps bear it with more unwillingness, or seek some desperate means of ridding themselves of it." Henry Melchoir Muhlenger, a Georgia colonist, page 35.
Thurmond goes on to recount the history of education of blacks in Georgia, the statutes on manumission (Slave owners who, in deference to the concept of jubilee in Biblical slavery, or to the fact that often the slaves in question were their own children and the mothers of their children, wished to free their slaves on their death beds were, ultimately, forbidden by state law from doing so, just as slaves were ultimately forbidden to buy their own freedom.), and the history of black soldiers in the Revolution, Spanish Florida, Seminole country, and the Civil War. "If you wish to know hell before your time, go to St. Simons and be hunted ten days by n*****s." A soldier in a Confederate landing party, page 197.
Regarding the question of whether the War Between the States was fought to preserve the union, over states rights, or over slavery, Thurmond quotes a Confederate Colonel "...after slavery was dead, the Confederacy clung to its putrid body and expired with it" Colonel William Oates, page 253. Had white Southerners, in other words, allied with their black brothers, the Confederacy could have been preserved at the expense of slavery; but too many despised negroes more than they loved independence.
Michael Thurmond's Freedom would make an excellent high school and college Georgia history text; there is certainly nothing like it now.
Also recommended: The Clamorous Malcontents, Children of Pride
Books:
- Global Politics in a Changing World: A Reader
- Hammer of the Gods
- History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)
- History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)
- History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)
- History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)
- History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)
- History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)
- History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)
- History: Fiction or Science? (Chronology, No. 1)
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