Review
Real Folks: Race and Genre in the Great Depression
Journal of the African Literature Association, Vol.8(1), p169
01 Oct 2013
Abstract
(55), the author uses the absurd notion of a black man disguised as a white man using his knowledge of whites to speak authoritatively to racist white men about the innate nobility, purity and superiority of the race to expound on her reading that the folk image-usually white and male- is one predicated on a series of cultural prompts and artificial rhetorical and behavioral constructs. Retman also notes that Schuyler's machine is commentary both on the many beauty products aimed at African-Americans that, arguably, were pushing for a more Caucasian look (lightning creams, hair straighteners, etc.) as well as the implication of Fordian mass production innovations on the spread of those products. Retman begins this section by articulating tourism's role in shaping the definition of the folk saying, "The Florida guide sold prospective visitors a particular relation to the 'other,' in this case an array of folk types who occupied the nostalgic temporality of 'the last frontier,' free from the homogenizing influence of mass culture yet somehow visible and accessible to the modern automobile traveler" (117). [...]both Hurston's experiences as ethnographer and the folklore she gathers are just something to sell.
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Details
- Title
- Real Folks: Race and Genre in the Great Depression
- Creators
- Vincent Williams
- Publication Details
- Journal of the African Literature Association, Vol.8(1), p169
- Publisher
- Taylor & Francis Ltd; Geneva
- Resource Type
- Review
- Language
- English
- Academic Unit
- English and Philosophy; Africana Studies
- Identifiers
- 991021875495604721