Conjugal Union - The Body, the House, and the Black American

Zusatztext Reid-Pharr, by contrast, takes pains to 'belabor' his points, resulting in a much more succint, and ultimately more satisfying piece of scholarship. Klappentext In Conjugal Union! Robert F. Reid-Pharr argues that during the antebellum period a community of free black northeastern intellectuals sought to establish the stability of a Black American subjectivity by figuring the black body as the necessary antecedent to any intelligible Black American public presence. Reid-Pharr goes on to argue that the fact of the black body's constant and often spectacular display demonstrates an incredible uncertainty as to that body's status. Thus antebellum black intellectuals were always anxious about how a stable relationship between the black community might be maintained. Paying particular attention to Black American novels written before the Civil War! the author shows how the household was utilized by these writers to normalize this relationship of body to community such that a person could enter a household as a white and leave it as a black. Zusammenfassung In his new book, Robert Reid-Pharr argues that black gender and sexuality have always played a crucial role in questions of black national identity. He identifies the origins of a "national" African American literature in the founding of the Black press in 1827 and the beginnings of a novelistic tradition in the antebellum period. Reid-Pharr shows how state conventions, churches, newspapers, and novels -- predominantly aimed at Northeastern Black communities -- were integral in shaping the ideal of the black family.

Product details

• Authors: Robert Reid-Pharr, Robert F. Reid-Pharr, Robert F. (Assistant Professor of English and Director of the Program in Comparative American Cultures Reid-Pharr
• Publisher: Oxford University Press
• Languages: English
• Product format: Hardback
• Released: 01.06.1999
• EAN: 9780195104028
• ISBN: 978-0-19-510402-8
• No. of pages: 178
• Series: Race and American Culture; Race and American Culture
• Subjects: Humanities, art, music > Linguistics and literary studies > General and comparative literary studies; USA, Ethnic Studies, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Sociology / Marriage & Family, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Gender Studies, LITERARY CRITICISM / American / General, Sociology: family & relationships, United States of America, USA, Literary studies: general, Gender studies, gender groups, Sociology: family and relationships, Black & Asian Studies, SOCIAL SCIENCE / Cultural & Ethnic Studies / General, LITERARY CRITICISM / Subjects & Themes / Gender Identity