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Behind the Burnt Cork Mask: Early Blackface Minstrelsy and Antebellum American
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Behind the Burnt Cork Mask: Early Blackface Minstrelsy and Antebellum American Popular Culture Paperback - 1998

by William J. Mahar


From the publisher

The songs, dances, jokes, parodies, spoofs, and skits of blackface groups such as the Virginia Minstrels and Buckley's Serenaders became wildly popular in antebellum America. Drawing on an unprecedented archival study of playbills, newspapers, sketches, monologues, and music, William J. Mahar explores the racist practices of minstrel entertainers and considers their performances as troubled representations of ethnicity, class, gender, and culture in the nineteenth century.

Mahar investigates the relationships between blackface comedy and other Western genres and traditions; between the music of minstrel shows and its European sources; and between "popular" and "elite" constructions of culture. Locating minstrel performances within their complex sites of production, Mahar reassesses the historiography of the field.

First line

Blackface minstrelsy was "the national art of its moment ... the soundtrack for the American 1848."

From the rear cover

Blackface conventions both criticized the changes occurring in antebellum American life and helped shape images of race, gender, and class. Through the songs, dances, jokes, parodies, spoofs, and skits of blackface, white performers could satirize majority values without directly attacking them. Burnt cork served as a masking device for these entertainers, shielding them from any direct personal identification with the material they were performing.

Behind the Burnt Cork Mask reassesses relationships between blackface comedy and other genres and traditions of Western theater; between the music of minstrel shows and its European sources; between blackface performance and socially constructed identities; and between "popular" and "elite" culture.

Details

  • Title Behind the Burnt Cork Mask: Early Blackface Minstrelsy and Antebellum American Popular Culture
  • Author William J. Mahar
  • Binding Paperback
  • Edition First Edition; F
  • Pages 472
  • Volumes 1
  • Language ENG
  • Publisher University of Illinois Press
  • Date December 1, 1998
  • Illustrated Yes
  • Features Illustrated
  • ISBN 9780252066962 / 0252066960
  • Weight 1.37 lbs (0.62 kg)
  • Dimensions 8.91 x 6 x 1.01 in (22.63 x 15.24 x 2.57 cm)
  • Themes
    • Chronological Period: 19th Century
    • Chronological Period: 1800-1850
  • Library of Congress subjects Popular culture - United States - History -, Minstrel shows - United States
  • Library of Congress Catalog Number 97-3351
  • Dewey Decimal Code 791.120

Media reviews

Citations

  • Library Journal, 01/01/1999, Page 0

About the author

William J. Mahar (d. 2018) was a professor of music at Penn State Harrisburg.
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Behind the Burnt Cork Mask : Early Blackface Minstrelsy and Antebellum American Popular Culture
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Behind the Burnt Cork Mask : Early Blackface Minstrelsy and Antebellum American Popular Culture

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Behind the Burnt Cork Mask: Early Blackface Minstrelsy and Antebellum American Popular Culture

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Behind the Burnt Cork Mask: Early Blackface Minstrelsy and Antebellum American Popular Culture

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Urbana, IL: University of Illinois Press, 1999. First Edition. Softcover. Near Fine. 444pp; Covers clean & bright, text unmarked, binding is tight, Near Fine condition. Study of relationships between blackface comedy and other genres and traditions of Western theater. Illustrated.
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Behind the Burnt Cork Mask : Early Blackface Minstrelsy and Antebellum American Popular Culture
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Behind the Burnt Cork Mask : Early Blackface Minstrelsy and Antebellum American Popular Culture

by Mahar, William J

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Behind the Burnt Cork Mask: Early Blackface Minstrelsy and Antebellum American Popular Culture (Music in American Life)

by William J. Mahar

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Behind the Burnt Cork Mask Early Blackface Minstrelsy and Antebellum American Popular Culture

by Mahar, William J.

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Paperback / softback. New. Promises to redefine the study of blackface minstrelsy, charting new directions for future inquiries by scholars in American studies, popular culture, and musicology
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Behind the Burnt Cork Mask – Early Blackface Minstrelsy and Antebellum American Popular Culture
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Behind the Burnt Cork Mask – Early Blackface Minstrelsy and Antebellum American Popular Culture

by Mahar, William J.

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Behind the Burnt Cork Mask: Early Blackface Minstrelsy and Antebellum American Popular Culture...
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Behind the Burnt Cork Mask: Early Blackface Minstrelsy and Antebellum American Popular Culture (Music in American Life)

by William J. Mahar

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ISBN 10 / ISBN 13
9780252066962 / 0252066960
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