African American Arts

SHARRELL D. LUCKETT is director of the Helen Weinberger Center for Drama and Playwriting and an assistant professor of drama and performance studies at the University of Cincinnati. She is the founding director of the Black Acting Methods Studio, a training program in performance theory and practice.

This collection explores the role of African American arts in shaping the future, and further informing new directions we might take in honoring and protecting the success of African Americans in the U.S. The essays engage readers in critical conversations by activists, scholars, and artists reflecting on national and transnational legacies of African-American activism as an element of artistic practice, particularly as they concern artistic expression and race relations, and the intersections of creative processes with economic, sociological, and psychological inequalities.

List of Illustrations                    Visual Foreword: Carrie Mae Weems   Series Editor Foreword: Carmen Gillespie   Introduction: African American Arts in Action Sharrell D. Luckett  Bodies of Activism Chapter 1: Trans Identity as Embodied Afrofuturism  Amber Johnson                          Chapter 2: Designing Our Freedom: Toward a New Discourse of Fashion as a Strategy for Self Liberation   Rikki Byrd   Chapter 3: Pearl Primus' Choreo-Activism: 1943-1949   Doria E. Charlson     Chapter 4: Performing New Nationalism/Performing a Living Culture: Josefina Báez’s "Dominicanish"   Florencia V. Cornet     Chapter 5: Ethnicity, Ethicalness, Excellence: Armond White’s All-American Humanism Daniel McNeil   Chapter 6: Race and History on the Operatic Stage: Caterina Jarboro Sings Aida  Lucy Caplan  Music & Visual Art as Activism Chapter  7: “I Am Basquiat”: Tracing Jean-Michel Basquiat's Alterity and Activism in Paint and Performance  Genevieve Hyacinthe             Chapter 8: “I Luh God”: Erica Campbell, Trap Gospel and the Moral Mask of Language Discrimination  Sammantha McCalla   Chapter 9: The Hidden Code of the Kongo Cosmogram in African American Art and Culture Nettrice R. Gaskins    Chapter 10: From Baldwin to Beyoncé: Exploring the Responsibility of the Artist in Society--- Re-envisioning the Black Female Sonic Artist as Citizen   Abby Dobson   Chapter 11: Slaying “Formation”: A Queering of Black Radical Tradition J. Michael Kinsey   Institutions of Activism Chapter 12: Centering Blackness Through Performance in Every 28 Hours Shondrika Moss-Bouldin   Chapter 13: Dancing for Justice Philadelphia: Embodiment, Dance, and Social Change  Julie B. Johnson   Chapter 14: A Conversation with Freddie Hendricks of the Freddie Hendricks Youth Ensemble of Atlanta Sharrell D. Luckett   Chapter 15: The Conciliation Project as a Social Experiment: Behind the Mask of Uncle Tomism and the Performance of Blackness Jasmine Coles & Tawnya Pettiford-Wates    Afterword: Blackballin'   A play by Rickerby Hinds   Acknowledgments Index About the Contributors