African American Theatre History

  african american theatre history: A History of African American Theatre Errol G. Hill, James V. Hatch, 2003-07-17 Table of contents
  african american theatre history: The Routledge Companion to African American Theatre and Performance Kathy Perkins, Sandra Richards, Renée Alexander Craft, Thomas DeFrantz, 2018-12-07 The Routledge Companion to African American Theatre and Performance is an outstanding collection of specially written essays that charts the emergence, development, and diversity of African American Theatre and Performance—from the nineteenth-century African Grove Theatre to Afrofuturism. Alongside chapters from scholars are contributions from theatre makers, including producers, theatre managers, choreographers, directors, designers, and critics. This ambitious Companion includes: A Timeline of African American theatre and performance. Part I Seeing ourselves onstage explores the important experience of Black theatrical self-representation. Analyses of diverse topics including historical dramas, Broadway musicals, and experimental theatre allow readers to discover expansive articulations of Blackness. Part II Institution building highlights institutions that have nurtured Black people both on stage and behind the scenes. Topics include Historically Black Colleges and Universities (HBCUs), festivals, and black actor training. Part III Theatre and social change surveys key moments when Black people harnessed the power of theatre to affirm community realities and posit new representations for themselves and the nation as a whole. Topics include Du Bois and African Muslims, women of the Black Arts Movement, Afro-Latinx theatre, youth theatre, and operatic sustenance for an Afro future. Part IV Expanding the traditional stage examines Black performance traditions that privilege Black worldviews, sense-making, rituals, and innovation in everyday life. This section explores performances that prefer the space of the kitchen, classroom, club, or field. This book engages a wide audience of scholars, students, and theatre practitioners with its unprecedented breadth. More than anything, these invaluable insights not only offer a window onto the processes of producing work, but also the labour and economic issues that have shaped and enabled African American theatre. Chapter 20 of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.
  african american theatre history: Radical Black Theatre in the New Deal Kate Dossett, 2020-01-29 Between 1935 and 1939, the United States government paid out-of-work artists to write, act, and stage theatre as part of the Federal Theatre Project (FTP), a New Deal job relief program. In segregated Negro Units set up under the FTP, African American artists took on theatre work usually reserved for whites, staged black versions of white classics, and developed radical new dramas. In this fresh history of the FTP Negro Units, Kate Dossett examines what she calls the black performance community—a broad network of actors, dramatists, audiences, critics, and community activists—who made and remade black theatre manuscripts for the Negro Units and other theatre companies from New York to Seattle. Tracing how African American playwrights and troupes developed these manuscripts and how they were then contested, revised, and reinterpreted, Dossett argues that these texts constitute an archive of black agency, and understanding their history allows us to consider black dramas on their own terms. The cultural and intellectual labor of black theatre artists was at the heart of radical politics in 1930s America, and their work became an important battleground in a turbulent decade.
  african american theatre history: The Ground on which I Stand August Wilson, 2001 August Wilson's radical and provocative call to arms.
  african american theatre history: Black Theater, City Life Macelle Mahala, 2022-08-15 Macelle Mahala’s rich study of contemporary African American theater institutions reveals how they reflect and shape the histories and cultural realities of their cities. Arguing that the community in which a play is staged is as important to the work’s meaning as the script or set, Mahala focuses on four cities’ “arts ecologies” to shed new light on the unique relationship between performance and place: Cleveland, home to the oldest continuously operating Black theater in the country; Pittsburgh, birthplace of the legendary playwright August Wilson; San Francisco, a metropolis currently experiencing displacement of its Black population; and Atlanta, a city with forty years of progressive Black leadership and reverse migration. Black Theater, City Life looks at Karamu House Theatre, the August Wilson African American Cultural Center, Pittsburgh Playwrights’ Theatre Company, the Lorraine Hansberry Theatre, the African American Shakespeare Company, the Atlanta Black Theatre Festival, and Kenny Leon’s True Colors Theatre Company to demonstrate how each organization articulates the cultural specificities, sociopolitical realities, and histories of African Americans. These companies have faced challenges that mirror the larger racial and economic disparities in arts funding and social practice in America, while their achievements exemplify such institutions’ vital role in enacting an artistic practice that reflects the cultural backgrounds of their local communities. Timely, significant, and deeply researched, this book spotlights the artistic and civic import of Black theaters in American cities.
  african american theatre history: African American Theatre Samuel A. Hay, 1994-03-25 This book traces the history of African American theatre from its beginnings to the present.
  african american theatre history: African American Performance and Theater History Harry J. Elam, David Krasner, 2001-01-18 African American Performance and Theater History is an anthology of critical writings that explores the intersections of race, theater, and performance in America. Assembled by two esteemed scholars in black theater, Harry J. Elam, Jr. and David Krasner, and composed of essays from acknowledged authorities in the field, this anthology is organized into four sections representative of the ways black theater, drama, and performance interact and enact continual social, cultural, and political dialogues. Ranging from a discussion of dramatic performances of Uncle Tom's Cabin to the Black Art Movement of the 1960s and early 1970s, articles gathered in the first section, Social Protest and the Politics of Representation, discuss the ways in which African American theater and performance have operated as social weapons and tools of protest. The second section of the volume, Cultural Traditions, Cultural Memory and Performance, features, among other essays, Joseph Roach's chronicle of the slave performances at Congo Square in New Orleans and Henry Louis Gates, Jr.'s critique of August Wilson's cultural polemics. Intersections of Race and Gender, the third section, includes analyses of the intersections of race and gender on the minstrel stage, the plight of black female choreographers at the inception of Modern Dance, and contemporary representations of black homosexuality by PomoAfro Homo. Using theories of performance and performativity, articles in the fourth section, African American Performativity and the Performance of Race, probe into the ways blackness and racial identity have been constructed in and through performance. The final section is a round-table assessment of the past and present state of African American Theater and Performance Studies by some of the leading senior scholars in the field--James V. Hatch, Sandra L. Richards, and Margaret B. Wilkerson. Revealing the dynamic relationship between race and theater, this volume illustrates how the social and historical contexts of production critically affect theatrical performances of blackness and their meanings and, at the same time, how African American cultural, social, and political struggles have been profoundly affected by theatrical representations and performances. This one-volume collection is sure to become an important reference for those studying black theater and an engrossing survey for all readers of African American literature.
  african american theatre history: The Escape, Or, A Leap for Freedom William Wells Brown, 2001 A well-known nineteenth-century abolitionist and former slave, William Wells Brown was a prolific writer and lecturer who captivated audiences with readings of his drama The Escape; or, a Leap for Freedom (1858). The first published play by an African American writer, The Escape explored the complexities of American culture at a time when tensions between North and South were about to explode into the Civil War. This new volume presents the first-edition text of Brown's play and features an extensive introduction that establishes the work's continuing significance. The Escape centers on the attempted sexual violation of a slave and involves many characters of mixed race, through which Brown commented on such themes as moral decay, white racism, and black self-determination. Rich in action and faithful in dialect, it raises issues relating not only to race but also to gender by including concepts of black and white masculinity and the culture of southern white and enslaved women. It portrays a world in which slavery provided a convenient means of distinguishing between the white North and the white South, allowing northerners to express moral sentiments without recognizing or addressing the racial prejudice pervasive among whites in both regions. John Ernest's introductory essay balances the play's historical and literary contexts, including information on Brown and his career, as well as on slavery, abolitionism, and sectional politics. It also discusses the legends and realities of the Underground Railroad, examines the role of antebellum performance art--including blackface minstrelsy and stage versions of Uncle Tom's Cabin--in the construction of race and national identity, and provides an introduction to theories of identity as performance. A century and a half after its initial appearance, The Escape remains essential reading for students of African American literature. Ernest's keen analysis of this classic play will enrich readers' appreciation of both the drama itself and the era in which it appeared. The Editor: John Ernest is an associate professor of English at the University of New Hampshire and author of Resistance and Reformation in Nineteenth-Century African-American Literature: Brown, Wilson, Jacobs, Delany, Douglass, and Harper.
  african american theatre history: The Cambridge Companion to African American Theatre Harvey Young, 2023-05-31 This new edition provides an expanded, comprehensive history of African American theatre, from the early nineteenth century to the present day. Including discussions of slave rebellions on the national stage, African Americans on Broadway, the Harlem Renaissance, African American women dramatists, and the New Negro and Black Arts movements, the Companion also features fresh chapters on significant contemporary developments, such as the influence of the Black Lives Matter movement, the mainstream successes of Black Queer Drama and the evolution of African American Dance Theatre. Leading scholars spotlight the producers, directors, playwrights, and actors who have fashioned a more accurate appearance of Black life on stage, revealing the impact of African American theatre both within the United States and around the world. Addressing recent theatre productions in the context of political and cultural change, it invites readers to reflect on where African American theatre is heading in the twenty-first century.
  african american theatre history: Black Theater is Black Life Harvey Young, Queen Meccasia Zabriskie, 2013 A series of interviews with prominet producers, directors, choreographers, designers, dancers, and actors who tell the history of African American culture in Chicago.
  african american theatre history: African American Theater Glenda Dicker/sun, 2013-08-23 Written in a clear, accessible, storytelling style, African American Theater will shine a bright new light on the culture which has historically nurtured and inspired Black Theater. Functioning as an interactive guide for students and teachers, African American Theater takes the reader on a journey to discover how social realities impacted the plays dramatists wrote and produced. The journey begins in 1850 when most African people were enslaved in America. Along the way, cultural milestones such as Reconstruction, the Harlem Renaissance and the Black Freedom Movement are explored. The journey concludes with a discussion of how the past still plays out in the works of contemporary playwrights like August Wilson and Suzan-Lori Parks. African American Theater moves unsung heroes like Robert Abbott and Jo Ann Gibson Robinson to the foreground, but does not neglect the race giants. For actors looking for material to perform, the book offers exercises to create new monologues and scenes. Rich with myths, history and first person accounts by ordinary people telling their extraordinary stories, African American Theater will entertain while it educates.
  african american theatre history: Black Theatre Paul Carter Harrison, Victor Leo Walker Ii, Gus Edwards, 2002-11-08 Generating a new understanding of the past—as well as a vision for the future—this path-breaking volume contains essays written by playwrights, scholars, and critics that analyze African American theatre as it is practiced today.Even as they acknowledge that Black experience is not monolithic, these contributors argue provocatively and persuasively for a Black consciousness that creates a culturally specific theatre. This theatre, rooted in an African mythos, offers ritual rather than realism; it transcends the specifics of social relations, reaching toward revelation. The ritual performance that is intrinsic to Black theatre renews the community; in Paul Carter Harrison's words, it reveals the Form of Things Unknown in a way that binds, cleanses, and heals.
  african american theatre history: White People Do Not Know how to Behave at Entertainments Designed for Ladies & Gentlemen of Colour Marvin Edward McAllister, 2003 McAllister offers a history of black theater pioneer William Brown's career and places his productions within the broader context of U.S. social, political, and cultural history.
  african american theatre history: Women of Distinction Lawson Andrew Scruggs, 1893 Written with a conscious sense of racial pride, a black physician presents biographical sketches of accomplished black women.
  african american theatre history: Historical Dictionary of African American Theater Anthony D. Hill, 2018-11-09 This second edition of Historical Dictionary of African American Theater reflects the rich history and representation of the black aesthetic and the significance of African American theater’s history, fleeting present, and promise to the future. It celebrates nearly 200 years of black theater in the United States and the thousands of black theater artists across the country—identifying representative black theaters, playwrights, plays, actors, directors, and designers and chronicling their contributions to the field from the birth of black theater in 1816 to the present. This second edition of Historical Dictionary of African American Theater, Second Edition contains a chronology, an introduction, appendixes, and an extensive bibliography. The dictionary section has over 700 cross-referenced entries on actors, playwrights, plays, musicals, theatres, -directors, and designers. This book is an excellent resource for students, researchers, and anyone wanting to know and more about African American Theater.
  african american theatre history: Black Patience Julius B. Fleming Jr., 2022-03-29 This book argues that, since transatlantic slavery, patience has been used as a tool of anti-black violence and political exclusion, but shows how during the Civil Rights Movement black artists and activists used theatre to demand freedom now, staging a radical challenge to this deferral of black freedom and citizenship--
  african american theatre history: African American Theater Buildings Eric Ledell Smith, 2011-08-17 African American theater buildings were theaters owned or managed by blacks or whites and serving an African American audience. Nearly 2,000 such theaters, including nickelodeons, vaudeville houses, storefronts, drive-ins, opera houses and neighborhood movie theaters, existed in the 20th century, yet very little has been written about them. In this book the African American theater buildings from 1900 through 1955 are arranged by state, then by city, and then alphabetically under the name by which they were known. The street address, dates of operation, number of seats, architect, whether it was a member of TOBA (Theater Owners Booking Association), type of theater (nickelodeon, vaudeville, musical, drama or picture), alternate name(s), race and name of manager or owner, whether the audience was mixed, and the fate of the theater are given where known. Commentary by theater historians is also provided.
  african american theatre history: Black Acting Methods Sharrell Luckett, Tia M. Shaffer, 2016-10-04 Black Acting Methods seeks to offer alternatives to the Euro-American performance styles that many actors find themselves working with. A wealth of contributions from directors, scholars and actor trainers address afrocentric processes and aesthetics, and interviews with key figures in Black American theatre illuminate their methods. This ground-breaking collection is an essential resource for teachers, students, actors and directors seeking to reclaim, reaffirm or even redefine the role and contributions of Black culture in theatre arts. Chapter 7 of this book is freely available as a downloadable Open Access PDF at http://www.taylorfrancis.com under a Creative Commons Attribution-Non Commercial-No Derivatives (CC-BY-NC-ND) 4.0 license.
  african american theatre history: Theorizing Black Theatre Henry D. Miller, 2014-01-10 The rich history of African-American theatre has often been overlooked, both in theoretical discourse and in practice. This volume seeks a critical engagement with black theatre artists and theorists of the twentieth century. It reveals a comprehensive view of the Art or Propaganda debate that dominated twentieth century African-American dramatic theory. Among others, this text addresses the writings of Langston Hughes, W.E.B. DuBois, Alain Locke, Lorraine Hansberry, Amiri Baraka, Adrienne Kennedy, Sidney Poitier, and August Wilson. Of particular note is the manner in which black theory collides or intersects with canonical theorists, including Aristotle, Keats, Ibsen, Nietzsche, Shaw, and O'Neill.
  african american theatre history: A Beautiful Pageant D. Krasner, 2016-09-27 The Harlem Renaissance was an unprecedented period of vitality in the American Arts. Defined as the years between 1910 and 1927, it was the time when Harlem came alive with theater, drama, sports, dance and politics. Looking at events as diverse as the prizefight between Jack Johnson and Jim 'White Hope' Jeffries, the choreography of Aida Walker and Ethel Waters, the writing of Zora Neale Hurston and the musicals of the period, Krasner paints a vibrant portrait of those years. This was the time when the residents of northern Manhattan were leading their downtown counterparts at the vanguard of artistic ferment while at the same time playing a pivotal role in the evolution of Black nationalism. This is a thrilling piece of work by an author who has been working towards this major opus for years now. It will become a classic that will stay on the American history and theater shelves for years to come.
  african american theatre history: The Theater of Black Americans Errol Hill, 1987 (Applause Books). From the origins of the Negro spiritual and the birth of the Harlem Renaissance to the emergence of a national black theatre movement, The Theatre of Black Americans offers a penetrating look at a black art form that has exploded into an American cultural institution. Among the essays: James Hatch Some African Influences on the Afro-American Theatre; Shelby Steele Notes on Ritual in the New Black Theatre; Sister M. Francesca Thompson OSF The Lafayette Players; Ronald Ross The Role of Blacks in the Federal Theatre.
  african american theatre history: Staging Faith Craig R. Prentiss, 2014 - Lively descriptions... compelling analysis... and careful attention to historical contexts. - Judith Weisenfeld, author of Hollywood Be Thy Name Methodically and brilliantly probes the nuances... One of the most brilliant and engaging studies on African American theater. - David Krasner, author of A Beautiful Pageant
  african american theatre history: Stages of Struggle and Celebration Sandra M. Mayo, Elvin Holt, 2016-01-15 From plantation performances to minstrel shows of the late nineteenth century, the roots of black theatre in Texas reflect the history of a state where black Texans have continually created powerful cultural emblems that defy the clichés of horses, cattle, and bravado. Drawing on troves of archival materials from numerous statewide sources, Stages of Struggle and Celebration captures the important legacies of the dramatic arts in a historical field that has paid most of its attention to black musicians. Setting the stage, the authors retrace the path of the cakewalk and African-inspired dance as forerunners to formalized productions at theaters in the major metropolitan areas. From Houston’s Ensemble and Encore Theaters to the Jubilee in Fort Worth, gospel stage plays of the Black Academy of Arts and Letters in Dallas, as well as San Antonio’s Hornsby Entertainment Theater Company and Renaissance Guild, concluding with ProArts Collective in Austin, Stages of Struggle and Celebration features founding narratives, descriptions of key players and memorable productions, and enlightening discussions of community reception and the business challenges faced by each theatre. The role of drama departments in historically black colleges in training the companies’ founding members is also explored, as is the role the support of national figures such as Tyler Perry plays in ensuring viability. A canon of Texas playwrights completes the tour. The result is a diverse tribute to the artistic legacies that continue to inspire new generations of producers and audiences.
  african american theatre history: American Theatre Theresa Saxon, 2011-10-11 This book provides a brief yet informative evaluation of the variety and complexity of theatrical endeavours in the United States, embracing all epochs of theatre history and situating American theatre as a lively, dynamic and diverse arena.
  african american theatre history: Black Broadway Stewart F. Lane, 2015 The African-American actors and actresses whose names have shone brightly on Broadway marquees earned their place in history not only through hard work, perseverance, and talent, but also because of the legacy left by those who came before them. Like the doors of many professions, those of the theater world were shut to minorities for decades. While the Civil War may have freed the slaves, it was not until the Civil Rights Movement of the 1960s that the playing field began to level. In this remarkable book, theater producer and historian Stewart F. Lane uses words and pictures to capture this tumultuous century and to highlight the rocky road that black actors have travelled to reach recognition on the Great White Way. After the Civil War, the popularity of the minstrel shows grew by leaps and bounds throughout the country. African Americans were portrayed by whites, who would entertain audiences in black face. While the depiction of blacks was highly demeaning, it opened the door to African-American performers, and by the late 1800s, a number of them were playing to full houses. By the 1920s, the Jazz Age was in full swing, allowing black musicians and composers to reach wider audiences. And in the thirties, musicals such as George Gershwin's Porgy and Bess and Eubie Blake's Swing It opened the door a little wider. As the years passed, black performers continued to gain ground. In the 1940s, Broadway productions of Cabin in the Sky, Carmen Jones, and St. Louis Woman enabled African Americans to demonstrate a fuller range of talents, and Paul Robeson reached national prominence in his awarding-winning portrayal of Othello. By the 1950s and '60s, more black actors--including Ruby Dee, Ossie Davis, and Sidney Poitier--had found their voices on stage, and black playwrights and directors had begun to make their marks. Black Broadway provides an entertaining, poignant history of a Broadway of which few are aware. By focusing a spotlight on both performers long forgotten and on those whom we still hold dear, this unique book offers a story well worth telling.
  african american theatre history: Plays of Negro Life Alain Locke, Thomas Montgomery Gregory, Montgomery Gregory, 1927 The drama of negro life is developing primarily because a native American drama is in process of evolution. Thus, although it heralds the awakening of the dormant dramatic gifts of the Negro folk temperament and has meant the phenomenal rise within a decade's span of a Negro drama and a possible Negro Theatre, the significance is if anything more national than racial. For pioneering genius in the development of the native American drama, such as Eugene O'Neill, Ridgley Torrence and Paul Green, now sees and recognizes the dramatically undeveloped potentialities of Negro life and folkways as a promising province of native idioms and source materials in which a developing national drama can find distinctive new themes, characteristic and typical situations, authentic atmosphere. The growing number of successful and representative plays of this type form a valuable and significant contribution to the theatre of today and open intriguing and fascinating possibilities for the theatre of tomorrow-- Introduction.
  african american theatre history: Black Theatre Usa Revised And Expanded Edition, Vol. 2 James V. Hatch, Ted Shine, 1996-03 This revised and expanded Black Theatre USA broadens its collection to fifty-one outstanding plays, enhancing its status as the most authoritative anthology of African American drama with twenty-two new selections. This collection features plays written between 1935 and 1996.
  african american theatre history: A Raisin in the Sun Lorraine Hansberry, 2016-11-01 A Raisin in the Sun reflects Lorraine Hansberry's childhood experiences in segregated Chicago. This electrifying masterpiece has enthralled audiences and has been heaped with critical accolades. The play that changed American theatre forever - The New York Times. Edition Description
  african american theatre history: The Cambridge Companion to the Harlem Renaissance George Hutchinson, 2007-06-14 This 2007 Companion is a comprehensive guide to the key authors and works of the African American literary movement.
  african american theatre history: The Impact of Race Woodie King, 2003 Looks at the evolution of the American black theater movement and includes coverage of the National Black Theatre Festival and the National Black Arts Festival in Atlanta.
  african american theatre history: Purlie , 1971 An African American preacher returns to his hometown to open a church, outwitting a segregationist plantation owner to make it happen.
  african american theatre history: Early Black American Playwrights and Dramatic Writers Bernard L. Peterson Jr., Bernard L. Peterson, 1990 This reference volume addresses an often overlooked area in the history of the American theatre, the contributions of early black playwrights and dramatic writers. At a time when they were denied full participation in many aspects of American life, including the mainstream of the theatre itself, black artists were compiling an impressive record of achievement on the American stage. This book, the most comprehensive on the subject, provides a complete look at these achievements by offering biographical information and a catalog of works for approximately 200 writers, including playwrights, librettists, screenwriters, and radio scriptwriters. From the emergence of black playwrights in the time prior to the Civil War, to the early days of film and radio in this century, the efforts of early black writers are fully documented in this work. The book begins with an author's preface and is followed by an introductory essay that discusses the development of black American playwrights from the antebellum period to World War II. The heart of the book, the biographical directory, is organized alphabetically, with each entry providing highlights of the author's life and career; collected anthologies that include any works; and an annotated chronological list of individual dramatic works, including genre, length, synopses, production history, prizes and awards, and script sources. Three appendixes offer information on other playwrights and their works, additional librettists and descriptions of their shows, and a chronology of dramatic works by genre. A bibliography cites such information sources as reference books and critical studies, dissertations, play anthologies, and newspapers andperiodicals frequently consulted, as well as significant libraries and repositories. The book concludes with title and general indexes and an index to early black theatre organizations.
  african american theatre history: Macbeth in Harlem Clifford Mason, 2020-06-12 2020 George Freedley Memorial Award Special Jury Prize from the Theatre Library Association​ 2021 PROSE Awards Finalist, Music & the Performing Arts In 1936 Orson Welles directed a celebrated all-black production of Macbeth that was hailed as a breakthrough for African Americans in the theater. For over a century, black performers had fought for the right to perform on the American stage, going all the way back to an 1820s Shakespearean troupe that performed Richard III, Othello, and Macbeth, without relying on white patronage. Macbeth in Harlem tells the story of these actors and their fellow black theatrical artists, from the early nineteenth century to the dawn of the civil rights era. For the first time we see how African American performers fought to carve out a space for authentic black voices onstage, at a time when blockbuster plays like Uncle Tom’s Cabin and The Octoroon trafficked in cheap stereotypes. Though the Harlem Renaissance brought an influx of talented black writers and directors to the forefront of the American stage, they still struggled to gain recognition from an indifferent critical press. Above all, Macbeth in Harlem is a testament to black artistry thriving in the face of adversity. It chronicles how even as the endemic racism in American society and its theatrical establishment forced black performers to abase themselves for white audiences’ amusement, African Americans overcame those obstacles to enrich the nation’s theater in countless ways.
  african american theatre history: The Black Circuit Rashida Z. Shaw McMahon, 2020-03-09 The Black Circuit: Race, Performance, and Spectatorship in Black Popular Theatre presents the first book-length study of Chitlin Circuit theatre, the most popular and controversial form of Black theatre to exist outside the purview of Broadway since the 1980s. Through historical and sociological research, Rashida Z. Shaw McMahon links the fraught racial histories in American slave plantations and early African American cuisine to the performance sites of nineteenth-century minstrelsy, early-twentieth-century vaudeville, and mid-twentieth-century gospel musicals. The Black Circuit traces this rise of a Black theatrical popular culture that exemplifies W. E. B. Du Bois’s 1926 parameters of for us, near us, by us, and about us, with critical differences that, McMahon argues, complicate our understanding of performance and spectatorship in African American theatre. McMahon shows how an integrated and evolving network of consumerism, culture, circulation, exchange, ideologies, and meaning making has emerged in the performance environments of Chitlin Circuit theatre that is reflective of the broader influences at play in acts of minority spectatorship. She labels this network the Black Circuit.
  african american theatre history: Dance Theatre of Harlem Judy Tyrus, Paul Novosel, 2021-10-26 2021 NAACP Image Award Nominee This definitive history is a celebration of the first African-American ballet company, from its 1960s origins in a Harlem basement, to the performances, community engagement, and education message of empowerment through the arts for all which the Company continues to carry forward today. Illustrated with hundreds of never before seen photos from the founding during the Civil Rights Movement by Arthur Mitchell and Karel Shook through to today, this visual history tells the story that fueled Dance Theatre of Harlem’s growth into one of the most influential and revolutionary American ballet companies of the last five decades. With exclusive backstage stories from its legendary dancers and staff, and unprecedented access to its archives, Dance Theatre of Harlem is a striking chronicle of the company's amazing history, its fascinating daily workings, and the visionaries who made its legacy. Here you’ll discover how the company’s founders—African-American maestro Arthur Mitchell of George Balanchine’s New York City Ballet, and Nordic-American Karel Shook of The Dutch National Ballet--created timeless works that challenged Eurocentric mainstream ballet head-on—and used new techniques to examine ongoing issues of power, beauty, myth, and the ever-changing definition of art itself. Gaining prominence in the 1970s and 80s with a succession of triumphs—including its spectacular season at the Metropolitan Opera House—the company also gained fans and supporters that included Nelson Mandela, Stevie Wonder, Cicely Tyson, Misty Copeland, Jessye Norman, and six American presidents. Dance Theatre of Harlem details this momentous era as well as the company's difficult years, its impressive recovery as it partnered with new media's most brilliant creators—and, in the wake of its 50th anniversary, amid a global pandemic, its evolution into a worldwide virtual performance space. Alive with stunning photographs, including many from the legendary Marbeth, this incomparable book is a must-have for any lover of dance, art, culture, or history.
  african american theatre history: The Civil Rights Theatre Movement in New York, 1939–1966 Julie Burrell, 2019-03-27 This book argues that African American theatre in the twentieth century represented a cultural front of the civil rights movement. Highlighting the frequently ignored decades of the 1940s and 1950s, Burrell documents a radical cohort of theatre artists who became critical players in the fight for civil rights both onstage and offstage, between the Popular Front and the Black Arts Movement periods. The Civil Rights Theatre Movement recovers knowledge of little-known groups like the Negro Playwrights Company and reconsiders Broadway hits including Lorraine Hansberry’s A Raisin in the Sun, showing how theatre artists staged radically innovative performances that protested Jim Crow and U.S. imperialism amidst a repressive Cold War atmosphere. By conceiving of class and gender as intertwining aspects of racism, this book reveals how civil rights theatre artists challenged audiences to reimagine the fundamental character of American democracy.
  african american theatre history: Zooman and the Sign Charles Fuller, 1982 'Zooman is black teen in Philadelphia who senselessly terrorizes his community wit hour regard to race. His most recent crime is killing a 12 year-old girl on a street filled with witnesses, all of who are afraid to talk.The dead girl's father posts a sign accusing the entire community of cowardice in the face of the ever escalating violence. -- Cover [p. 4].
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  african american theatre history: Living with Lynching Koritha Mitchell, 2011-10-01 Living with Lynching: African American Lynching Plays, Performance, and Citizenship, 1890–1930 demonstrates that popular lynching plays were mechanisms through which African American communities survived actual and photographic mob violence. Often available in periodicals, lynching plays were read aloud or acted out by black church members, schoolchildren, and families. Koritha Mitchell shows that African Americans performed and read the scripts in community settings to certify to each other that lynching victims were not the isolated brutes that dominant discourses made them out to be. Instead, the play scripts often described victims as honorable heads of households being torn from model domestic units by white violence. In closely analyzing the political and spiritual uses of black theatre during the Progressive Era, Mitchell demonstrates that audiences were shown affective ties in black families, a subject often erased in mainstream images of African Americans. Examining lynching plays as archival texts that embody and reflect broad networks of sociocultural activism and exchange in the lives of black Americans, Mitchell finds that audiences were rehearsing and improvising new ways of enduring in the face of widespread racial terrorism. Images of the black soldier, lawyer, mother, and wife helped readers assure each other that they were upstanding individuals who deserved the right to participate in national culture and politics. These powerful community coping efforts helped African Americans band together and withstand the nation's rejection of them as viable citizens. The Left of Black interview with author Koritha Mitchell begins at 14:00. An interview with Koritha Mitchell at The Ohio Channel.
  african american theatre history: The African Company Presents Richard III Carlyle Brown, 1994 THE STORY: Earning their bread with satires of white high society, the African Company came to be known for debunking the sacred status of the English classics (which many politically and racially motivated critics said were beyond the scope of bla
A Review of Dramatic Movement of African American Women: …
Book Review: Dramatic Review of African American Women the Black Theatre Review, Volume 3, Issue 1, July 2024 93 Herode's passion for this subject matter shines through on every page, making this book a must-read for anyone seeking a deeper understanding of African American theatre and Black women playwrights.

Ancient Kemet in African American Literature and Criticism, 1853 …
African history is also a key element that infuses African American literary content and timelines with a continuity of African ideas in creative production. African American literature is a testament of how people of African descent have and continue to translate the culture’s identity, experiences, communal aspirations, challenges, and

ABSTRACT Title of Dissertation: THE PHENOMENOLOGY OF …
they remain an undeniable part of American puppet -theatre history. This curious invention of mid -nineteenth -century English Punch and Judy shows appeared in American puppet plays for nearly three quarters of a century . An African puppet had been a regular feature of Punch shows since at least the mid -1700s. This

THE SHAPING OF SOUTH AFRICAN THEATRE: AN OVERVIEW OF …
The history of much of South African theatre, even today, is a performance one, rather than a literary one, though colonial thinking has long sought to canonise the printed text. While the discussion to follow will of necessity focus on the “available” texts and their authors,

Staging the "Native": Making History in American Theatre Culture, 1828-1838
A Review Essay," Studies in American Indian Literature 2:1 (Winter 1987): 1-16; and Don B. Wilmeth, "Noble or Ruthless Savage? The American Indian Onstage in the Drama," Journal of American Drama and Theatre 1:2 (Spring 1989): 39-78, and "Tentative Checklist of Indian Plays (1606-1987)," Journal of American Drama and Theatre 1:3 (Fall 1989): 34-54.

SYLLABUS S - pvamu.edu
1 SYLLABUS DRAM 2322-African-American Theatre-19445-P01 Fall 2022 Course Information Description Instructor: YharNahKeeShah “Ýa-Ya” Smith Section # and CRN: P02 and 19445 Office Location: 2J283 Office Phone: 936-261-3308 Email Address: ytsmith@pvamu.edu (best way to contact me) Office Hours: By appointment only via Zoom Mode of Instruction: In Person

THE 3231: Spring 2022 African-American Theatre History and …
Af. Am. Theatre– Spring 2022 Page 1 University of Florida - College of the Arts - School of Theatre and Dance THE 3231: Spring 2022 African-American Theatre History and Practice Class Meeting Time - MWF Per. 7 (1:55 - 2:45) / CON 0219 Dr. Mikell Pinkney / Office: 222 McGuire Pavilion / 273-0512 / mpinkney@arts.ufl.edu

Anti-Lynch Plays by African American Women: - JSTOR
American theatre history.3 (In her 1984 book Exorcising Blackness, Trud-ier Harris examines the impact of lynching on the work of African American writers, but she deals pre-dominately with short stories, novels, and essays.) Although anti-lynch plays were written over a period of more than a century by both African American men and women and ...

THE 3231: Section 24962 / Fall 2022 African-American Theatre History ...
Af. Am. Theatre– Fall 2022 / Page 1 University of Florida - College of the Arts - School of Theatre and Dance THE 3231: Section 24962 / Fall 2022 African-American Theatre History and Practice Class Meeting Time - MWF Per. 6 (12:50 - 1:40) / CON 0219 Dr. Mikell Pinkney / Office: 222 McGuire Pavilion / 273-0512 / mpinkney@arts.ufl.edu

AMERICAN THEATRE - api.pageplace.de
American drama more thoroughly, a more expansive, albeitaxiomatic, definition of American theatre has come into operation: the staging of plays and performances in the playhouses of the American nation. The preface to The American Stage (Engle and Miller), for example, explains its focus on the ‘250 year history’ of American theatre, dating

Performative Inter-Actions in African Theatre 1
Contemporary African-American Drama: Trends in Diaspora Performance D ONALD M ... explore its relevance for African theatre and performance. However, in doing this, we hope to move on from the debates around the term “performativity”, to …

THE ROUTLEDGE COMPANION TO AFRICAN AMERICAN THEATRE …
AFRICAN AMERICAN THEATRE AND PERFORMANCE The Routledge Companion to African American Theatre and Performance is an outstanding collection of specially written essays that charts the emergence, development, and diversity of African American Theatre and Performance—from the nineteenth-century African Grove Theatre to Afrofuturism.

Ancient Kemet in African American Literature and Criticism, 1853 …
African history is also a key element that infuses African American literary content and timelines with a continuity of African ideas in creative production. African American literature is a testament of how people of African descent have and continue to translate the culture’s identity, experiences, communal aspirations, challenges, and

Signifyin(g) on African-American Theatre: 'The Colored Museum…
of African-American theatre. In his recent study on African-American literary theory, The Signifying Monkey, Henry Louis Gates argues that African-American literature is 1 Jack Kroll, "Theater: Zapping Black Stereotypes," Newsweek (17 November 1986): 85. 2 George Wolfe, quoted in Jeremy Gerard, "'Colored Museum' is Author's Exorcism," New York

GRADE 11 NOVEMBER 2018 DRAMATIC ARTS - SA EXAMS
SECTION B: SOUTH AFRICAN THEATRE This section is COMPULSORY. QUESTION 2: SOUTH AFRICAN THEATRE 2.1 Name the South African play and playwright that you have studied this year. (2) 2.2 Name and describe the type of theatre space that would be the most suitable for the South African play you have studied this year. (4)

Course Syllabus African American Music - Prairie View A&M …
African American Music . Department of Music and Theatre College of Arts and Sciences Instructor Name: Dr. William F. McQueen III Office Location: 1G 159 Hobart Taylor Hall Office Phone: 936-261-3330 Fax: 936-857-4415 Email Address: www.wfmcqueen@pvamu.edu Snail Mail (U.S. Postal Service) Address:

TBE Study Guide FINAL - Penumbra Theatre
at Penumbra Theatre and experience the variety of lenses through which African Americans view and engage with the world. In its 41-year history, Penumbra Theatre has produced 37 premieres of new work by African American artists. THE MISSION Penumbra Theatre creates professional productions that are artistically excellent, thought

© 2018 Penumbra Theatre Company
15 Sep 1976 · at Penumbra Theatre and experience the variety of lenses through which African Americans view and engage with the world. In its 41-year history, Penumbra Theatre has produced 37 premieres of new work by African American artists. THE MISSION Penumbra Theatre creates professional productions that are artistically excellent, thought

1 Introduction: Canonising an African Theory of Theatre
use in African theatre and serve in addressing ideological issues related to agency, perspective, re-righting history. Afroscenology lls that lacuna by extending its tenets to the eld of theatre and performance studies. It provides a system of thought and practice to guide performance, playwrighting, dancing, 2

African American Student Theatre Organization Involvement and …
the history of the African American characters as a woman of color. Even as a child, I was interested in African American literature, playwrights, history and performance. ... learning about African American theatre artists whom I had never heard of, as I was experiencing the work of a new playwright every class period. As much as I was

THe CAmBRidge ComPANioN To AfRiCAN AmeRiCAN THeATRe
1. African American theater–History. 2. American drama–African American authors– History and criticism. 3. African Americans in the performing arts. i. young, Harvey, 1975– pn2270.a35c36 2012 792.089′96073–dc23 2012018843 isbn 978-1 …

THE CAMBRIDGE HISTORY OF AFRICAN AMERICAN LITERATURE
3 . The emergence of an African American literary canon, 1760–1820 52 vincent carretta 4 . Dividing a nation, uniting a people: African American literature and the abolitionist movement 66 stefan m. wheelock 5 . African American literature and the abolitionist movement, 1845 to the Civil War 91 john ernest v

The Routledge Companion to African American Theatre and …
African American Theatre and Performance Edited by Kathy A. Perkins, Sandra L. Richards, Renée Alexander Craft , and Thomas F. DeFrantz First published 2009 ISBN 13: 978-1-138-72671-0 (hbk) ISBN 13: 978-1-315-19122-5 (ebk) Chapter 20 Being Black on Stage and Screen Black actor training before Black Power and the rise of Stanislavski’s system

Early African American Women Playwrights (1916-1930) and the …
3 Cf. esp. the respective sections in Samuel A. Hay, African American Theatre : A Historical and Critical Analysis (Cambridge, UK: Cambridge UP, 1994); Casper LeRoy Jordan, A ... the history of a truly African American drama begins with Willis Richardson's The Chip Woman's Fortune (1923), "the first serious play by a black writer to appear on ...

2021 AFRICAN AMERICAN BOOKLIST
D. Hill’s essay provides an historical overview of African American theatre. Dr. Hill is professor emeritus of drama in the Department of Theatre at The Ohio State University. His academic work has been in the areas of African American and American theatre history, and also in performance theory and criticism.

Theatre (THTR) - catalog.uark.edu
THTR 44603. African American Theatre History -- 1950 to Present. 3 Hours. A chronological examination of African-American theatre history from 1950 to the present through the study of African-American plays and political/social conditions. Upon completion of this course the student should be familiar with the major works

Africana Studies (AFST)
Sports as a paradigm of the African-American experience. The forms of racism and the periodic significant social advances of the African-American community in the U.S. will be examined from the vantage point of African-American sports. Attention will also be paid to the continuing impact of sports on African-American culture. Sports heroes ...

The Refusal of Motherhood in African American Women's …
in African American Women's Theater Joyce Meier University of Michigan, Ann Arbor As Darlene Hine and Kate Wittenstein show in their recent study of slavery, African American slave women practiced sexual abstinence, abortion, and infanticide as strategies of resistance, exemplifying their refusal to participate in and help perpetuate a

Article In Dahomey in England: A (negative) transatlantic …
The first all-black American musical comedy on Broadway, In Dahomey (1902-1905), has made a name for itself in America’s theatre annals and in the history of black American performance. Although critics have written about the relevance of the show in America, investigations into this turn-of-the-century performance wider in its

Pipeline - Penumbra Theatre
In its 43-year history, Penumbra Theatre has produced 37 premieres of new work by African American artists. The Mission Penumbra Theatre creates professional productions that are artistically excellent, thought provoking, and relevant and illuminates the human condition through the prism of the African American experience.

Slavery and Sentiment on the American Stage, 1787 1861
CAMBRIDGE STUDIES IN AMERICAN THEATRE AND DRAMA General Editor DON B. WILMETH, Brown University Advisory Board C.W.E. BIGSBY, University of East Anglia C. LEE JENNER, Independent critic and dramaturge BRUCE A. McCONACHIE, University of Pittsburgh BRENDA MURPHY, University of Connecticut LAURENCE SENELICK, Tufts University The …

AA frican American Theatre: A Historical and Critical
sionary reading of African American theatre history, and something of a jeremiad. What drives Hay is a commit-ment "to improve prospects for the further long-term health of the theatre" (1). The health of African American theatre is ailing, Hay tells us, badly-and one could easi-ly include in this diagnosis all kinds of theatres in America.

AFRO - African American Studies - University of Illinois Urbana …
Survey of African American music, from its origins to the present with a focus on understanding details of musical performance and the ways in which music interacts with its social and political context.

The Routledge Companion to African American Theatre and …
African American Theatre and Performance Edited by Kathy A. Perkins, Sandra L. Richards, Renée Alexander Craft , and Thomas F. DeFrantz First published 2009 ISBN 13: 978-1-138-72671-0 (hbk) ISBN 13: 978-1-315-19122-5 (ebk) Chapter 20 Being Black on Stage and Screen Black actor training before Black Power and the rise of Stanislavski’s system

UNDERSTANDING AUGUST WILSON: AS AN AFRICAN AMERICAN …
LangLit AAAAn International Peern International Peer----Reviewed Open Reviewed Open AAAAccess Journalccess Journal Vol. 2 Issue 4 418 May, 2016 Website: www.langlit.org Contact No.: +91-9890290602

The Present State of Black Theatre - JSTOR
theatre artists and critics refined and articulated the aesthetic for this emerging theatre movement.2 The movement's proponents viewed the theatre as an instrument to further the cause of Black Power within the African American community. They rejected Western standards in favor of those reflecting a black nationalist perspective.

African American Theatre History - netsec.csuci.edu
African American theatre history is a testament to the enduring spirit of a people. It's a story of resilience, cultural richness, and the profound impact of art on social change. From the early struggles to the vibrant contemporary scene, African American theatre has consistently defied

“Imaginative Collaboration”: Pedagogical Issues in African-American …
African American Theatre History with a discussion of West African-based performance practices, I have to acknowledge the ways in which those prac-tices have been shaped by an array of cultural influences. And if my teaching strategies are to mirror the performance practices discussed in the class, my

SYLLABUS - Prairie View A&M University
1 SYLLABUS DRAM 2223-African-American Theatre 11435-Fall 2018 1 Wednesday-12:00-2:00 PM, or by appointment Instructor: YharNahKeeShah *Ya-Ya* Smith Section # and CRN: P01-11435 Office Location: Hobart Taylor 2J283 Office Phone: (936) 261-3308 Email Address: ytsmith@pvamu.edu (best way to communicate) Office Hours: Tuesday/Thursday 1:00-1230 …

CARIBBEAN THEATRE: A POST COLONIAL STORY
or American thriller, whose title and ... French colonial masters, a landmark event in Caribbean history. My anticipation of becoming a student at the College was heightened by the thought of being in an environment where such a ... made Caribbean theatre history by being co‐founder of the St Lucia Arts Guild, whose aim was precisely the ...

African American Studies - Prairie View A&M University
HIST 4213 African American History I and HIST 4223 African American History II are required courses. (18 Credits) CAREER OPTIONS A F R I C A N A M E R I C A N S T U D I E S @ P V A M U With a strong foundation in the social sciences and ... DRAM 2223 African American Theatre II HIST 3223 Women in History HDFM 2533 The Contemporary Family in ...

The Routledge Companion to African American Theatre and Performance …
African American Theatre and Performance Edited by Kathy A. Perkins, Sandra L. Richards, Renée Alexander Craft , and Thomas F. DeFrantz First published 2009 ISBN 13: 978-1-138-72671-0 (hbk) ISBN 13: 978-1-315-19122-5 (ebk) Chapter 20 Being Black on Stage and Screen Black actor training before Black Power and the rise of Stanislavski’s system

My Old Kentucky Home: Black History in the Bluegrass State
African American history. Following this approach in writing and researching African Ameri can history, I placed black people and their perspectives at the center of their own history, and asked what did the history of Louisville, and Kentucky, look like …

Staging Race in Nineteenth-Century America - JSTOR
the intersection of the American theatre from, the colonial to facksonian eras with the politics of American nationalism. He is the author of Performing Patriotism: National Identity in the Colonial and Revolutionary American Theater (2007), which was …

THE EVOLUTION OF AMERICAN MUSICAL THEATRE.
THE EVOLUTION OF AMERICAN MUSICAL THEATRE. 9 Chapter 2: The Evolution of American Musical Theatre. The following chapter gives an introduction to musical history through the decades and chronobiologicly moves from the 1900s and ends till the 2000s. 2.1. The 1900s and 1920s: ‘‘The Glorious Decades of Broadway and the First World War''.

AFAM 101-01: Introduction to African American ... - Georgetown …
To understand key moments in African American history Course Requirements and Evaluation Criteria Class participation and activities: 15 points To earn all points, your participation in class discussions and activities must be brilliant and sustained. Remember that you may also discuss on our Blackboard site as well.

African American Studies Minor - Texas Southern University
HIST 430 Topics In History HIST 447 Mod African-American Hist HIST 478 Slavery HIST 481 Topics In African Hist MUSI 235 African American Women in Music: 1865-Present ... SOC 335 Ethnic Groups In Society POLS 412 Civil Rights THEA 4362 African American Theatre Courses used to fulfill minor requirements in African American Studies cannot be ...

Geography of the Harlem Renaissance - JSTOR
David Krasner is Director of Undergraduate Theater Studies at Yale University, where he teaches theatre history, acting, and directing. His hook, Resistance, Parody, and Double Consciousness in African American Theatre, 1895-1910 (St. Martin's, 1997), received the 1998 Errol Hill Award from the American Society for Theatre Research.

African American Performers in Stalinâ•Žs Soviet Union: Between ...
African American performers in the Stalinist theatre as a field does not have a large body of secondary sources with which to consult. T he framework for this project weaves together political and aesthetic theories from both African American and Soviet sources that are based in historiographic readings of the period. This projec t builds on Paul