Browsing by Subject "Johnson, James Weldon, 1871-1938 -- Criticism and interpretation"
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- ItemAn Exploration of Racial Identity and Performance in The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man(2017) Bowles, Jamauri; Solomon, AsaliThe Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man was published at the start of the 20th century, and the story’s setting is the post-Reconstruction era in the United States. The novel focuses on racial identity, but it also prominently features the theme of performance. This paper will investigate how performance creates a disruption in how the main character of the book looks at his racial identity, and how he attempts to re-establish his understanding of it and the comfort that it affords him, to no avail. It will also look at how the main character’s life experiences illuminate ideas of double-consciousness and passing. In this paper, the presence of performance in the novel will be explored through the main character’s relationships with his parents, his interactions with music, and locations and travels to different cities. By the conclusion of this paper, it will be seen that performance illustrates both subtle and obvious ways to see how blackness is marginalized in society, and that the main character’s feelings of alienation and isolation, which arise from his struggle with his racial identity, indicate a perceived inferiority of blackness to whiteness in America.
- ItemMusical Narrative in James Weldon Johnson's The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man(2014) Weissman, Benjamin; Stadler, GustavusJames Weldon Johnson's "The Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man" divulges the fictional life-story of a bi-racial man living in United States at the end of the 19th century. The narrator, the ex-colored man, describes his life to be structured according to aurally and musically inflected events. The musical junctures of the narrator's life are marked with references to specific musical works and/or to their respective composers: a waltz by Chopin, Ludwig von Beethoven's Sonata in C minor, Op. 13, "Pathétique," Valentin’s aria, "Avant de quitter ces lieux," from Charles Gounod's Faust, Frederic Chopin's Nocturne in C minor, Op.48, No.1, and a ragtime arrangement of Felix Mendelssohn's "Wedding March." In this essay, I examine the ways in which the protagonist's exploration of European and African American music mirrors his search for identity. The narrator becomes a talented pianist through his exposure to and aptitude for African American musical expression and European musical technique. In his childhood, the narrator's mother shares with him the passionate music of her African American heritage. He begins piano lessons in his adolescence, versing him in the classical European technique and repertoire. It is his musical skill in each of these traditions that enables him to succeed as a performer, excelling at both emotive expression and technical skill. Ultimately, in failing to produce a meaningful musical coalescence between these traditions, the narrator fails to coalesce his blackness and his whiteness. Instead, he passes as white, "ex-colored," through the final musical reference in his narrative: his performance of Chopin's Nocturne in C minor, Op.48, No.1.
- ItemMusical Politics: The political and social significance of African-American folk music in The Autobiography of an Ex-Coloured Man(2011) Mirarchi, Alexander; Benston, Kimberly W.