Love and theft : blackface minstrelsy and the American working class / Eric Lott.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

Blackface and blackness : the minstrel show in American culture -- Love and theft : "racial" production and the social unconscious of blackface -- White kids and no kids at all : working-class culture and languages of race -- The blackening of America : popular culture and national cultures -- "The seeming counterfeit" : early blackface acts, the body, and social contradiction -- "Genuine negro fun" : racial pleasure and class formation in the 1840s -- California gold and European revolution : Stephen Foster and the American 1848 -- Uncle Tomitudes : racial melodrama and modes of production.

Print version record.

For over two centuries, America has celebrated the same African-American culture it attempts to control and repress, and nowhere is this phenomenon more apparent than in the strange practice of blackface performance. Born of extreme racial and class conflicts, the blackface minstrel show appropriated black dialect, music, and dance; at once applauded and lampooned black culture; and, ironically, contributed to a ""blackening of America."" Drawing on recent research in cultural studies and social history, Eric Lott examines the role of the blackface minstrel show in the political struggles of t ...

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