The Creolization of American Culture: William Sidney Mount and the Roots of Blackface Minstrelsy

Contents

Contents preface ix acknowledgments xv 1 Recovering the Creole Synthesis: The Roots of Blackface Minstrelsy 1 2 The Creole Synthesis in the New World: Cultures in Contact 28 3 Long Island and the Lower East Side: Mount’s Background, Youth, and Apprenticeships 79 4 Minstrelsy’s Material Culture: The Evidence of Mount’s Portraiture 122 5 Melody’s Polyrhythmic Polysemic Possibilities: The Bodily Evidence of Mount’s Music 148 6 Akimbo Culture: Dance and the Participatory Pleasures of the Body 173 Conclusion: The Creole Synthesis in American Culture 210 Appendix: Blackface Scholarship 217 notes 235 index 299 Illustrations follow page 124. ...