Mixed Race Studies

Women and Mixed Race Representation in Film: Eight Star Profiles

McFarland
2021-09-10
302 pages
54 photos, notes, bibliography, index
7 x 10
Softcover ISBN: 978-1-4766-6338-8
eBook ISBN: 978-1-4766-4473-8

Valerie C. Gilbert
Seattle, Washington

This book uses a black/white interracial lens to examine the lives and careers of eight prominent American-born actresses from the silent age through the studio era, New Hollywood, and into the present century: Josephine Baker, Nina Mae McKinney, Fredi Washington, Lena Horne, Dorothy Dandridge, Lonette McKee, Jennifer Beals and Halle Berry. Combining biography with detailed film readings, the author fleshes out the tragic mulatto stereotype, while at the same time exploring concepts and themes such as racial identity, the one-drop rule, passing, skin color, transracial adoption, interracial romance, and more. With a wealth of background information, this study also places these actresses in historical context, providing insight into the construction of race, both onscreen and off.

Table of Contents

• Preface
• Introduction
• 1. Josephine Baker: From Exotic Savage to Creole Queen
• 2. Nina Mae McKinney: Dichotomy of a Hollywood Black Woman
• 3. Fredi Washington: Paradox of Black Identity
• 4. Lena Horne: Separate and Unequalled
• 5. Dorothy Dandridge: ­Star-Crossed Crossover Star
• 6. Lonette McKee: Mixed Race Heroine Remix
• 7. Jennifer Beals: White But Not Quite
• 8. Halle Berry: Imitation of Dorothy Dandridge
• Chapter Notes
• Bibliography
• Screen Title Index
• Subject Index

Lena Horne Honored With A Stamp From the United States Postal Service

WBGO Journal
WBGO 88.3 FM
Newark, New Jersey
2018-01-30

Ang Santos

Lena Horne Hulton Archive/Getty Images

Lena Horne is remembered as an all-around entertainer, Hollywood actress, Grammy Award winning singer, and a Tony Award winning Broadway star. But equally important to her legacy was a willingness to use fame as a platform to promote Civil Rights in the 1960s.

Horne’s daughter Gail Lumet Buckley believes her mother would be proud to be put alongside the other members of the USPS Black Heritage Stamp Series.

Stamp photographer Christian Steiner, Horne’s daughter Gail Lumet Buckley (with family members), USPS Deputy Postmaster General Ronald Stroman, and WBGO President Amy Niles shared personal memories and stories during the Lena Horne stamp unveiling. Credit Ang Santos / WBGO

Read the entire article here. Listen to the story (00:02:57) here.

Knowledge Session: Who Was Lena Horne?

I Am Hip-Hop
2015-07-07

Rishma Dhaliwal

Lena Horne (June 30, 1917 – May 9, 2010) was born in Brook­lyn, New York, on June 30, 1917. Her father, Edwin “Teddy” Horne, who worked in the gambling trade, left the fam­ily when Lena was three. Her mother, Edna, was an act­ress with an African Amer­ican theater troupe and traveled extens­ively. Horne was mainly raised by her grand­par­ents, Cora Cal­houn and Edwin Horne. Yet, she still moved a great deal in her early years because her mother often took her with her on the road. They lived in vari­ous parts of the South before Horne was returned to her grand­par­ents’ home in 1931. After they died, Horne lived with a friend of her mother’s, Laura Rol­lock. Shortly there­after Edna remar­ried and Horne moved in with her mother and her mother’s new hus­band. The con­stant mov­ing res­ul­ted in Lena hav­ing an edu­ca­tion that was often inter­rup­ted. She atten­ded vari­ous small-town, segreg­ated (sep­ar­ated by race) school’s when in the South with her mother. In Brook­lyn she atten­ded the Eth­ical Cul­tural School, the Girls High School, and a sec­ret­arial school…

Read the entire article here.

The Black Calhouns: From Civil War to Civil Rights with One African American Family

Atlantic Monthly Press
February 2016
336 pages
Cloth ISBN: 978-0-8021-2454-8

Gail Lumet Buckley

Gail Lumet Buckley tells the story of her dynamic family during the most crucial century in African American history

In The Black Calhouns, Gail Lumet Buckley—daughter of actress Lena Horne—delves deep into her family history, detailing the experiences of an extraordinary African American family from Civil War to Civil Rights. Beginning with her great-great grandfather Moses Calhoun, a house slave who used the rare advantage of his education to become a successful businessman in postwar Atlanta, Buckley follows her family’s two branches: one that stayed in the South, and the other that settled in Brooklyn. Through the lens of her relatives’ momentous lives, Buckley examines major events throughout American history. From Atlanta during Reconstruction and the rise of Jim Crow, from the two World Wars to New York City during the Harlem Renaissance and then the Civil Rights Movement, this ambitious, brilliant family witnessed and participated in the most crucial events of the nineteenth and twentieth centuries. Combining personal and national history, The Black Calhouns is a vibrant portrait of six generations during dynamic times of struggle and triumph.

Who’s Black, Who’s Not, and Who Cares?

Uptown Magazine
2011-11-02

Yaba Blay, Assistant Professor of Africana Studies
Drexel University, Philadelphia, Pennsylvania

“What are you?” It’s a question I have never been asked. I am Black. Period. The color of my skin is reflective of my Ghanaian ancestry and by its dark tone, everyone I encounter knows exactly what I am. Although I have lived most of my life acutely aware of the disadvantages assigned my complexion, it is not until recently, when I began to encounter people who identify as Black but don’t necessarily “look Black,” that I began to realize some of the privileges my dark skin carries; the most profound of which is its ability to unambiguously communicate my identity, not only to other people, but to other Black people. They know I am Black. I can rest assured that when someone in the room is talking about Black people, they realize that they are talking about my people. I also know that if I say “we” when talking about Black people, no one looks at me like I’m crazy, no one laughs at me as if I am somehow confused about my identity, and no one takes offense because they suspect I am somehow perpetrating a fraud. My Black is that Black that everyone knows is Black for a fact…

…On the one hand, we may reject our lighter skinned sisters and brothers because of their multiracial-ness, whether actual – “You’re mixed, you’re not Black” – or assumed – “You’re so light, you must be mixed.” But then on the other hand, most of us would concede that the large majority of Black people, particularly African Americans, are of mixed heritage. So, which one is it?

How did we get here? When did we abandon our cultural and political understandings of Blackness for more phenotypical ones? And do such narrow constructions of Blackness ultimately benefit us as community? Where would we be as a community if we had relied on skin color to determine Blackness a hundred years ago? No W.E.B. DuBois. No Mary Church Terrell. No Malcolm X. No Lena Horne. No Arturo Schomburg. And let’s understand the implications if we continue to use skin color as a gauge of racial identity – in essence, Herman Cain would be more Black than Ben Jealous….

Read the entire article here.

Dr Blay’s latest project “(1)ne Drop: Conversations on Skin Color, Race and Identity” seeks to challenge narrow, yet popular perceptions of what “Blackness” is and what “Blackness” looks like. To learn more about the project, visit 1nedrop.com.