{"id":8822,"date":"2010-09-10T21:11:24","date_gmt":"2010-09-10T21:11:24","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/www.mixedracestudies.org\/wordpress\/?p=8822"},"modified":"2017-02-01T18:34:00","modified_gmt":"2017-02-01T18:34:00","slug":"searching-for-the-authentic-red-black-self-depictions-of-african-native-subjectivity-in-literature-visual-art-and-film","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/?p=8822","title":{"rendered":"Searching for the authentic Red-Black self: Depictions of African-Native subjectivity in literature, visual art, and film"},"content":{"rendered":"

Searching for the authentic Red-Black self: Depictions of African-Native subjectivity in literature, visual art, and film<\/a><\/em><\/strong><\/p>\n

University of California, Berkeley
\n2005
\n235 pages
\nAAT 3186996
\nISBN: 9780542292071<\/p>\n

Sarita Nyasha Cannon<\/a><\/strong>, Associate Professor of English
\nSan Francisco State University<\/em><\/p>\n

In this dissertation, I explore representations of a largely invisible multiracial group: people of Native American and African-American descent.<\/strong> Relying upon the two theoretical frameworks of cultural studies and multiculturalism outlined in Chapter 1, I analyze texts from various genres in order to understand the construction of Black-Red subjectivity. In Chapter 2, I examine the 1848 slave narrative\/native autobiography The Life of Dr. Okah Tubbee<\/a><\/em>. Written by a mulatto<\/a> who passed<\/a> as the son of a Choctaw<\/a> chief in order to escape the slavery, this text exemplifies the performative possibilities of autobiography as well as Tubbee’s simultaneous rejection of Blackness and embrace of stereotypical ideas of Indian-ness. In Chapter 3, I look at another figure that straddles African American and Native American cultures, the fictional character of Rayona in Michael Dorris’<\/a> 1988 novel A Yellow Raft in Blue Water<\/em>. Like Tubbee, Rayona negotiates various identities. However, rather than being a somewhat tragic trickster figure who rejects Blackness as Tubbee does, Rayona is able to embrace her multiple subject positions in a variety of contexts. In Chapter 4, I focus on visual representations of African-Native Americans in the sculpture of African-Chippewa<\/a> artist Edmonia Lewis<\/a> and in the portraits of African-Choctaw photographer Valena Broussard Dismukes<\/a>. I argue that despite Lewis’ familiarity with Native culture, she deploys stereotypes about American Indians in an attempt to gain a mainstream audience. Dismukes, on the other hand, creates portraits of contemporary Black Indians who can express their mixed heritage on their own terms. Finally, in Chapter 5, I explore two contemporary documentary films that reflect two opposite narratives of the history of Black-Native subjectivity. Steven Rich Heape’s<\/a> film Black Indians<\/a> <\/em>celebrates people with African-Native heritage and elevates them to a special status. On the other hand, Long Lance<\/em>, a documentary about a mixed-race man’s rejection of the one-drop rule<\/a> and his fabrication of various Native American identities, emphasizes the tragic nature of “passing<\/a>.” Implicit within my exploration of these cultural representations of Black Indians is the elusive quest for racial or cultural “authenticity,” a problematic goal that often unconsciously panders to an essentialized notion of identity. In their attempts to render authentic images of Blacks, Native Americans, and Black-Native Americans, these authors and artists often reinscribe stereotypes about these groups and thus reinforce the very racial and social hierarchies they intend to question.<\/p>\n

Purchase the dissertation here<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

Searching for the authentic Red-Black self: Depictions of African-Native subjectivity in literature, visual art, and film University of California, Berkeley 2005 235 pages AAT 3186996 ISBN: 9780542292071 Sarita Nyasha Cannon, Associate Professor of English San Francisco State University In this dissertation, I explore representations of a largely invisible multiracial group: people of Native American and […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1649,838,459,1196,8,3015,6940,20],"tags":[3798,1986,3797,3802,3801,3799,3800],"class_list":["post-8822","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-anthropology","category-dissertations","category-history","category-literary-criticism","category-media-archive","category-native-americans","category-slavery","category-usa","tag-edmonia-lewis","tag-sarita-cannon","tag-sarita-nyasha-cannon","tag-steven-heape","tag-steven-rich-heape","tag-valena-broussard-dismukes","tag-valena-dismukes"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8822","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=8822"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8822\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":51366,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/8822\/revisions\/51366"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=8822"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=8822"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mixedracestudies.org\/wp\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=8822"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}