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Becoming Belafonte : Black Artist, Public Radical / Judith E. Smith.

By: Material type: TextTextSeries: Discovering AmericaPublisher: Austin : University of Texas Press, [2021]Copyright date: ©2014Description: 1 online resource (368 p.)Content type:
Media type:
Carrier type:
ISBN:
  • 9780292767331
Subject(s): DDC classification:
  • 782.42164092 23
Other classification:
  • online - DeGruyter
Online resources:
Contents:
Frontmatter -- CONTENTS -- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS -- INTRODUCTION -- 1. FROM HARLEM, JAMAICA, AND THE SEGREGATED NAVY TO NEW YORK CITY’S INTERRACIAL LEFT-WING CULTURE, 1927– 1948 -- 2. BLACK LEFT, WHITE STAGE, COLD WAR: Moving into the Spotlight, 1949– 1954 -- 3. MULTIMEDIA STARDOM AND THE STRUGGLE FOR RACIAL EQUALITY, 1955– 1960 -- 4. STORMING THE GATES: Producing Film and Television, 1957– 1970 -- AFTERWORD -- ABBREVIATIONS FOR NOTES -- NOTES -- INDEX
Summary: A son of poor Jamaican immigrants who grew up in Depression-era Harlem, Harry Belafonte became the first black performer to gain artistic control over the representation of African Americans in commercial television and film. Forging connections with an astonishing array of consequential players on the American scene in the decades following World War II—from Paul Robeson to Ed Sullivan, John Kennedy to Stokely Carmichael—Belafonte established his place in American culture as a hugely popular singer, matinee idol, internationalist, and champion of civil rights, black pride, and black power. In Becoming Belafonte, Judith E. Smith presents the first full-length interpretive study of this multitalented artist. She sets Belafonte’s compelling story within a history of American race relations, black theater and film history, McCarthy-era hysteria, and the challenges of introducing multifaceted black culture in a moment of expanding media possibilities and constrained political expression. Smith traces Belafonte’s roots in the radical politics of the 1940s, his careful negotiation of the complex challenges of the Cold War 1950s, and his full flowering as a civil rights advocate and internationally acclaimed performer in the 1960s. In Smith’s account, Belafonte emerges as a relentless activist, a questing intellectual, and a tireless organizer. From his first national successes as a singer of Calypso-inflected songs to the dedication he brought to producing challenging material on television and film regardless of its commercial potential, Belafonte stands as a singular figure in American cultural history—a performer who never shied away from the dangerous crossroads where art and politics meet.
Holdings
Item type Current library Call number URL Status Notes Barcode
eBook eBook Biblioteca "Angelicum" Pont. Univ. S.Tommaso d'Aquino Nuvola online online - DeGruyter (Browse shelf(Opens below)) Online access Not for loan (Accesso limitato) Accesso per gli utenti autorizzati / Access for authorized users (dgr)9780292767331

Frontmatter -- CONTENTS -- ACKNOWLEDGMENTS -- INTRODUCTION -- 1. FROM HARLEM, JAMAICA, AND THE SEGREGATED NAVY TO NEW YORK CITY’S INTERRACIAL LEFT-WING CULTURE, 1927– 1948 -- 2. BLACK LEFT, WHITE STAGE, COLD WAR: Moving into the Spotlight, 1949– 1954 -- 3. MULTIMEDIA STARDOM AND THE STRUGGLE FOR RACIAL EQUALITY, 1955– 1960 -- 4. STORMING THE GATES: Producing Film and Television, 1957– 1970 -- AFTERWORD -- ABBREVIATIONS FOR NOTES -- NOTES -- INDEX

restricted access online access with authorization star

http://purl.org/coar/access_right/c_16ec

A son of poor Jamaican immigrants who grew up in Depression-era Harlem, Harry Belafonte became the first black performer to gain artistic control over the representation of African Americans in commercial television and film. Forging connections with an astonishing array of consequential players on the American scene in the decades following World War II—from Paul Robeson to Ed Sullivan, John Kennedy to Stokely Carmichael—Belafonte established his place in American culture as a hugely popular singer, matinee idol, internationalist, and champion of civil rights, black pride, and black power. In Becoming Belafonte, Judith E. Smith presents the first full-length interpretive study of this multitalented artist. She sets Belafonte’s compelling story within a history of American race relations, black theater and film history, McCarthy-era hysteria, and the challenges of introducing multifaceted black culture in a moment of expanding media possibilities and constrained political expression. Smith traces Belafonte’s roots in the radical politics of the 1940s, his careful negotiation of the complex challenges of the Cold War 1950s, and his full flowering as a civil rights advocate and internationally acclaimed performer in the 1960s. In Smith’s account, Belafonte emerges as a relentless activist, a questing intellectual, and a tireless organizer. From his first national successes as a singer of Calypso-inflected songs to the dedication he brought to producing challenging material on television and film regardless of its commercial potential, Belafonte stands as a singular figure in American cultural history—a performer who never shied away from the dangerous crossroads where art and politics meet.

Mode of access: Internet via World Wide Web.

In English.

Description based on online resource; title from PDF title page (publisher's Web site, viewed 26. Apr 2022)