“What Is It”? Containing the Threat of the Black Male Body in American Popular Culture

Ward, Jonathan D T (2016) “What Is It”? Containing the Threat of the Black Male Body in American Popular Culture. Doctoral thesis, University of East Anglia.

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Abstract

This thesis takes a critical look at the representation of the black male body in American popular culture throughout the twentieth century, intending to examine the meanings ascribed to this body and analyze the ways that these meanings are communicated to the consumers of these cultural productions. The focus will be on visual examples of popular cultural productions, with the intention of examining representations of the black male body in film, photography, and television, and the viewer. In looking at these cultural texts, the thesis will seek to examine the relationship between visual text and spectator, in terms of how these contribute to understandings of black masculinity. Because of the impact of cultural productions upon conceptions of the world, the self, and the relationship between the two, this thesis will seek to develop an understanding of the way that black masculinity is depicted visually, and what the implications of this are for American culture.

Item Type: Thesis (Doctoral)
Faculty \ School: Faculty of Arts and Humanities > School of American Studies (former - to 2014)
Depositing User: Jackie Webb
Date Deposited: 07 Oct 2016 14:09
Last Modified: 30 Jun 2019 00:38
URI: https://ueaeprints.uea.ac.uk/id/eprint/60782
DOI:

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