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The showman and the slave : race, death, and memory in Barnum's America / Benjamin Reiss.
- Format:
- Book
- Author/Creator:
- Reiss, Benjamin.
- Language:
- English
- Subjects (All):
- Barnum, P. T. (Phineas Taylor), 1810-1891.
- Barnum, P. T.
- Heth, Joice, -1836.
- Heth, Joice.
- Popular culture--United States--History--19th century.
- Popular culture.
- Enslaved women--United States--Biography.
- Enslaved women.
- Freak shows--Social aspects--United States--History--19th century.
- Freak shows.
- White people--Race identity--United States.
- White people.
- African Americans in popular culture--History--19th century.
- African Americans in popular culture.
- Racism in popular culture--United States--History--19th century.
- Racism in popular culture.
- Death in popular culture--United States--History--19th century.
- Death in popular culture.
- Northeastern States--Race relations.
- Northeastern States.
- Physical Description:
- 1 online resource (280 p.)
- Edition:
- 1st Harvard University Press pbk. ed.
- Place of Publication:
- Cambridge, Mass. : Harvard University Press, 2010.
- Language Note:
- English
- Summary:
- Reiss uses P. T. Barnum's Joice Heth hoax to examine the contours of race relations in the antebellum North. Barnum's first exhibit as a showman, Heth was an elderly enslaved woman said to be the 161-year-old former nurse of the infant George Washington. Seizing upon the novelty, the newly emerging commercial press turned her act--and especially her death--into one of the first media spectacles in American history.
- Contents:
- Frontmatter
- CONTENTS
- FIGURES
- AckrunvZedgments
- Introduction: The Dark Subject
- 1. DEATH AND DYING
- 1. Possession
- 2. The Celebrated Curiosity
- 3. Private Acts, Public Memories
- 4. Sacred and Profane
- 5. Culture Wars
- 6. Love, Automata, and India Rubber
- 7. Spectacle
- II. RESURRECTION
- 8. Authenticity and Commodity
- 9. Exposure and Mastery
- 10. Erasure
- III. LIFE
- 11. A Speculative Biography
- Note to the 2010 Printing
- Notes
- Index
- Notes:
- Bibliographic Level Mode of Issuance: Monograph
- Includes bibliographical references (p. [227]-259) and index.
- ISBN:
- 9780674042650
- 0674042654
- OCLC:
- 648279053
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