Uncle : race, nostalgia, and the politics of loyalty / Cheryl Thompson.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Thompson, Cheryl, 1977- author.

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

African Americans in popular culture.

African Americans in mass media.

African Americans--Social conditions.

African Americans.

Stereotypes (Social psychology).

Uncle Tom (Fictitious character).

Uncle Tom.

Stowe, Harriet Beecher, 1811-1896. Uncle Tom's cabin.

Stowe, Harriet Beecher.

Uncle Tom's cabin (Stowe, Harriet Beecher).

Physical Description:

271 pages : illustrations ; 22 cm

Place of Publication:

Toronto : Coach House Books, [2021]

Summary:

"Jackie Robinson, President Barack Obama, Supreme Court Justice Clarence Thomas, O. J. Simpson, and Christopher Darden have all been accused of being an Uncle Tom during their careers. How, why, and with what consequences for our society did Uncle Tom morph first into a servile old man and then into a racial epithet hurled at African American men deemed, by other Black people, to have betrayed their race? Uncle Tom, the eponymous figure in Harriet Beecher Stowe's sentimental anti-slavery novel, Uncle Tom's Cabin, was a loyal Christian who died a martyr's death. But soon after the best-selling novel appeared, theatre troupes across North America and Europe transformed Stowe's story into minstrel shows featuring white men in blackface. In Uncle, Cheryl Thompson traces Tom's journey from literary character to racial trope. She exposes the relentless reworking of Uncle Tom into a nostalgic, racial metaphor with the power to shape how we see Black men, a distortion visible in everything from Uncle Ben and Rastus the Cream of Wheat chef to the first interracial dance partners in Hollywood, Shirley Temple and Bill 'Bojangles' Robinson. In a post-truth North America, where nostalgia is used as a political tool to rewrite history, Uncle makes the case for why understanding the production of racial stereotypes matters more than ever before."-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Machine generated contents note: 1. Uncle Tom's Cabin

2. Uncle Tom And Eva

3. Minstrel Show Tom

4. Vaudeville Tom

5. Aunt Jemima In Chicago

6. Rastus

7. The Reconstruction Of Uncle Tom

8. Sambo And Uncle Remus

9. Sleeping Car Porters And Uncle Ben

10. Topsy-Turvy Dolls And Shirley Temple

11. Uncle Tom On The Big Screen

12. Amos `N' Andy

13. Song Of The South And Uncle Remus's Return

14. Uncle Tom's 1960S Transformation

15. Harry Belafonte And Sidney Poitier

16. The Anti-Tom

17. Good Times' Coonfoolery

18. Uncle Tom And Black Capitalism

19. The 1980S, Bill Cosby, And Smokescreen Toms

20. A Politically Correct Uncle Tom And An In-Your-Face Topsy

21. Advertising Black Buddies

22. Uncle Ben And Aunt Jemima 2.0

23. Oj. Simpson, A Passing Uncle

24. Barack Obama And The Paradox Of Black Political Power.

Notes:

Includes bibliographical references.

Other Format:

Online version: Thompson, Cheryl, 1977- Uncle.

ISBN:

9781552454107

155245410X

OCLC:

1120096035

Publisher Number:

99986767666