The Famous Lady Lovers : Black Women and Queer Desire Before Stonewall / Cookie Woolner.

Format:

Book

Author/Creator:

Woolner, Cookie, author.

Series:

Gender and American law.

Gender and American Culture Series

Language:

English

Subjects (All):

African American lesbians--Social life and customs--20th century.

African American lesbians.

Sexual minority culture--United States.

Sexual minority culture.

Physical Description:

1 online resource (210 pages): illustrations ;

Edition:

First edition.

Place of Publication:

Chapel Hill, North Carolina : The University of North Carolina Press, [2023]

Summary:

"Black queer women have shaped American culture since long before the era of gay liberation. Decades prior to the Stonewall Uprising, in the 1920s and 1930s, Black 'lady lovers'-as women who loved women were then called-crafted a queer world. In the cabarets, rent parties, speakeasies, literary salons, and universities of the Jazz Age and Great Depression, communities of Black lady lovers grew, and queer flirtations flourished. Cookie Woolner here uncovers the intimate lives of performers, writers, and educators such as Bessie Smith, Ethel Waters, Gladys Bentley, Alice Dunbar-Nelson, and Lucy Diggs Slowe, along with the many everyday women she encountered in the archives. Examining blues songs, Black newspapers, vice reports, memoirs, sexology case studies, and more, Woolner illuminates the unconventional lives Black lady lovers formed to suit their desires. In the urban North, as the Great Migration gave rise to increasingly racially mixed cities, Black lady lovers fashioned and participated in emerging sexual subcultures. During this time, Black queer women came to represent anxieties about the deterioration of the heteronormative family. Negotiating shifting notions of sexuality and respectability, Black lady lovers strategically established queer networks, built careers, created families, and were vital cultural contributors to the US interwar era"-- Provided by publisher.

Contents:

Cover

Half Title

Series Page

Title Page

Copyright Page

Dedication

Contents

List of Illustrations

INTRODUCTION. Have We a New Sex Problem Here?

ONE. Woman Slain in Queer Love Brawl: The Violent Emergence of Lady Lovers in the 1920s Northern Black Press

TWO. The Famous Lady Lovers in the Early Twentieth-Century Black Popular Entertainment Industry

THREE. A Freakish Party: Black Lady Lovers, Vice, and Space in the Prohibition Era Urban North

FOUR. Intimate Friends and Bosom Companions: Middle-Class Black Lady Lovers Crafting Queer Kinship Networks

CONCLUSION

Acknowledgments

Notes

Bibliography

Index.

Notes:

Description based on print version record.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN:

9798890861924

9798890861931

9781469675497

1469675498

9781469675503

1469675501

OCLC:

1397555785