Week 10 - Who Can Write African American Theatre? Thomas Gibbons's Bee-Luther-Hatchee

This week, we are exploring notions of racial and cultural authenticity as explored in the play Bee-Luther-Hatchee by Thomas Gibbons. As the second non-African American playwright we have discussed in the course, Gibbons joins many white American writers who have written extensively on African American life and race relations in the United States in both positive and negative ways. Some of these writer's works have re-inscribed racial stereotypes and denigrated black subjects, while other have attempted to present the self-determination of African Americans.
In what ways do you think the race of the playwright does/does not impact his ability to write African American characters and their experiences in a believable fashion? Do you read the work as more/less "authentic" because of his racial identification? As you blog on authenticity this week, think broadly what it means to "authentically" represent racial and cultural experiences. Is this possible? For discussion, you may consider ways you can issues of authenticity to fictional representations of African American life in American popular culture such as television, film, music, etc.

Week 9 - Why African American Theater Matters/August Wilson's Fences

This week we read Fences by August Wilson and the playwrights polemic speech "The Ground on Which I Stand." As you think about how the notion of Africa is translated into the work of Wilson, consider how the aftermath of slavery becomes a link to the African past of African Americans. How, if at all, do you see references to Africa in Wilson's work? Are they obvious or masked? How does the past, and its recollection, in Fences suggest links to the history of slavery and African culture? Why does African American Theater matter to Wilson? Why does it matter to you?

Week 8-Colored Contradictions: The Colored Museum- Midterm reflection

This week we completed our midterm exam which was an opportunity for you to stretch out and explore what your thoughts are on African American Theatre thus far. We read The Colored Museum by George C. Wolfe which is a meditation on the variosu representations of African American life by black playwrights and performers from slavery to the the contemporary moment. Written in 1985, the play presented a compelling cultural critique of many African American playwrights we have read to date, including Lorraine Hansberry,Charles Fuller, Amiri Baraka and Ntozake Shange. Wolfe critiques the work of these playwrights within a broader analysis of African American cultural production in the aftermath of slavery. As you blog about racial stereotypes in African American Theatre, consider how African American writers and performers manipulate these recognizable characters in both positive and negative ways. What social contradictions do you find? How do class and gender complicate the manipulation of these stereotypes?

Week 7- Brothers, Sisters, Mothers, Fathers: Ntozake Shange's For Colored Girls and Lynn Nottage's Crumbs from the Table of Joy

This week we explore the black family in African American Theater, specifically focusing on the role of women and their multiple roles. As we explore the terms Negro, Colored, Black, Afro-American and African American, and their relationship to the black family, how do these terms define the limits of what roles are available to women? How are women's roles over time reflected in the ways that black people in the United States identify themselves as "black"? Shange's For Colored Girls explores the multiple roles of black women as sisters, mothers, lovers, friends. The play takes place in the 1970s as black women began to assert themselves as feminists and create their own perceptions of black female identity. In Nottage's Crumbs, we see African American women in the 1950s defining themselves both in and outside the family home in realtionship to black men and socially prescribed roles for women. Both plays address the ways that black women define themselves in relationship to dominant society and black men.
As you blog this week, link your ideas about the play to the shifting definitions of blackness reflected in the terms Negro, Colored, Black, Afro-American and African American. How does the historical time period assigned to these terms shape possibilities for black women to self-define?

Week 6- Disrupting the Black-White Binary / Adrienne Kennedy's Funnyhouse of a Negro

This week, we continue our examination of plays influenced by the avant-garde that have shaped African American Theater. As you blog on the key term for this week, racial passing, see if you can identify the ways that Kennedy disrupts and/or reinforces the hierarchies between blackness and whiteness. Some questions that may prompt you to write are:
How does the playwright suggest relationships of power between the'selves' of Negro Sarah? What examples in the play does Negro Sarah give for wanting to be white?
How is her performance of blackness shaped by her hatred for all things "black"? What themes in this play are similar to other playwrights who experiment with the avant-garde such as Baraka and Genet?

Week 5- The Black Theater and the Avant-garde...Jean Genet's The Blacks

This week we are reading Jean Genet's The Blacks: A Clown Show. The play, written by a French playwright, became a seminal work in African American Theater because of its complex themes, avant-garde structure and searing look at complex issues of power, race and corruption.

As you blog about the idea of "performing blackness," think about what examples from the play you can use in your response that challenge your perceptions of what blackness "is" or how it can be expressed in performance. The following questions may be prompts that help you develop your entry about performing blackness this week:

How do the characters perform blackness in the play? Genet is not writing about African American experiences specifically, but black experiences of colonialism.

Are Genet's thought provoking ideas about blackness different and/or similar to those expressed by African American playwrights?

Can you tell that Genet is not a black writer?

How does the author challenge what counts as a "black" play?

Avant-garde writers depart from bourgeois theater forms in order to disrupt the status quo and incite reaction from their audiences. How can a white man from France write about experiences of blackness? Is this as an avant-garde tactic used by Genet to shock and provoke audiences?

Week 4- The Black Arts Movement and The Dutchman

This week we are discussing the Black Arts Movement which was started by Amiri Baraka. Many of the plays produced during this time period, from the mid-1960s to the mid-1970s, worked to establish a new Black Aesthetic for creating art. In his play "The Dutchman," Leroi Jones (AKA Amiri Baraka) uses the theater and the characters he creates to explore many polemic issues that shape American identity at this time. As you blog this week about Inter-racial conflict,think about the following questions. In what ways does Baraka use the relationship between Clay and Lula to explore and disrupt socially constructed racial stereotypes?
How does the play address inter-racial relationships?
If you consider the platform of the Blach Arts Movement as one that stressed separatism, community involvement and the development of a new arts aesthetic that departs from Euro-American ideals, how successful is Baraka at achieving these goals? Where does he fail?You do not have to respond to all of them,but do let them guide you to think more broadly abut Civil Rights and quests for self-determination by African Americans in the 1960s.