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This pathbreaking study of region, race, and gender reveals how we underestimate the South's influence on the formation of black masculinity at the national level. Many negative stereotypes of black men-often contradictory ones-have emerged from the ongoing historical traumas initiated by slavery. Are black men emasculated and submissive or hypersexed and violent? Nostalgic representations of black men have arisen as well: think of the philosophical, hardworking sharecropper or the abiding, upright preacher. To complicate matters, says Riché Richardson, blacks themselves appropriate these images for purposes never intended by their (mostly) white progenitors. Starting with such well-known caricatures as the Uncle Tom and the black rapist, Richardson investigates a range of pathologies of black masculinity that derive ideological force from their associations with the South. Military policy, black-liberation discourse, and contemporary rap, she argues, are just some of the instruments by which egregious pathologies of black masculinity in southern history have been sustained. Richardson's sources are eclectic and provocative, including Ralph Ellison's fiction, Charles Fuller's plays, Spike Lee's films, Huey Newton's and Malcolm X's political rhetoric, the O. J. Simpson discourse, and the music production of Master P, the Cash Money Millionaires, and other Dirty South rappers. Filled with new insights into the region's role in producing hierarchies of race and gender in and beyond their African American contexts, this new study points the way toward more epistemological frameworks for southern literature, southern studies, and gender studies.

This pathbreaking study of region, race, and gender reveals how we underestimate the South's influence on the formation of black masculinity at the national level. Starting with such well-known caricatures as the Uncle Tom and the black rapist, Richardson investigates a range of pathologies of black masculinity.

The largely invisible and often crushing struggles of young African-American men come vividly – and heroically – to life in All the Difference, which traces the paths of two teens from the South Side of Chicago who dream of graduating from college. Statistics predict that Robert and Krishaun will drop out of high school, but they have other plans. Oscar® nominated producer/director Tod Lending's intimate film, executive produced by author Wes Moore, follows the young men though five years of hard work, sacrifice, setbacks and uncertainty. As they discover, support from family, teachers and mentors makes all the difference in defying the odds.

01 02 Black Men Worshipping analyzes the discursive spaces where black Christian masculinity is constructed, performed, and contested in American religion and culture. It judiciously considers the anxiety that emerges from black male negotiations with constructions of blackness, maleness, and Christian embodiment. Black Men Worshipping places fictive literary narratives such as Uncle Tom's Cabin and In My Father's House , and film narratives such as The Green Mile in dialogue with the non-fictive narratives of popular African American figures Bishop T. D. Jakes and Pastor Donnie McClurkin in an effort to provide a snapshot of the complex constellation of issues involved in black male Christian embodiment. 13 02 Stacy C. Boyd is currently an assistant professor of English and Africana Studies at the University of West Georgia. 04 02 Messianic Masculinity: Killing Black Male Bodies in Uncle Tom's Cabin and The Green Mile Christian Race Man: Bishop T.D. Jakes and the Search for Contemporary Christian Masculinity Donnie McClurkin and the Tensions of Black Christian Sexuality Father Stories and Hungry Sons in Ernest J. Gaines's In My Father's House 02 02 Black Men Worshipping analyzes the discursive spaces where Black masculinity is constructed, performed, and contested in American religion and culture. It judiciously considers the anxiety that emerges from Black male negotiations with these constructions, placing fictive literary and film narratives in conversation with the non-fictive narratives of controversial and popular religious personalities such as Donnie McClurkin and T.D. Jakes. 

Violence from Slavery to #BlackLivesMatter brings together perspectives on violence and its representation in African American history from slavery to the present moment. Contributors explore how violence, signifying both an instrument of the white majority's power and a modality of black resistance, has been understood and articulated in primary materials that range from slave narrative through \"lynching plays\" and Richard Wright's fiction to contemporary activist poetry, and from photography of African American suffering through Blaxploitation cinema and Spike Lee's films to rap lyrics and performances. Diverse both in their period coverage and their choice of medium for discussion, the 11 essays are unified by a shared concern to unpack violence's multiple meanings for black America. Underlying the collection, too, is not only the desire to memorialize past moments of black American suffering and resistance, but, in politically timely fashion, to explore their connections to our current conjuncture.

Art is often regarded as a reflection of life, with media possessing the capacity to challenge societal norms and influence social and political perspectives as reported by Höijer (Nordicom Review 32(2), 2011). Within American media, Black men are frequently vilified and stereotyped as absent or deadbeat fathers as described by Kumah-Abiwu (Journal of Men’s Studies, 28(1), 2020), Kurwa (Housing Police Debate, 30(6), 2020), Rambert (UCLA Law Review, 68(1), 2021), and Stamps (Journal of Communications, 28(4), 2017). Such portrayals perpetuate harmful narratives and reinforce the negative stereotypes of Black men as absentee parents as discussed by Caldwell, Jr. (Spectrum: A Journal on Black Men, 10(1), 2022). One cultural phenomenon that highlights the intersection of race and parenting is The Talk, a long-standing tradition in Black families, as delineated by Caldwell, Jr. (2024) and Whitaker and Snell (Journal of Human Behavior in the Social Environment, 26(3–4), 2016). Despite its prevalence, limited scholarly attention has been devoted to this practice, particularly from the perspective of Black fathers as presented by Caldwell, Jr. (2024) and Mahadevan et al. (2020). This study explores contemporary television shows and films such as Black-ish, Boyz N the Hood, and The Hate U Give as examples of media representations depicting Black fathers as present and actively engaging in The Talk with their children. This research underscores the importance of culturally responsible and positive representations of Black fathers in American television and film. These narratives not only challenge prevailing stereotypes but also affirm the critical role of Black fathers in guiding their children through life in a racially charged society.

The program focuses on illegal drugs, and the continued effect they have on the African American community via an exploration of the recent drug-culture film Superfly and discussions with local drug rehabilitation employees. Program includes clips from the recent film, an interview with actor Ron O'Neal conducted by John Slade, a discussion among community members who oppose the film (John Chatterton of the Bay State Banner and David Booker and Fred Smallwood of First Incorporated, a drug rehabilitation program in Roxbury that is among the oldest in the country), 'man on the street' interviews regarding drug use, and a discussion with South End Community Drug Council employees Joseph Nkunta, Rochelle Lee, and Steve Moss about the specific ways they handle drug abuse in the community.

Black Male Framescharts the development and shifting popularity of two stereotypes of black masculinity in popular American film: \"the shaman\" or \"the scoundrel.\" Starting with colonial times, Williams identifies the origins of these roles in an America where black men were forced either to defy or to defer to their white masters. These figures recur in the stories America tells about its black men, from the fictional Jim Crow and Zip Coon to historical figures such as Booker T. Washington and W. E. B. Du Bois. Williams argues that these two extremes persist today in modern Hollywood, where actors such as Sam Lucas, Paul Robeson, Sidney Poitier, Denzel Washington, and Morgan Freeman, among others, must cope with and work around such limited options. Williams situates these actors' performances of one or the other stereotype within each man's personal history and within the country's historical moment, ultimately to argue that these men are rewarded for their portrayal of the stereotypes most needed to put America's ongoing racial anxieties at ease. Reinvigorating the discussion that began with Donald Bogle's seminal work, Toms, Coons, Mulattoes, Mammies, and Bucks, Black Male Frames illuminates the ways in which individuals and the media respond to the changing racial politics in America.

[...]hero Leroy Green watches Bruce Lee's film Enter the Dragon (1973) in a New York City mid town movie theater while wearing traditional Chinese male clothing (cant: cheongsam) and a straw hat while he eats popcorn with chopsticks. \"2 The Last Dragon, a box office success,3 functions as a fantastical space wherein Black and mixed-race authors (director Michael Shultz and screenwriter Louis Venosta) and audience engage in a complex, uneven, entertaining, and problematic relationship with Chinese and Japanese martial arts popular culture placed in a New York City context. Like the opening sequence of both the Hong Kong print and the Cantonese print of its genealogical, aesthetic, and nominative forbearer Enter the Dragon (1973), The Last Dragon commences with a musical martial arts montage/ The viewer is treated to Leroy Green-a young, sweating, brown-skinned, wavy-haired muscular man-practicing his martial arts forms. Ronald L. Jackson II, Scripting the Black Masculine Body: Identity, Discourse, and Racial Politics in Popular Media, Negotiating Identity: Discourses, Politics, Processes, and Praxes (Albany: State University of New' York Press, 2006), 49-50. Amy Abugo Ongiri, \"He Wanted to Be Just Like Bruce Lee: African Americans, Kung Fu Theatre and Cultural Exchange at the Margins J Journal of Asian American Studies, 5, no. 1 (2002): 31-40. Vijay Prashad, Everybody Was Kung Fu Fighting: Afro-Asian Connections and the Myth of Cultural Purity (Boston: Beacon Press, 2001); Bill V. Mullen, Afro-Orientalism (Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press, 2004); Fred Ho and Bill V. Mullen, Afro Asia: Revolutionary Political & Cultural Connections between...

An intimate portrait of Congresswoman Barbara Lee, a pioneer on behalf of racial and economic justice and the lone voice in opposition to the authorization of military force after the September 11th attacks.