Michael Jackson and the Quandary of a Black Identity

ISBN-10: 143848481X
ISBN-13: 9781438484815
Category: Social Science
Pages: 276
Language: English
Published: 2021-08-01
Publisher: State University of New York Press
Author: Sherrow O. Pinder

Description

A close examination of the complexity inherent in Michael Jackson’s ambiguous racial identity. In Michael Jackson and the Quandary of a Black Identity, Sherrow O. Pinder explores the ways in which the late singer's racial identification process problematizes conceptualizations of race and the presentation of blackness that reduces blacks to a bodily mark. Pinder is particularly interested in how Michael Jackson simultaneously performs his racial identity and posits it against strict binary racial definitions, neither black nor white. While Jackson's self-fashioning deconstructs and challenges the corporeal notions of "natural bodies" and fixed identities, negative readings of the King of Pop fuel epithets such as "weird" or "freak," subjecting him to a form of antagonism that denies the black body its self-determination. Thus, for Jackson, racial identification becomes a deeply ambivalent process, which leads to the fragmentation of his identity into plural identities. Pinder shows how Jackson as a racialized subject is discursively confined to a "third space," a liminal space of ambivalence. Sherrow O. Pinder is Professor of Political Science and Multicultural and Gender Studies at California State University, Chico. She has published several books, including Black Political Thought: From David Walker to the Present.

Get the book

Similar books

EBOOK: The Stata Survival Manual
By David Pevalin, Karen Robson
Timberlake website Another useful website is www.timberlake.co.uk. Timberlake Consultants is a statistical consultancy company that also distributes and ...
Brooks/Cole Empowerment Series: Understanding Generalist Practice
By Karen K. Kirst-Ashman, Grafton H. Hull
Timberlake, E. M., Farber, M. Z., & Sabatino, C. A. (2002). The general method of social work practice (4th ed.). Boston: Allyn & Bacon. Timberlake, E. M. ...
The Fashionista Files: Adventures in Four-Inch Heels and Faux Pas
By Karen Robinovitz, Melissa de la Cruz
All Out of Love • Madonna: The Immaculate Collection • Erasure: Circus Justin Timberlake. Justified - - - - - - - - - - * 75% + T H E FAS H ...
Asian Americans Information Directory: A Guide to Organizations, Agencies, Institutions, Programs, Publications, and Services Concerned with Asian American Nationalities and...
By Karen Backus
+ 3590 + Hmong from Laos c / o Assoc . of Hmong in Illinois 4554 N ... Veteran ' s Alliance 1544 Timberlake Rd . St . Paul , MN 55117 Vue Yang , Vice Pres .
Marriage and Cohabitation
By Arland Thornton, William G. Axinn, Yu Xie
... is much higher than in the United States, with the prevalence in France being perhaps the highest (Heuveline and Timberlake 2004; Toulemon 1997).
Native American Verbal Art: Texts and Contexts
By William M. Clements
HENRY TIMBERLAKE'S CHEROKEE WAR SONG 1. That Timberlake's memoir contains the first English translation of the words of a Native American song seems to have ...
Oratory in Native North America
By William M. Clements
But Timberlake seems to have had a bit more literary sensitivity - suggested by his translation of the Cherokee war song in his memoirs - than these earlier ...
Contemporary Urban Sociology
By William G. Flanagan
Timberlake , Michael . 1985. " The World System Perspective and Urbanization . ” In Michael Timberlake ( ed . ) , Urbanization in the World Economy , 3-4 .
The Bhopal Tragedy: Language, Logic, And Politics In The Production Of A Hazard
By William Bogard
The poor tend to live in dwellings that are structurally unsuited to withstand the impact of environmental extremes (Wijkman and Timberlake 1984, pp.
The Archaeological Guide to Iowa
By William E. Whittaker, Lynn M. Alex, Mary De La Garza
To display and share his discoveries, in 1940 Johnson built the Timberlake Museum on his farm. It remained open to the public during the summer and for ...