Racism and anti-racism in American popular culture : portrayals of African-Americans in fiction and film /

Although vernacular culture is seldom examined seriously, it is the vehicle by which society expresses and perpetuates many of its deepest values. This solid study by two British academicians analyzes selected popular American novels and films in their historical contexts to show how they communicate either racist or what the authors call "anti-racist" attitudes. Among the novelists and novels discussed are Joel Chandler Harris's Uncle Remus, His Songs and Sayings (1880), Albion Tourgee's Bricks Without Straw (1880), Charles W. Chestnutt's The Conjure Woman (1899), Thomas Dixon's The Clansman (1941), Howard Fast's Freedom Road (1944), Ann Petry's The Street (1946), William Styron's The Confessions of Nat Turner (CH, Mar'68), and Alice Walker's Meridian (CH, Sep'76). The films, dealt with more cursorily, include Birth of a Nation and Gone With the Wind. The authors have tackled a large and complex subject, but their summary investigation is an insightful look both at the systemic racism that pervades American life and at the popular media that help transmit it. College, university, and public libraries. -R. Newman, New York Public Library