Cultural Ventriloquism From Twain to Eminem

Ventriloquism: Your first association is no doubt a man on stage with a large -speaking” puppet on his knee, an old-fashioned art form. But the concepts of ventriloquism – speaking indirectly, usually in a concealed way, for someone else or expressing oneself -with a difference” through someone else; the links between body and voice – resonate richly throughout American literary and cultural history. The patriarchal society and husbands of the 19th century, for instance, claimed to be acting in women’s -best interests” in controlling female bodies and opinions. The rise of the phenomenally popular entertainment genre of -blackface minstrelsy” was, among other things, an attempt by white society to keep African Americans in their stereotypical place through degrading and exaggerated imitation of appearance, movements, and language. In his play Ah Sin (written with Bret Harte in 1876/77), Mark Twain voiced in -yellowface” a sneaky, physically unsavory Chinese immigrant, reinforcing negative stereotypes which dominated mainstream thinking for a century. Native Americans were largely silenced and defused by being -herded” onto reservations, and their autobiographical accounts or orations were generally filtered through white editors. In live ventriloquist acts, however, the puppet or dummy is the actor’s alter ego, and often takes over the performance; we will see telling examples of this, especially in ethnic literature, in which the suppressed minority member develops into the empowered one who -pulls the strings.” Cultural ventriloquism continues as a strategy in 21st-century performance, although now it is often associated with a joyful postmodernist hybridity. Yet debates rage, particularly in online platforms: For instance, is the white rapper Eminem a modern -blackface minstrel” or a transcultural popular hero? Looked at broadly, the very undertaking of writing fiction means -throwing your voice” into the characters of novels. We will examine the profound literary theoretical implications of ventriloquism. Do we read a novel or view a film about Native Americans differently, for instance, when we know that the author or director is non-Native? Or can the power of imagination erase the potentially distorted effects of narrative ventriloquism? Fulbright Prof. Bill Stratton from the University of Denver, a specialist in Native American Studies, will teach a class session on the -white framework- of most 19th-century Native American texts. He has developed a new approach to analyzing Native texts, which we hope he will introduce to us! All the theory and novel/autobiography excerpts, plays, speeches, short stories (e.g. Charlotte Perkins Gilman's rich story -The Yellow Wall-Paper-), as well as the full novel by Native American Sherman Alexie, Flight (2007), will be contained in the photocopied semester -reader,- to be available at the beginning of the semester. After you have been accepted for this course, you may purchase the Southern author Carson McCullers' widely read, remarkable novel The Heart Is a Lonely Hunter (any edition; used copies are available on the web for less than 2 €!; we will also view the moving film adaptation starring Alan Arkin, 1968.) Have patience with the beginning chapters which introduce the characters; McCullers shows fascinating modes of (failed) communication which will fit into our course theme productively! Anglistik - Amerikanistik Universität Siegen SoSe 2013 Ph.D. Waegner Cathy Ph.D