Performing Black-Jewish Symbiosis: The "Hassidic Chant" of Paul Robeson (original) (raw)
Related papers
Everything Man: The Form and Function of Paul Robeson
2020
Cover designed by Drew Sisk Text designed by Matthew Tauch Typeset in Whitman by Copperline Book Services element | xv enforced quietude, motivating creation, narrative, and possibility. Neruda organizes recurrent scenes of Robeson as and in relation to earth, fire, water, and air, stimulating our reception of Robeson as organic and fundamental. He is portrayed as "the song of germinating earth, the river and the movement of nature," "the potent voice of the water over the fire," and the "voice of the earth" whose "river of a heart was deeper, was wider than the silence." Allusions to water-"you were a subterranean river"-reflect and extend his proximity and relationship to the Show Boat role that made him a star as well as to the laboring peoples on the Mississippi and Niger who taught him his history through the languages and cultures of African peoples. 8 Narrative and lyrical representations of Robeson frequently document sound as the authentic revelation of his beliefs, materiality, and transit across and beneath the oceans. Through music, his character and contributions are uniquely congealed, forming a spectacular and complex substance of body, meaning, and air: the Voice.
Performing History: Paul Robeson Peekskill and Call Mr Robeson
Excellence in Performing Arts Research, 2016
In 1949 Paul Robeson (with support from Pete Seeger, Woodie Guthrie, Howard Fast, and others) attempted to and then successfully held a civil and workers’ rights concert in Peekskill, New York. Marring these performances, however, were protests that turned progressively violent. These violent protests have come to be known as the Peekskill Riots and serve as a major milestone in the nation’s history surrounding protest, music, politics, and Paul Robeson. This paper reflects on this relationship, particularly how it is being remembered today. Through field research, including participant observation, interviews, landscape analysis, and primary and secondary archival research, I demonstrate how British-Nigerian writer, singer, actor, activist, and architect Tayo Aluko “performs history” through his musical Call Mr. Robeson. This includes how Paul Robeson and the Peekskill Riots are remembered through performance and how the continued performances place the identity and history of Peekskill in a state of becoming. This is also a case study more broadly for how social movements are influenced, fueled, and remembered through performance.
Performing Protest in Cross-Cultural Spaces: Paul Robeson and Othello
Multicultural Shakespeare, 2017
When the famous African-American actor and singer Paul Robeson played the lead in Shakespeare’s Othello in London in 1930, tickets were in high demand during the production’s first week. The critical response, however, was less positive, although the reviews unanimously praised his bass-baritone delivery. When Robeson again played Othello on Broadway thirteen years later, critics praised not only his voice but also his acting, the drama running for 296 performances. My argument concerning Robeson uses elements first noted by Henri Lefebvre in his seminal work, The Production of Space, while I also draw on Paul Connerton’s work on commemorative practices. Using spatial and memorial theories as a backdrop for examining his two portrayals, I suggest that Robeson’s nascent geopolitical awareness following the 1930 production, combined with his already celebrated musical voice, allowed him to perform the role more dramatically in 1943.
Journal of African American History, 2022
Paul Robeson was perhaps the most popular Black artist on planet Earth in the 1930s and 1940s. As an actor, he commanded the stage in the anglophone world's two greatest theater cities, London and New York, and was cast in the leading role of numerous major Hollywood films. Even more so, Robeson was a legendary singer who drew huge audiences to his many concertsfamously sung in more than two dozen languages-in the United States and Canada; England, Ireland, Scotland, and Wales; on the European continent from Spain to Norway and the Soviet Union; and even Australasia. 1 While Jack
Expanding the African-American Studies Curriculum: "Paul Robeson: An American Life
Pennsylvania history, 1999
For almost twenty years since beginning teaching in 1968 at the University of California, I dealt regularly in class with the multifaceted accomplishments of Paul Robeson in many of my interdisciplinary humanities and social sciences courses. Because my focus has largely been on twentieth century cultural and political history, and because I have often emphasized the central problem of race and racism, my Robeson references have been both pedagogically appropriate and personally compelling. Paul Robeson is arguably the greatest Renaissance person in American history and one of the central cultural figures of the twentieth century. An exceptional scholar, lawyer, athlete, stage and screen actor, singer, and civil rights and political activist, he performed brilliantly in every professional enterprise he undertook. Few human beings have ever achieved his levels of excellence in even one field, much less several. Yet despite his extraordinary accomplishments, he remains virtually unknown by millions of educated Americans. In my own work as a university teacher, I rarely encountered students familiar with his many accomplishments. Indeed, most of my students, including African Americans, had not even heard of him. I often found it necessary to interrupt my regular course progression to inform students of Paul Robeson's life and work and to offer various explanations for the discouraging lack of public knowledge about the artist/ activist and his colossal impact. As a human being, I found this widespread ignorance disturbing and depressing. As an educator, I resolved to address the problem by initiating a new course that would simultaneously address this egregious educational deficiency and expand the curriculum in African American Studies. My goal was to offer UCLA students a systematic opportunity to learn about Paul Robeson and to provide, through a detailed examination of his life, a unique approach to study twentieth century history more generally. Because Robeson's spectacular talents in theater, film, music, and politics encourage students to understand culture in broader historical perspective, I also envisioned that the course would augment the interdisciplinary emphasis of African American Studies-a perspective that distinguishes the field from the conventional disciplines that have dominated university life for many decades. Believing that the time had come for a comprehensive examination of the man and his times for a university audience, I approached the UCLA Center for African American Studies. Quickly responding, the Center offered me the opportunity to present the upper division and graduate level course I entitled
Placing Paul Robeson in History: Understanding His Philosophical Framework
Black Studies, 2016
Paul Robeson is one of the greatest yet most unknown figures of the 20th century. This article goes beyond the traditional bibliographic style of documenting this great life, toward constructing a usable philosophical framework from it. Utilizing Robeson's own works, and building on the small critical literature already in existence, I present his philosophical framework-comprised of anti-colonialism, socialism, and human rights. I present these dense, interconnected, and ever-expansive philosophical stances into a form of communication that can be easily understood, evaluated, taught, and compared. Understanding the philosophies, actions, and examples of his ideological framework will provide the appropriate contextual background for understanding (to play off the title of Robeson's 1958 book, Here I Stand) where Paul Robeson philosophically stood.