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Ebony Magazine and Lerone Bennett Jr. : popular Black history in postwar America

Call Number

  • 051 W5173 (CEN)

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Publication Information

Urbana : University of Illinois Press, [2020]

Physical Description

x, 193 pages ; 23 cm

Summary

"This study reveals the previously hidden impact of 'Ebony' magazine as a major producer and disseminator of popular black history during the second half of the twentieth century. Far from dismissing 'Ebony' as a consumer magazine with limited political or educational importance, E. James West highlights the value editors, readers, and advertisers placed upon 'Ebony's' role as a 'history book'. Benefitting from unprecedented access to new archives at Chicago State and Emory University, West also offers the first substantive biographical account of the writing and philosophy of Lerone Bennett Jr., who used his position at 'Ebony' to emerge as one of the twentieth century's most influential popular black historians. Focusing on Lerone Bennett's role within Johnson Publishing, and assessing 'Ebony's' broader historical coverage, this book uses the magazine as a window into the transition of black history from the margins to the center of American cultural, historical, and political representation. As an important cultural outlet with millions of readers, 'Ebony' played a powerful role in reshaping public representations of African American history. Directed by the efforts of Bennett, the magazine produced militant depictions of black history and connected activism in the present to a longstanding history of radical black protest. However, as a black consumer magazine it also helped to legitimize and facilitate corporate mediation of black history, and to frame and limit discussions of African American history, memory, and identity." --

Contents

  • Introduction
  • An abundance of outright untruths
  • Tell us of our past
  • White problems and the roots of black power
  • Learning is an all-black thing
  • We can seize the opportunity
  • A hero to be remembered
  • Conclusion.

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