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Chapter 8 - “Dramatic Race”

Democratic Lessons of Twenty-First-Century African American Drama

from Part III - The Dynamics of Race and Literary Dynamics

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  02 November 2024

John Ernest
Affiliation:
University of Delaware
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Summary

This chapter presents contemporary African American theater and drama as a democratic art form that addresses social injustice and racial inequalities in the aftermath of the Black Lives Matter movement and the Obama presidency. The plays The White Card by Claudia Rankine and Fairview: A Play by Jackie Sibblies Drury are discussed in light of recent developments in Black performance theory and with regard to Jacques Rancière’s argument on the democratic and egalitarian potential of theatrical performance. Both plays work toward a revision of how racial identities are configured in what Rancière has called the “distribution of the sensible.” The White Card reflects on the theatrical representation of police brutality and its mediation through photography and art. Fairview provides an example of how contemporary playwrights elaborate on a tradition of actor–spectator interaction in African American theater as a means for destabilizing the social allocation of racial and spatial positions in society. In this sense, Rankine and Drury transform African American theater into an oppositional site that challenges the configuration of racial discourses in a variety of contexts and instances.

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Publisher: Cambridge University Press
Print publication year: 2024

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  • “Dramatic Race”
  • Edited by John Ernest, University of Delaware
  • Book: The Cambridge Companion to Race and American Literature
  • Online publication: 02 November 2024
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108891189.010
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  • “Dramatic Race”
  • Edited by John Ernest, University of Delaware
  • Book: The Cambridge Companion to Race and American Literature
  • Online publication: 02 November 2024
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108891189.010
Available formats
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Save book to Google Drive

To save content items to your account, please confirm that you agree to abide by our usage policies. If this is the first time you use this feature, you will be asked to authorise Cambridge Core to connect with your account. Find out more about saving content to Google Drive.

  • “Dramatic Race”
  • Edited by John Ernest, University of Delaware
  • Book: The Cambridge Companion to Race and American Literature
  • Online publication: 02 November 2024
  • Chapter DOI: https://doi.org/10.1017/9781108891189.010
Available formats
×