Author : Marvin Edward McAllister
Release : 1997
Genre :
Kind :
Book Rating : /5 ( reviews)

GET EBOOK

"White People Do Not Know how to Behave at Entertainments Designed for Ladies and Gentlemen of Colour" - read free eBook in online reader or directly download on the web page. Select files or add your book in reader. Download and read online ebook "White People Do Not Know how to Behave at Entertainments Designed for Ladies and Gentlemen of Colour" write by Marvin Edward McAllister. This book was released on 1997. "White People Do Not Know how to Behave at Entertainments Designed for Ladies and Gentlemen of Colour" available in PDF, EPUB and Kindle. The African Grove/African Theatre was founded by William Brown, a retired ship steward who traveled the Caribbean and Europe before settling in New York City. Brown's entertainments existed from 1821 to 1824 and his African Theatre was the first black-owned theater in North America. In 1822, Brown wrote and produced the first black drama, The Drama of King Shotaway, a play that chronicles a 1795 Black Carib insurrection on the island of St. Vincent. The primary objective of this dissertation is to place the African Grove pleasure garden and the African theatre in the theatrical, political, and social contexts of nineteenth century America. The early nineteenth century was one of the most diverse periods in American entertainment history. By grounding the company in America's early national period, I attempt to recover much of that diversity and to reevaluate this formative era in American and Afro-American history. This project's secondary objective is to establish a tradition of Afro-American performance that predates blackface minstrelsy. America's degrading national art form has nearly erased the existence of Negro cultural institutions like the African Theatre and New World African celebrations like Pinkster. Before minstrelsy, Brown's company employed European, Indian, and African dramatic, dance, and musical conventions. At America's first black theater, actors and audiences occasionally challenged conventional theater practices. In 1822, the troupe was arrested for performing their unique version of Shakespeare's Richard III. Brown's innovative entertainments politicized the New York stage and ultimately led to his theater's demise.