Brian Roberts teaches writing and history at the University of Northern Iowa. He is the author of American Alchemy: The California Gold Rush and Middle Class Culture.
"Blackface Nation is a brilliantly incisive retelling of
nineteenth-century American history from the perspective of the
nation's arguably most revealing art form: popular music. With an
ear finely tuned to the discordant harmonies of a slave society in
its final throes, Roberts charts the rise of the modern racial
state in the triumph of blackface songs over abolitionist
anthems."-- "Elise Lemire, author of Black Walden: Slavery and Its
Aftermath in Concord, Massachusetts"
"In this engaging treatment of nineteenth- and early
twentieth-century American popular music and culture, Brian Roberts
provides a readily accessible analysis of American life during its
highly formative years. Thoroughly grounded in research, Roberts's
talented reconstruction captures personalities and landscapes that
draw readers into his story. He offers fine detail to enrich the
imagined world evoked by his archival sources. . . . Roberts
contributes significantly to a more nuanced understanding of
nineteenth century American culture. He takes his well-deserved
place among the historians who successfully use music as
a rich and evocative means for understanding American culture writ
large. His interdisciplinary approach extends into theater and
literature, which are well suited to cultural historical study. . .
. Roberts has crafted a worthy contribution to cultural historical
study and appreciation."-- "The American Historical Review"
"It is no easy thing to produce a strikingly original book covering
blackface minstrelsy, a topic on which longstanding,
cross-disciplinary, and voluminous scholarship exists. Roberts make
blackface performance speak meaningfully to the whole of US
history--especially to rebellion, settler colonialism,
republicanism, gender, and white supremacy. The placing of the War
of 1812 as a watershed in US popular culture is especially
remarkable. Roberts treats blackface over a long period of time,
beginning before and extending well after its heyday. Accessible
and sometimes displaying a sly humor, Blackface Nation deserves a
wide readership in and beyond undergraduate classrooms."-- "David
Roediger, University of Kansas"
"Wide in scope, Blackface Nation examines many of the important
episodes in 19th-century US history through popular music.
Demonstrating both story-telling skills and a remarkable command of
print sources - including song sheets, songsters, broadsides, and
numerous other published records from the period - perhaps
Roberts's greatest achievement in this study is unfolding a
gripping account of American culture while maintaining a remarkable
focus on its expressions in song and music. The result is one of
the most informative and persuasive cultural histories of the 19th
century to come out in recent years. . .Blackface Nation will prove
invaluable as a study that maintains a firm grip on the broader
historical context and the archive, even as it approaches subject
matter that too often remain in the realm of other, related fields
such as theater, music, and American studies."
-- "Reviews in History"
Brian Roberts begins Blackface Nation with two claims. First, he
argues that in order to understand the making of systemic racism in
the United States, we must understand how nineteenth century
popular music created and contested constructions of racial
difference. Second, he states that "as much as America exists in
history, it is also a musical" (23). To address this first
argument, Roberts connects three trends in popular song that
emerged before the Civil War: patriotic songs, blackface
minstrelsy, and the widely popular, politically progressive
repertoire of the Hutchinson Family Singers. Through the process of
making this first point, Roberts inherently addresses his second
and essentially reframes much of what we know about the nineteenth
century through the lens of popular music."--Joseph Thompson "JAAH"
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