The Showman and the Slave : : Race, Death, and Memory in Barnum's America / / Benjamin Reiss.
Reiss uses P. T. Barnum's Joice Heth hoax to examine the contours of race relations in the antebellum North. Barnum's first exhibit as a showman, Heth was an elderly enslaved woman said to be the 161-year-old former nurse of the infant George Washington. Seizing upon the novelty, the newly...
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Superior document: | Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter HUP eBook-Package Backlist 2000-2013 (Canada) |
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Place / Publishing House: | Cambridge, MA : : Harvard University Press, , [2022] ©2001 |
Year of Publication: | 2022 |
Language: | English |
Online Access: | |
Physical Description: | 1 online resource (281 p.) |
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Other title: | Frontmatter -- CONTENTS -- FIGURES -- AckrunvZedgments -- Introduction: The Dark Subject -- 1. DEATH AND DYING -- 1. Possession -- 2. The Celebrated Curiosity -- 3. Private Acts, Public Memories -- 4. Sacred and Profane -- 5. Culture Wars -- 6. Love, Automata, and India Rubber -- 7. Spectacle -- II. RESURRECTION -- 8. Authenticity and Commodity -- 9. Exposure and Mastery -- 10. Erasure -- III. LIFE -- 11. A Speculative Biography -- Note to the 2010 Printing -- Notes -- Index |
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Summary: | Reiss uses P. T. Barnum's Joice Heth hoax to examine the contours of race relations in the antebellum North. Barnum's first exhibit as a showman, Heth was an elderly enslaved woman said to be the 161-year-old former nurse of the infant George Washington. Seizing upon the novelty, the newly emerging commercial press turned her act--and especially her death--into one of the first media spectacles in American history. |
Format: | Mode of access: Internet via World Wide Web. |
ISBN: | 9780674042650 9783110756067 9783110442205 |
DOI: | 10.4159/9780674042650?locatt=mode:legacy |
Access: | restricted access |
Hierarchical level: | Monograph |
Statement of Responsibility: | Benjamin Reiss. |