Yellowface : : Creating the Chinese in American Popular Music and Performance, 1850s-1920s / / Krystyn R. Moon.

Music and performance provide a unique window into the ways that cultural information is circulated and perceptions are constructed. Because they both require listening, are inherently ephemeral, and most often involve collaboration between disparate groups, they inform cultural perceptions differen...

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Bibliographic Details
Superior document:Title is part of eBook package: De Gruyter Rutgers University Press Backlist eBook-Package 2000-2013
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Place / Publishing House:New Brunswick, NJ : : Rutgers University Press, , [2004]
©2004
Year of Publication:2004
Language:English
Online Access:
Physical Description:1 online resource (224 p.)
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Description
Other title:Frontmatter --
Contents --
Illustrations --
Acknowledgments --
Introduction --
1. Imagining China: Early Nineteenth-Century Writings and Musical Productions --
2. Toward Exclusion: American Popular Songs on Chinese Immigration, 1850-1882 --
3. Chinese and Chinese Immigrant Performers on the American Stage, 1830s-1920s --
4. The Sounds of Chinese Otherness and American Popular Music, 1880s-1920s --
5. From Aversion to Fascination: New Lyrics and Voices, 1880s-1920s --
6. The Rise of Chinese and Chinese American Vaudevillians, 1900s-1920s --
Conclusion --
Appendix A. American Popular Songs with Chinese Subjects or Themes --
Appendix B. Musicals, Revues, and Plays Produced in the United States with Chinese Songs, Scenes, or Characters --
Notes --
Index --
About the Author
Summary:Music and performance provide a unique window into the ways that cultural information is circulated and perceptions are constructed. Because they both require listening, are inherently ephemeral, and most often involve collaboration between disparate groups, they inform cultural perceptions differently from literary or visual art forms, which tend to be more tangible and stable. In Yellowface, Krystyn R. Moon explores the contributions of writers, performers, producers, and consumers in order to demonstrate how popular music and performance has played an important role in constructing Chinese and Chinese American stereotypes. The book brings to life the rich musical period of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. During this time, Chinese and Chinese American musicians and performers appeared in a variety of venues, including museums, community theaters, and world's fairs, where they displayed their cultural heritage and contested anti-Chinese attitudes. A smaller number crossed over into vaudeville and performed non-Chinese materials. Moon shows how these performers carefully navigated between racist attitudes and their own artistic desires. While many scholars have studied both African American music and blackface minstrelsy, little attention has been given to Chinese and Chinese American music. This book provides a rare look at the way that immigrants actively participated in the creation, circulation, and, at times, subversion of Chinese stereotypes through their musical and performance work.
Format:Mode of access: Internet via World Wide Web.
ISBN:9780813541228
9783110688610
DOI:10.36019/9780813541228
Access:restricted access
Hierarchical level:Monograph
Statement of Responsibility: Krystyn R. Moon.