How It Feels to Be Free

Black Women Entertainers and Civil Rights Activism in the 1960s

Author: Ruth Feldstein
ISBN: 9780195314038

In 1964, Nina Simone sat at a piano in New York's Carnegie Hall to play what she called a "show tune." Then she began to sing: "Alabama's got me so upset/Tennessee made me lose my rest/And everybody knows about Mississippi Goddam!" Simone, and her song, became icons of the civil rights movement. But her confrontational style was not the only path taken by black women entertainers. In How It Feels to Be Free, Ruth Feldstein examines celebrated black women performers, illuminating the risks they took, their roles at home and abroad, and the ways that they raised the issue of gender amid their demands for black liberation. Feldstein focuses on six women who made names for themselves in the music, film, and television industries: Simone, Lena Horne, Miriam Makeba, Abbey Lincoln, Diahann Carroll, and Cicely Tyson. These women did not simply mirror black activism; their performances helped constitute the era's political history. Makeba connected America's struggle for civil rights to the fi

Publisher: OUP USA
Publish Date: 2013

Subjects: History / United States / 20th Century, History / Modern / 20th Century, History / Americas (North, Central, South, West Indies), Music / History & Criticism, Social Science / Ethnic Studies / African American Studies, Social Science / Women's Studies

This book is available in the following Community Centers: Women's Center (Location: African-American/Black Studies)