Dr. Linda Tucker, assistant professor of English in the Department of English and Foreign Languages at Southern Arkansas University, Magnolia, recently had her book, Lockstep and Dance: Images of Black Men in Popular Culture, published by the University Press of Mississippi.<\/p>\n
Tucker\u2019s book examines popular culture\u2019s reliance on long-standing stereotypes of black men as animalistic, hypersexual, dangerous criminals, whose bodies, dress, actions, attitudes, and language both repel and attract white audiences. She studies this trope in the images of well-known African American men in four cultural venues: contemporary literature, black-focused films, sports commentary, and rap music.<\/p>\n
Through rigorous analysis, the book argues that American popular culture\u2019s representations of black men preserve racial hierarchies that imprison blacks both intellectually and physically. Of equal importance are the ways in which black men battle against, respond to, and become implicated in the production and circulation of these images.<\/p>\n
Tucker cites examples ranging from Michael Jordan\u2019s underwear commercials and the popular \u201cBarbershop\u201d movies, to the career of rapper Tupac Shakur and John Edgar Wideman\u2019s memoir \u201cBrothers and Keepers.\u201d Tucker\u2019s book tracks the continuity between historical images of African American men, the peculiar constitution of whites\u2019 anxieties about black men, and black men\u2019s tolerance of and resistance to the reproduction of such images. The legacy of these stereotypes is still apparent in contemporary advertising, film, music, and professional basketball. The book argues persuasively that these cultural images reinforce the idea of black men as prisoners of American justice but also shows how black men struggle against this imprisonment.<\/p>\n
Copies of the book are available in the SAU bookstore. The book can also be purchased online at amazon.com.<\/p>\n
Tucker joined the faculty of the Department of English and Foreign Languages in 2003. She received her B.A. from York University and earned her M.A. and Ph.D. from the University of Alberta.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Dr. Linda Tucker, assistant professor of English in the Department of English and Foreign Languages at Southern Arkansas University, Magnolia, recently had her book, Lockstep and Dance: Images of Black Men in Popular Culture, published by the University Press of Mississippi.<\/p>\n
Tucker\u2019s book examines popular culture\u2019s reliance on long-standing stereotypes of black men as animalistic, hypersexual<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":17,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"open","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"_genesis_hide_title":false,"_genesis_hide_breadcrumbs":false,"_genesis_hide_singular_image":false,"_genesis_hide_footer_widgets":false,"_genesis_custom_body_class":"","_genesis_custom_post_class":"","_genesis_layout":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"categories":[207,312],"tags":[],"class_list":{"0":"post-147","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","6":"category-college-of-liberal-performing-arts","7":"category-english-and-foreign-language","8":"entry"},"acf":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.saumag.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.saumag.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.saumag.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.saumag.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/17"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.saumag.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=147"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/web.saumag.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/147\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/web.saumag.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=147"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.saumag.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=147"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/web.saumag.edu\/news\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=147"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}