YallBeefin-2649

  No Mountain Left to Climb: The Mixtape Demia Gist Disc 1: Respectability Politics: Tin Pan Alley Pop & Crooner Ballads Billie Holiday and Her Orchestra - “The Man I Love” (1928) The Mills Brothers - “Paper Doll” (1942) Nat “King” Cole - “Unforgettable” (1951) Tommy Edwards - “It’s All In The Game (1951 Version) [Bonus Track]” (1963) Traditional pop and the "Great American Songbook," a genre primarily composed by white songwriters and marketed to mainstream American audiences, are identified in the four songs on this opening disc. Rather than racial conflict or cultural specificity, these songs emphasize romantic longing and emotional refinement. In many cases, Black performers were interpreting lyrics and narratives written by white composers, effectively voicing universalized American love stories rather than their own lived experiences. Their polished orchestration and universal themes are indicative of respectability politics—the strategy of succeeding by conforming ...

  Yamariana Easley-Jones Dr. Harris African American Literature I 1 March 2026 Identity: Cultural vs Racial. Ideals, expectations, black and African American re not One in the Same.  My topic was loosely inspired by the debates of DuBois and BTW. The heart of their debates is to find out what is best for the black collective and how black people should be living their lives. This led me to question “What Does it Mean to be Black?” From there, I wanted to explore the concept of cultural vs racial identity and how the two may be seen as interchangeable; they're not. African American is something referring to only Black Americans while Black can cover many cultures and places. The primary reading that I chose for my mixtape is Notes of a Native Son by James Baldwin. I was mostly inspired by the essay within my text titled “Stranger in the Village.” Baldwin is telling a story of how he is staying in a small Swiss village where he is the first Black man most of the people there ha...

  Assignment Instructions Disc 1: Traditional pop and the "Great American Songbook," a genre primarily composed by white songwriters and marketed to mainstream American audiences, are identified in the four songs on this opening disc. Rather than racial conflict or cultural specificity, these songs emphasize romantic longing and emotional refinement. In many cases, Black performers were interpreting lyrics and narratives written by white composers, effectively voicing universalized American love stories rather than their own lived experiences. Their polished orchestration and universal themes are indicative of respectability politics—the strategy of succeeding by conforming to prevailing American standards. Performing this music gave Black musicians visibility in a segregated industry, but frequently within socially acceptable bounds. This dynamic has a direct connection to the primary text, Langston Hughes' "The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain," as Black a...

  If I had to create a name for my piece, it would be monolith. That is the word that drove my creative process. When reading about the battle to be a “representative” identity in our community, I realized it was definitely a double edged sword. Who can lead us inside the community and represent our community to outsiders, without erasing the opinions, ideas and experiences of a wide array of individuals. Personally, in many areas I related to the “black experience” but there were many instances where a black opinion or action was judged, but it didn’t align with my own. Anna Julia Cooper said “no man can represent the race” and “Whatever the attainments of the individual may be, unless his home has moved on pari passu, he can never be regarded as identical with or representative of the whole.” and I wholeheartedly agree. A false image of a collective can be easily broadcasted and erases lived realities of individuals. We are viewed as one-dimensional zoo animals, understood as wha...

  Katelin Helen Shipp   Thursday February, 26, 2026   African American Literature   Dr. Harris   Pan-African Community Program Proposal     Main Text   The community engagement program I envisioned was primarily influenced by Alan  Locke’s “Enter the New Negro”, as in this essay he describes a new type of African American  that is spiritually emancipated from social intimidation for they are occupied imagining “a new  vision of opportunity”. 101 years after this essay, African Americans may have improved their  socioeconomic standing, but have only strayed further from this “New Negro” Locke had  envisioned. In the contemporary era that we live in, Black Americans operate in survival mode,  self policing, dividing, disparaging, all while carrying a distorted sense of self that is formed by  outside perspectives. This division, policing and distortion is only exacerbated by social med...

 Jeffries Camille African American Literature Dr. Harris February 26, 2026 Title: Seen, Not Known: A New Psychology on Repeat Primary Text: The New Negro (1925) by Alain Locke This mixtape explores the conflicting relationship between being visible and invisible when it comes to Black identity and expression in terms of art. Because of the use of stereotypes as well as social judgments based upon what is expected from them, Black people are often seen as being hyper-visible. However, we ignore or misunderstand the inward lives of Black people. This project will reference Alain Locke's idea of "New Psychology," which finds that true transformation starts from within and is based upon self-definition rather than external recognition. The mixtape format represents this; the songs are layered with sound, feeling, and thought to demonstrate that the experience of coming of age is a process that is repeated rather than a single event. The first three songs on the mixtape, ...