| Series |
Music in American life
Music in American life. ^A223005
|
| Contents |
Introduction: reclaiming the past from the margins of history -- Race and class in Southern juxtaposition: the forgotten roots of a (rock) revolution -- Popular culture and the struggle for black equality in the postwar South: rethinking the relationship -- "Could fifty million record buyers have been irrelevant?": understanding the past through popular music -- Dateline Dixie: rock 'n' roll, race, and the issue of change -- Conquering the bias of taste: postwar guardians of culture and the critique of 1950s rock 'n' roll -- With all deliberate speed and disorder: a silent generation defines itself -- The King of Rock as hillbilly cat: myth and Southern history revisited -- Rock 'n' roll, race, and Elvis Presley: Southern youth in dissent? |
| Abstract |
This book contends that popular music, specifically Elvis Presley's brand of rock 'n' roll, helped revise racial attitudes after World War II. Observing that youthful fans of rhythm and blues, rock 'n' roll, and other black-inspired music seemed more inclined than their segregationist elders to ignore the color line, Bertrand links popular music with a more general relaxation, led by white youths, of the historical denigration of blacks in the South. The tradition of southern racism, successfully communicated to previous generations, failed for the first time when confronted with the demand for rock 'n' roll by a new, national, commercialized youth culture. |
| Bibliography note | Includes bibliographical references (pages 281-311) and index. |
| LCCN | 99050895 |
| ISBN | 0252025865 (cloth : acid-free paper) |
