Chad A. Barbour
- Published in print:
- 2016
- Published Online:
- January 2018
- ISBN:
- 9781496806840
- eISBN:
- 9781496806888
- Item type:
- book
- Publisher:
- University Press of Mississippi
- DOI:
- 10.14325/mississippi/9781496806840.001.0001
- Subject:
- Society and Culture, Native American Studies
This book examines the transmission of the ideals and myths of playing Indian in American popular culture. In the nineteenth century, American art and literature developed and nurtured images of the ...
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This book examines the transmission of the ideals and myths of playing Indian in American popular culture. In the nineteenth century, American art and literature developed and nurtured images of the Indian and the frontiersman that
exemplified ideals of heroism, bravery, and manhood, as well as embodying fears
of treason, loss of civilization, and weakness. During this time, Daniel Boone emerged as an exemplary figure of crossing the white-Native line. In the
twentieth century, comic books, among other popular forms of media, would
inherit these images. The Western genre of comic books participated fully in that genre’s conventions, replicating and perpetuating the myths and ideals long associated with the frontier in the United States. A fascination with Native Americans was also present in comic books devoted to depicting the Indian past
of the U.S. In such stories, the Indian is always a figure of the past, romanticized
as a lost segment of U.S. history, ignoring contemporary and actual Native
peoples. Playing Indian occupies a definite subgenre of the Western comics, especially during the postwar period when a host of comics featuring a “white Indian” as the hero were being published. Playing Indian migrates into superhero comics, a phenomenon that heightens and amplifies the notions of heroism,
bravery, and manhood already attached to the white Indian trope. Instances of superheroes, such as Batman and Superman, playing Indian corroborate with the depictions found in the strictly Western comics. The superhero as Indian is
revived in the twenty-first century via Captain America, attesting to the
continuing power of this ideal and image.Less
This book examines the transmission of the ideals and myths of playing Indian in American popular culture. In the nineteenth century, American art and literature developed and nurtured images of the Indian and the frontiersman that
exemplified ideals of heroism, bravery, and manhood, as well as embodying fears
of treason, loss of civilization, and weakness. During this time, Daniel Boone emerged as an exemplary figure of crossing the white-Native line. In the
twentieth century, comic books, among other popular forms of media, would
inherit these images. The Western genre of comic books participated fully in that genre’s conventions, replicating and perpetuating the myths and ideals long associated with the frontier in the United States. A fascination with Native Americans was also present in comic books devoted to depicting the Indian past
of the U.S. In such stories, the Indian is always a figure of the past, romanticized
as a lost segment of U.S. history, ignoring contemporary and actual Native
peoples. Playing Indian occupies a definite subgenre of the Western comics, especially during the postwar period when a host of comics featuring a “white Indian” as the hero were being published. Playing Indian migrates into superhero comics, a phenomenon that heightens and amplifies the notions of heroism,
bravery, and manhood already attached to the white Indian trope. Instances of superheroes, such as Batman and Superman, playing Indian corroborate with the depictions found in the strictly Western comics. The superhero as Indian is
revived in the twenty-first century via Captain America, attesting to the
continuing power of this ideal and image.
Kimberly Springer
- Published in print:
- 2009
- Published Online:
- March 2014
- ISBN:
- 9781604734072
- eISBN:
- 9781604734089
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Mississippi
- DOI:
- 10.14325/mississippi/9781604734072.003.0001
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Television
This introductory chapter begins with a discussion of The Oprah Culture Industry (TOCI), which comprises her embodiment, her cultural productions, her actions, and her ideology, and then sets out the ...
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This introductory chapter begins with a discussion of The Oprah Culture Industry (TOCI), which comprises her embodiment, her cultural productions, her actions, and her ideology, and then sets out the book’s purpose, which is to provide theories and hypotheses that address the questions which drive TOCI. An overview of the subsequent chapters is also presented.Less
This introductory chapter begins with a discussion of The Oprah Culture Industry (TOCI), which comprises her embodiment, her cultural productions, her actions, and her ideology, and then sets out the book’s purpose, which is to provide theories and hypotheses that address the questions which drive TOCI. An overview of the subsequent chapters is also presented.
Chris Goertzen
- Published in print:
- 2008
- Published Online:
- March 2014
- ISBN:
- 9781604731224
- eISBN:
- 9781604733310
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- University Press of Mississippi
- DOI:
- 10.14325/mississippi/9781604731224.003.0001
- Subject:
- Music, History, American
This chapter introduces the concept of the American fiddle contests, citing an example that happens once a year in the second-largest shopping mall in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Fiddle contests are often ...
More
This chapter introduces the concept of the American fiddle contests, citing an example that happens once a year in the second-largest shopping mall in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Fiddle contests are often composed of music, dance, and a lot of community engagement. Most the participants and audience members in these fiddle contests behave like old friends at a neighborhood barbecue or a family reunion. This chapter then traces the roots of these American fiddling contest from the late-eighteenth-century Scotland—where it tries to uncover how this tradition was passed during the migration to America—down to mid-twentieth century America. How has this tradition affected the overall culture of America, and how has changed affected the tradition? These are questions answered in this first chapter.Less
This chapter introduces the concept of the American fiddle contests, citing an example that happens once a year in the second-largest shopping mall in Tuscaloosa, Alabama. Fiddle contests are often composed of music, dance, and a lot of community engagement. Most the participants and audience members in these fiddle contests behave like old friends at a neighborhood barbecue or a family reunion. This chapter then traces the roots of these American fiddling contest from the late-eighteenth-century Scotland—where it tries to uncover how this tradition was passed during the migration to America—down to mid-twentieth century America. How has this tradition affected the overall culture of America, and how has changed affected the tradition? These are questions answered in this first chapter.
Barbara Tepa Lupack
- Published in print:
- 2020
- Published Online:
- September 2020
- ISBN:
- 9781501748189
- eISBN:
- 9781501748202
- Item type:
- chapter
- Publisher:
- Cornell University Press
- DOI:
- 10.7591/cornell/9781501748189.003.0010
- Subject:
- Film, Television and Radio, Film
This chapter studies The Mysteries of Myra (1916). Although the Wharton brothers apparently abandoned some of the shorter pictures that they had been considering, early in the new year of 1916, they ...
More
This chapter studies The Mysteries of Myra (1916). Although the Wharton brothers apparently abandoned some of the shorter pictures that they had been considering, early in the new year of 1916, they began preparations for The Mysteries of Myra. Pioneering in both subject and execution, The Mysteries of Myra aimed to avoid the hackneyed melodramatic lines of many early serials by offering instead what one contemporary reviewer called “a wonderful new theme that compels attention because of the puzzling thoughts regarding mental telepathy and spirits presented in a manner which follows authenticated scientific discoveries.” In other words, the serial purported to demonstrate the way that science had become powerful enough to “prove” the existence of the unscientific. Myra had other cultural reverberations as well. In addition to reflecting the unconventional “New Woman” type that had come into vogue in the 1910s, Myra Maynard was also emblematic of another early twentieth-century type in America popular culture: the adolescent girl as a liminal figure who, as she comes of age, uncannily mediates between the living and the dead. The scenario for the serial was written by Charles W. Goddard, a veteran of serial pictures who had scripted The Perils of Pauline and whose association with the Whartons dated back to their first Elaine serial production in 1914. On the Myra scripts, Goddard collaborated closely with American investigator of psychic phenomena Hereward Carrington, who supplied most of the occult story lines.Less
This chapter studies The Mysteries of Myra (1916). Although the Wharton brothers apparently abandoned some of the shorter pictures that they had been considering, early in the new year of 1916, they began preparations for The Mysteries of Myra. Pioneering in both subject and execution, The Mysteries of Myra aimed to avoid the hackneyed melodramatic lines of many early serials by offering instead what one contemporary reviewer called “a wonderful new theme that compels attention because of the puzzling thoughts regarding mental telepathy and spirits presented in a manner which follows authenticated scientific discoveries.” In other words, the serial purported to demonstrate the way that science had become powerful enough to “prove” the existence of the unscientific. Myra had other cultural reverberations as well. In addition to reflecting the unconventional “New Woman” type that had come into vogue in the 1910s, Myra Maynard was also emblematic of another early twentieth-century type in America popular culture: the adolescent girl as a liminal figure who, as she comes of age, uncannily mediates between the living and the dead. The scenario for the serial was written by Charles W. Goddard, a veteran of serial pictures who had scripted The Perils of Pauline and whose association with the Whartons dated back to their first Elaine serial production in 1914. On the Myra scripts, Goddard collaborated closely with American investigator of psychic phenomena Hereward Carrington, who supplied most of the occult story lines.
