2009/11/16 by Allyson Nadia Field · 1 citation
Arts and Humanities · Economics, Econometrics and Finance · Social Sciences · #Cinema and Media Studies #Race, History, and American Society #Theater, Performance, and Music History
paper · pdf · doi:10.1080/01956050903218075
openalex publication_date 2009/11/16 · openalex created_date 2025/10/10 · openalex updated_date 2026/07/29
Drawing on surviving accounts of screening and extant photographic materials, this essay focuses on the formal compositions of the films created for southern black agricultural and industrial institutes' publicity campaigns before and after the incendiary release of The Birth of a Nation. To date, there has been no sustained study of the role of film in the publicity projects of Hampton or Tuskegee. However, this is a crucial moment in the history of black filmmaking and spectatorship as it is the locus of debates over representations of “uplift” that would occupy African American public discourse throughout the Harlem Renaissance and after.