{"id":507,"date":"2020-03-09T22:55:52","date_gmt":"2020-03-10T03:55:52","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/performinghistory\/?p=507"},"modified":"2020-03-09T22:55:52","modified_gmt":"2020-03-10T03:55:52","slug":"ya-like-jazz-exploring-jazz-in-paris-through-la-revue-negre","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/performinghistory\/2020\/03\/09\/ya-like-jazz-exploring-jazz-in-paris-through-la-revue-negre\/","title":{"rendered":"Ya Like Jazz? Exploring Jazz in Paris through La Revue N\u00e8gre"},"content":{"rendered":"

When I was six years old I took ballet. For the final recital, myself and ten other small, suburban white girls dressed in tiny black tutu\u2019s danced to \u201cWhat a Wonderful World\u201d by Louis Armstrong. It\u2019s a good memory that has stayed with me for my entire life. Six-year-old me did not see Louis Armstrong as \u201cother\u201d. She didn\u2019t even know what the man behind the music looked like, she just knew that she loved the music even though the music was black and it was jazz and none of the little girls in that class had experienced any sort of racism or oppression. I wonder now that I\u2019m older and supposedly wiser if it was wrong to enjoy it. To answer this question, I look to 1920s Paris.<\/span><\/p>\n

Much like my six-year-old self, French people were elated when hearing jazz for the first time. It was new, it was exciting, and sounded nothing like anyone had ever heard before. The problems came when fun and exciting music turned into <\/span>exoticizing<\/span><\/i>. Josephine Baker, a black woman born in St. Louis, Missouri, contributed with the exoticization of black people in <\/span>La Revue N\u00e8gre. <\/span><\/i>\u201cIt is certain that the show was designed to play on [the idea that authentic jazz was a direct offshoot of <\/span>la music negr\u00e9<\/span><\/i>], as well as to reify the exotic and primitivist stereotypes associated with<\/span> la negr\u00e9<\/span><\/i> [..] <\/span>La Revue N\u00e8gre <\/span><\/i>succeeded in conforming to age-old fantasies about exotic <\/span>negr\u00e9<\/span><\/i> swirling in the French cultural imagination [1].\u201d Critics called the show \u201c\u2018authentic\u2019 and \u2018raw\u2019,\u201d and as the \u201cepitome of avant-garde [1]\u201d. Au<\/span>diences \u201cscreamed with disdain and delight\u201d as they watched a topless Josephine Baker move in an \u201cacrobatic epilepsy of tortuous gestures and hallucinatory spirals [1].\u201d Andr\u00e9 Levinson was absorbed in the \u201cbeauty of black dance, its marvellous flexibility and rhythmic fantasy, were the product of an innate gift, not a conscious art- a gift that has more or less atrophied in the cultivated human being [2].\u201d Yikes. African Americans were apparently not cultivated<\/span><\/i> enough, and this allowed them to have incredible dancing skills.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n

\"\"
This minstrel poster advertising La Revue N\u00e8gre is proof that Parisians were dehumanizing African Americans.<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

All cultivations aside, the show was a smashing hit. But not for everyone, especially a man named Ren\u00e9 Bizet. Bizet was outraged that a nearly-naked Baker was performing in his sacred performance hall, which \u201c<\/span>should<\/span><\/i> be<\/span><\/i> a place for performances as civilized and sophisticated as their audiences [1].\u201d Yikes again. \u201cBizet believed the popularity of the show was symptomatic of a decrease in refined taste within French culture [1].\u201d Honestly, it\u2019s hard to win in this situation. On one hand- if you\u2019re a French person fully supporting and loving the show, you are uncivilized, unsophisticated, and in support of the \u201cheathen\u201d ideas the show promotes. On the other hand- if you\u2019re like Ren\u00e9 Bizet with your nose stuck up in the air laughing at those who think that <\/span>La Revue N\u00e8gre <\/span><\/i>is \u201chigh art\u201d doesn\u2019t that make you just as bad? I don\u2019t think either side had a respect for black culture, and that\u2019s why I think 1920s Parisians really <\/span>did not <\/span><\/i>love, respect, or celebrate African American artists. I believe at first, parisians were a lot like me in ballet at six years old, discovering something new for the first time and filled with excitement. <\/span>La Revue N\u00e8gre <\/span><\/i>proves that the French took this innocent wonder and gave it a good old-fashioned colonist spin, and African Americans became nothing more than a loveable sideshow.<\/span><\/p>\n

 <\/p>\n

Sources<\/p>\n

[1] Jordan, Matthew F. Le Jazz: Jazz and French Cultural Identity<\/em>. University of Illinois Press, 2010.<\/p>\n

[2] Acocella, Joan and Lynn Garafola. Andr\u00e9 Levinson on Dance: writings from Paris in the twenties<\/em>. Wesleyan University Press, 1991.\u00a0<\/span><\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"

When I was six years old I took ballet. For the final recital, myself and ten other small, suburban white girls dressed in tiny black tutu\u2019s danced to \u201cWhat a Wonderful World\u201d by Louis Armstrong. It\u2019s a good memory that has stayed with me for my entire life. Six-year-old me did not see Louis Armstrong […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2010,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[1],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-507","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-uncategorized"],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/performinghistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/507","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/performinghistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/performinghistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/performinghistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2010"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/performinghistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=507"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/performinghistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/507\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":512,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/performinghistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/507\/revisions\/512"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/performinghistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=507"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/performinghistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=507"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/pages.stolaf.edu\/performinghistory\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=507"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}