Stepping out of the darkness, the American emerges upon the stage of history as a new character, as puzzling to himself as to others. American Humor, Constance Rourke's pioneering "study of the national character," singles out the archetypal figures of the Yankee peddler, the backwoodsman, and the blackface minstrel to illuminate the fundamental role of popular culture in fashioning a distinctive American sensibility. A memorable performance in its own right, American Humor crackles with the jibes and jokes of generations while presenting a striking picture of a vagabond nation in perpetual self-pursuit. Davy Crockett and Henry James, Jim Crow and Emily Dickinson rub shoulders in a work that inspired such later critics as Pauline Kael and Lester Bangs and which still has much to say about the America of Bob Dylan and Thomas Pynchon, Bill Clinton and George W. Bush.
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CONSTANCE ROURKE (1885–1941) was a historian, anthropologist, and critic who revolutionized the study of American culture. Born in Cleveland, Ohio, and educated at Vassar and the Sorbonne, she spent most of her life in Grand Rapids, Michigan. Her influential studies of American life include Trumpets of Jubilee (1927), Troupers of the Gold Coast (1928), and the biographies Davy Crockett (1928), Audubon (1936), and Charles Sheeler: Artist in the American Tradition (1938). Her most famous work remains American Humor: A Study of the National Character, recognized as a classic from its publication in 1931. Rourke devoted her later life to "living research," exploring regional culture, from Shaker furniture to African-American song, and Western folk tales. She died in 1941, after falling on an icy porch.
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cobs twist your hair, duden day, duden duden duden, comic trio, comic poetry Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
New England, Mark Twain, New York, Henry James, Jack Downing, Brother Joe, Civil War, New Orleans, Yankee Doodle, United States, Emily Dickinson, Our American Cousin, Zip Coon, Mike Fink, Main Street, Dan Tucker, King Saul, Artemus Ward, Bret Harte, Andrew Jackson, South Seas, Jim Crow, Reverend Samuel Peters, Tyrone Power, San Francisco Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
cobs twist your hair, duden day, duden duden duden, comic trio, comic poetry Key Phrases - Capitalized Phrases (CAPs): (learn more)
New England, Mark Twain, New York, Henry James, Jack Downing, Brother Joe, Civil War, New Orleans, Yankee Doodle, United States, Emily Dickinson, Our American Cousin, Zip Coon, Mike Fink, Main Street, Dan Tucker, King Saul, Artemus Ward, Bret Harte, Andrew Jackson, South Seas, Jim Crow, Reverend Samuel Peters, Tyrone Power, San Francisco Browse Sample Pages:
Front Cover | Table of Contents | First Pages | Index | Back Cover | Surprise Me!
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- Western Rivermen, 1763-1861: Ohio and Mississippi Boatmen and the Myth of the Alligator Horse by Michael Allen on page 7, page 70, and Back Matter
- Randy Newman: American Dreams by Kevin Courrier in Front Matter, page 17, and Back Matter
- Manly Arts: Masculinity and Nation in Early American Cinema by David A. Gerstner in Back Matter (1), and Back Matter (2)
- Hip: The History by John Leland on page 168, and Back Matter
- Nowhere in America: The Big Rock Candy Mountain and Other Comic Utopias (Folklore and Society) by Hal Rammel on page 29, and Back Matter
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