Michael Jackson and the Blackface Mask

In this expanded, all-new edition, this book argues for the tangible relationship between Jackson and blackface minstrelsy. It reveals the dialogue at minstrelsy's core and, in its broader sense, tracks a centuries-long pattern of racial oppression and its resistance and how that has been played out in popular theatre.

Harriet J. Manning is Associate Researcher at Newcastle University, UK.

Introduction: Michael Jackson and the Afterlife of Blackface Minstrelsy 1. 'Billie Jean' at Motown 25: Blackface Minstrelsy for a New Generation 2. 'Weel About and Turn About and Do Jis So': The Demands and Desires of Antebellum Minstrel Theatre 3. 'It's Black, It's White': Hollywood, Racial Stereotypes and the Blackface Mask 4. 'We Wear the Mask That Grins and Lies': The Black Minstrel Tradition 5. 'Wacko Jacko': Michael Jackson's Misrepresentation and Its Strategic Resistance 6. 'The Truth of Lust, Woman to Man': The (Re)masculation of Michael Jackson 7. 'Come and Rescue Me Out of This Storm': The Question of Michael Jackson's Legacy