Barbershops, Bibles, and BET: Everyday Talk and Black Political Thought - Hardcover

Harris-Lacewell, Melissa Victoria

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 0691114056 ISBN 13: 9780691114057

Publisher: Princeton University Press, 2004

Synopsis

What is the best way to understand black political ideology? Just listen to the everyday talk that emerges in public spaces, suggests Melissa Harris-Lacewell. And listen this author has--to black college students talking about the Million Man March and welfare, to Southern, black Baptists discussing homosexuality in the church, to black men in a barbershop early on a Saturday morning, to the voices of hip-hop music and Black Entertainment Television.

Using statistical, experimental, and ethnographic methods Barbershops, Bibles, and B.E.T offers a new perspective on the way public opinion and ideologies are formed at the grassroots level. The book makes an important contribution to our understanding of black politics by shifting the focus from the influence of national elites in opinion formation to the influence of local elites and people in daily interaction with each other. Arguing that African Americans use community dialogue to jointly develop understandings of their collective political interests, Harris-Lacewell identifies four political ideologies that constitute the framework of contemporary black political thought: Black Nationalism, Black Feminism, Black Conservatism and Liberal Integrationism. These ideologies, the book posits, help African Americans to understand persistent social and economic inequality, to identify the significance of race in that inequality, and to devise strategies for overcoming it.

About this title

From the Publisher

Winner of the 2005 Best Book Award, Racial and Ethnic Political Identities, Ideologies and Theories Category of the Race, Ethnicity, and Politics Section, American Political Science Association.

Co-Winner of the 2005 W.E.B. Du Bois Book Award, National Conference of Black Political Scientists

From the Inside Flap

"While sociologists have produced wonderful ethnographic works on the black community, few have explained the political relevance of discourse in these communities. Harris-Lacewell links public discourse with ideology formation and political behavior in a way that is compelling, new, and important."--Andrea Simpson, University of Richmond, author of The Tie that Binds

Edition details

• Publisher: Princeton University Press
• Publication date: 2004
• ISBN 10: 0691114056
• ISBN 13: 9780691114057
• Binding: Hardcover
• Language: English
• Edition number: 1
• Number of pages: 368