How the Arabian Nights Inspired the American Dream, 1790-1935 - Hardcover

Nance, Susan

3.6

5 ratings by Goodreads

9780807832745: How the Arabian Nights Inspired the American Dream, 1790-1935

Hardcover

ISBN 10: 080783274X ISBN 13: 9780807832745

Publisher: University of North Carolina Press, 2009

View all copies of this ISBN edition:

Americans have always shown a fascination with the people, customs, and legends of the "East--witness the popularity of the stories of the Arabian Nights, the performances of Arab belly dancers and acrobats, the feats of turban-wearing vaudeville magicians, and even the antics of fez-topped Shriners. In this captivating volume, Susan Nance provides a social and cultural history of this highly popular genre of Easternized performance in America up to the Great Depression.

According to Nance, these traditions reveal how a broad spectrum of Americans, including recent immigrants and impersonators, behaved as producers and consumers in a rapidly developing capitalist economy. In admiration of the Arabian Nights, people creatively reenacted Eastern life, but these performances were also demonstrations of Americans' own identities, Nance argues. The story of Aladdin, made suddenly rich by rubbing an old lamp, stood as a particularly apt metaphor for how consumer capitalism might benefit each person. The leisure, abundance, and contentment that many imagined were typical of Eastern life were the same characteristics used to define "the American dream."

The recent success of Disney's Aladdin movies suggests that many Americans still welcome an interpretation of the East as a site of incredible riches, romance, and happy endings. This abundantly illustrated account is the first by a historian to explain why and how so many Americans sought out such cultural engagement with the Eastern world long before geopolitical concerns became paramount.

"synopsis" may belong to another edition of this title.

Book Description:

"Nance's original research appraises a variety of performances of and by West Asian 'orientals' as gendered fantasies of leisure and power within American consumer capitalism. Her book introduces a colorful array of entertaining individuals and reveals new insights about such groups as the Shriners and African American Muslims as it expands the dimensions of transnational cultural history."--Timothy Marr, University of North Carolina, author of The Cultural Roots of American Islamicism

About the Author:

Susan Nance is assistant professor of U.S. history at the University of Guelph in Ontario, Canada.

"About this title" may belong to another edition of this title.