Black Bodies, White Gazes: The Continuing Significance of Race in America

318 Pages·2017·21.15 MB·English

by  George Yancy

Black Bodies, White Gazes

Black Bodies,

White Gazes
The Continuing Significance
of Race in America
Second Edition
George Yancy

ROWMAN & LITTLEFIELD
Lanham • Boulder • New York • London
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Copyright © 2017 by Rowman & Littlefield
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without written permission from the publisher, except by a reviewer who may quote
passages in a review.
British Library Cataloguing in Publication Information Available
Library of Congress Cataloging- in- Publication Data
Names: Yancy, George, author.

Title: Black bodies, white gazes: the continuing significance of race
in America / George Yancy.
Description: Second Edition. | Lanham: Rowman & Littlefield, 2016. |
Includes index.
Identifiers: LCCN 2016038669 (print) | LCCN 2016041887 (ebook) |
ISBN 9781442258341 (cloth : alk. paper) | ISBN 9781442258365 (pbk. : alk. paper) |
ISBN 9781442258358 (Electronic)
Subjects: LCSH: African Americans. | Racism—United States. |
United States—Race relations.
Classification: LCC E185 .Y32 2016 (print) | LCC E185 (ebook) |
DDC 305.800973—dc23
LC record available at https://lccn.loc.gov/2016038669
The paper used in this publication meets the minimum requirements of American
National Standard for Information Sciences—P ermanence of Paper for Printed Library
Materials, ANSI/ NISO Z39.48- 1992.
Printed in the United States of America
For all bodies that suffer

Contents

Foreword ix
Preface to the Second Edition xiii
Acknowledgments xxv
Introduction xxix
1 Black Bodies and the Myth of a Post- Racial America 1
2 The Elevator Effect: Black Bodies/ White Bodies 17
3 The Return of the Black Body: Nine Vignettes 51
4 The Agential Black Body: Resisting the Black Imago
in the White Imaginary 105
5 Exposing the Serious World of Whiteness through Frederick
Douglass’s Autobiographical Reflections 125
6 Desiring Bluest Eyes, Desiring Whiteness: The Black Body
as Torn Asunder 169
7 Whiteness as Ambush and the Transformative Power
of Vigilance 217
8 White Embodied Gazing, the Black Body as Disgust,
and the Aesthetics of Un- Suturing 243
Index 263
About the Author 275
vii