THE SONIC COLOR LINE
POSTMILLENNIAL POP
General Editors: Karen Tongson and Henry Jenkins
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Media Franchising: Creative License and Collaboration in the Culture Industries
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Your Ad Here: The Cool Sell of Guerrilla Marketing
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Looking for Leroy: Illegible Black Masculinities
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From Bombay to Bollywood: The Making of a Global Media Industry
Aswin Punathambekar
A Race So Different: Performance and Law in Asian America
Joshua Takano Chambers-Letson
Surveillance Cinema
Catherine Zimmer
Modernity’s Ear: Listening to Race and Gender in World Music
Roshanak Keshti
The New Mutants: Superheroes and the Radical Imagination of American Comics
Ramzi Fawaz
Restricted Access: Media, Disability, and the Politics of Participation
Elizabeth Ellcessor
The Sonic Color Line: Race and the Cultural Politics of Listening
Jennifer Lynn Stoever
The Sonic Color Line
Race and the Cultural Politics of Listening
Jennifer Lynn Stoever
NEW YORK UNIVERSITY PRESS
New York
NEW YORK UNIVERSITY PRESS
New York
© 2016 by New York University
All rights reserved
References to Internet websites (URLs) were accurate at the time of writing. Neither the author nor New York University Press is responsible for URLs that may have expired or changed since the manuscript was prepared.
ISBN: 978-1-4798-9043-9 (hardback)
ISBN: 978-1-4798-8934-1 (paperback)
For Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication data, please contact the Library of Congress.
New York University Press books are printed on acid-free paper, and their binding materials are chosen for strength and durability. We strive to use environmentally responsible suppliers and materials to the greatest extent possible in publishing our books.
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A book in the American Literatures Initiative (ALI), a collaborative publishing project of NYU Press, Fordham University Press, Rutgers University Press, Temple University Press, and the University of Virginia Press. The Initiative is supported by the Andrew W. Mellon Foundation. For more information, please visit www.americanliteratures.org.
CONTENTS
Introduction: The Sonic Color Line and the Listening Ear
4. “A Voice to Match All That”: Lead Belly, Richard Wright, and Lynching’s Soundtrack
5. Broadcasting Race: Lena Horne, W. E. B. Du Bois, and Ann Petry
For my grandma Maryanne (1923–2001), whose lovingly gruff, crumpled-paper-bag voice still carries me.
For my dad, Jeff (1948–2011), who first taught me how to listen, and whose brown Koss KO/747 headphones rest right next to my stereo.
For my son, Martin, who arrived amidst the writing of this book. You teach me to listen anew while letting me think I am teaching you. Your voice will always be my favorite sound. I love you more! Infinity!
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
“Can you sing out in the pouring rain? / Can you sing out, can you sing out?”
—Fishbone, “Pouring Rain”
In summer 2015, I was honored to thank Norwood Fisher and Angelo Moore of Fishbone in person for being my first,
