Racial Innocence - (America and the Long 19th Century) by Robin Bernstein (Hardcover)

Book Synopsis

2013 Book Award Winner from the International Research Society in Children's Literature
2012 Outstanding Book Award Winner from the Association for Theatre in Higher Education
2012 Winner of the Lois P. Rudnick Book Prize presented by the New England American Studies Association
2012 Runner-Up, John Hope Franklin Publication Prize presented by the American Studies Association
2012 Honorable Mention, Distinguished Book Award presented by the Society for the Study of American Women Writers

Dissects how "innocence" became the exclusive province of white children, covering slavery to the Civil Rights era

Beginning in the mid nineteenth century in America, childhood became synonymous with innocence--a reversal of the previously-dominant Calvinist belief that children were depraved, sinful creatures. As the idea of childhood innocence took hold, it became racialized: popular culture constructed white children as innocent and vulnerable while excluding black youth from these qualities. Actors, writers, and visual artists then began pairing white children with African American adults and children, thus transferring the quality of innocence to a variety of racial-political projects--a dynamic that Robin Bernstein calls "racial innocence." This phenomenon informed racial formation from the mid nineteenth century through the early twentieth.

Racial Innocence takes up a rich archive including books, toys, theatrical props, and domestic knickknacks which Bernstein analyzes as "scriptive things" that invite or prompt historically-located practices while allowing for resistance and social improvisation. Integrating performance studies with literary and visual analysis, Bernstein offers singular readings of theatrical productions from blackface minstrelsy to Uncle Tom's Cabin to The Wonderful Wizard of Oz; literary works by Joel Chandler Harris, Harriet Wilson, and Frances Hodgson Burnett; material culture including Topsy pincushions, Uncle Tom and Little Eva handkerchiefs, and Raggedy Ann dolls; and visual texts ranging from fine portraiture to advertisements for lard substitute. Throughout, Bernstein shows how "innocence" gradually became the exclusive province of white children--until the Civil Rights Movement succeeded not only in legally desegregating public spaces, but in culturally desegregating the concept of childhood itself.

Review Quotes

"[T]antalizing [W]ith ethical finesse and theoretical dexterity, Bernsteins book explores. . . the extent to which our national reality has been a topsy-turvy one from the start."--Leo Cabranes-Grant "Theatre Survey"

"A historiographic tour de force . . . Her rich archive and nuanced analysis will make this a classic book for theater historians and performance theorists."-- "The Outstanding Book Award prize committee, Association for Theatre in Higher Education"

"A paradigm-shifting study of major significance."--Judie Newman "The Journal of American Studies"

"A powerhouse of a book. . . [an] intervention of the highest order. Racial Innocencewill quickly become a cornerstone text in many fields, ranging from critical race theory and performance studies to American cultural history and childhood studies."--Douglas A. Jones "Journal of Dramatic Theory and Criticism"

"A provocative, insightful, and bold text that demonstrates how important the field of cultural studies is and can be."--Jenny Wills "Jeunesse: Young People, Texts, Cultures"

"Arresting. . . shows how the hegemonic project of white supremacy takes constant reinforcement in popular forms to naturalize racist practices on the ground."--Jayna Brown "Callaloo"

"Bernstein masterfully balances important theoretical and methodological interventions alongside insightful analysis of everyday material."--Jasmine Nichole Cobb "Callaloo"

"Bernstein offers a new perspective by exploring not only what artifacts reveal but also what they demand."-- "Journal of American Culture"

"Bernstein's book will be of keen interest to those working to study either childhood or toy culture in the United States, as well as to scholars of critical race theory or postcolonial studies."--Aaron C. Thomas "Cultural Studies"

"Bernstein's text unfolds with a readerly pleasure few scholarly books achieve, as she offers stunning close readings while steadily constructing a compelling narrative arc built upon each piece of evidence."-- "Legacy"

"Bernsteins powerful account of how the sentimental ideology of childhood innocence, and particularly its highly gendered manifestations, function to articulate racial hierarchies gives strong and detailed evidence for how paying attention to childhood serves to refocus many all too familiar, and troublesome, facets of American culture. I know of virtually no one of her generation who writes with this kind of verve, authority and pleasure. Racial Innocence will prove an important and widely read bookin part simply because it will be so much fun to read."--Karen Sanchez-Eppler, Amherst College

"Chilling proof that the post-racial utopia is yet to be realized in American society."--Kam Williams, syndicated columnist

"Daringly imaginative."--Perry Nodelman "International Research for Children's Literature"

"Dazzling incredibly moving."--Sarah E. Chinn "American Quarterly"

"Far-reaching... important."--Matthew Davis "Genre"

"Fresh and astonishing."--Christian DuComb "Theatre Journal"

"Groundbreaking . . . radical."--Lisa Merrill "Theatre Annual"

"Impressively researched, cogently written, and deeply theorized. . . . [Bernstein shows how] harmless, innocent fun (as evidenced in an astonishing chapter on the minstrel roots of Raggedy Ann and Andy) became a disavowed site for the reproduction of white supremacy. . . . [M]akes an understated but highly persuasive case for the contribution of a historically-oriented performance studies to the interdisciplinary conversations surrounding the politics of the everyday."--Tavia Nyong'o "Theatre History Studies"

"Intellectual espresso."--Michelle McCrary "Is That Your Child?"

"Intellectually exhilarating."--Martha Saxton "The Journal of the History of Childhood and Youth"

"It is original, theoretically challenging, and adds fundamentally new insights to the history of childhood."-- "Prize Committee, Grace Abbott Best Book Award, Society for the History of Childhood and Youth"

"Magnificent and stylish truly groundbreaking."--Richard Flynn "The Lion and the Unicorn"

"Nineteenth and early twentieth-century material culture comes alive in Robin Bernsteins brilliant study of the racialized and gendered ideologies that shape, inform and continue to haunt notions of American childhood into the present day. Through imaginative and masterfully innovative archival research, Bernstein shows how representations of childhood and childs play are integral to the making of whiteness and blackness and citizenship in this country. Racial Innocence is a groundbreaking book that for the first time illuminates the powerful and critical connections between constructions of girlhood, racial formations and American popular culture."--Daphne Brooks, Princeton University

"One of those rare books that shifts the paradigm--a book that, in years to come, will be recognized as a landmark in children's literature and childhood studies . . . This is not one of those scholarly books that offer a thesis and then proceed to pummel the reader into submission by piling example on top of example. Instead, it develops a certain line of argument, and then turns, moving in a different direction, developing this new direction fully before changing tack once more. Structuring the argument this way makes for a much more interesting reading experience . . . [F]ew scholars can write a sentence like Bernstein can: packed with insight, theoretically sophisticated, and yet lucid--even, at times, lyrical..."--Philip Nel "Children's Literature"

"Racial Innocence is an invaluable contribution. . . it enlivens a diverse constellation of evidence, making it an exemplary model for any interdisciplinary project of similarly ambitious scope."--Meredith A. Bak "Journal of Popular Culture"

"Remarkably impressive. . . . Bernstein surprises us with the fractures we know."--Kathryn Bond Stockton "Modern Drama"

"Revelatory."--Anna Mae Duane "MELUS: Multi-Ethnic Literature of the US"

"Richly researched, inspiring in its analysis of archival material, and impressive in its deft ability to traverse disciplinary borders, including childhood studies, performance studies, literary studies, and American history. . . . Poignant. . . Bernsteins superb text hauntingly prompts the reader to consider where invocations of childhood are being used in contemporary US racial formation. At a time when black childhood performances have been front and center in American media discoursefor example, the circulating images of Trayvon Martin that were used to simultaneously evidence both the teenage innocent and the future-adult-thugRacial Innocencerequires the contemporary reader to resist feigning holy obliviousness" to the ways in which racial arguments can be cloaked in children and their toys."--Amma Ghartey-Tagoe Kootin "TDR: The Drama Review"

"Riveting."--Michelle H. Martin "Children's Literature Association Quarterly"

"Vibrant. . . [An] exemplary model of interdisciplinary scholarship."--Kristen B. Proehl "African American Review"

"You will never look at a Raggedy Ann doll the same way again."--Rebecca Onion "Backlist"

About the Author

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Robin Bernstein is Associate Professor of African and African American Studies and Studies of Women, Gender, and Sexuality at Harvard University. Her previous books include Cast Out: Queer Lives in Theater.