Dixie bound : a cultural biography of an American legend, 1860-1930
Abstract/Contents
- Abstract
- Few songs have gained as enduring and contradictory a national legacy as "I Wish I Was in Dixie's Land." The tune was first performed in New York City on the minstrel stage and adapted to new lyrics by Civil War soldiers. President Lincoln requested its performance the day after Appomattox and, though still associated with the Confederate anthem today, it has encouraged generations of Americans to reflect on their national heritage by whistling and wishing that they were in a place called Dixie. But Dixie is not necessarily, or historically, synonymous with the American South. Over the past two centuries, Dixie has played a dominant role in shaping American popular culture, a role derived only in part from Dixie's Southern connotations. By charting Dixie's scandalous and enthralling journey over the turn of the century, Dixie Bound establishes an historical framework for understanding Dixie as a national literary phenomenon that began long before Scarlett and Rhett. Building an archive of previously unexamined tunes, texts, and visual artifacts, this study traces Dixie's circulation from the start of the Civil War through the rise of Tin Pan Alley and Dixieland jazz. These early appearances offer a dramatic counterpoint to present-day notions of Dixie and particularly to our presumptions about Dixie's racial and regional past. Precisely by turning back to the early history of Dixie, Dixie Bound provides necessary insight into the song's unsettling legacy today.
Description
| Type of resource | text |
|---|---|
| Form | electronic; electronic resource; remote |
| Extent | 1 online resource. |
| Publication date | 2014 |
| Issuance | monographic |
| Language | English |
Creators/Contributors
| Associated with | Perkins, Sarah |
|---|---|
| Associated with | Stanford University, Department of English. |
| Primary advisor | Jones, Gavin |
| Thesis advisor | Jones, Gavin |
| Thesis advisor | Elam, Michele |
| Thesis advisor | Rampersad, Arnold |
| Thesis advisor | Richardson, Judith |
| Advisor | Elam, Michele |
| Advisor | Rampersad, Arnold |
| Advisor | Richardson, Judith |
Subjects
| Genre | Theses |
|---|
Bibliographic information
| Statement of responsibility | Sarah Perkins. |
|---|---|
| Note | Submitted to the Department of English. |
| Thesis | Thesis (Ph.D.)--Stanford University, 2014. |
| Location | electronic resource |
Access conditions
- Copyright
- © 2014 by Sarah Jane Perkins
- License
- This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution Non Commercial 3.0 Unported license (CC BY-NC).
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