Anti-Imperialist Modernism

Race and Transnational Radical Culture from the Great Depression to the Cold War

Fiction & Literature, Literary Theory & Criticism, American
Cover of the book Anti-Imperialist Modernism by Benjamin Balthaser, University of Michigan Press
View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart
Author: Benjamin Balthaser ISBN: 9780472121502
Publisher: University of Michigan Press Publication: December 15, 2015
Imprint: University of Michigan Press Language: English
Author: Benjamin Balthaser
ISBN: 9780472121502
Publisher: University of Michigan Press
Publication: December 15, 2015
Imprint: University of Michigan Press
Language: English

Anti-Imperialist Modernism excavates how U.S. cross-border, multi-ethnic anti-imperialist movements at mid-century shaped what we understand as cultural modernism and the historical period of the Great Depression.  The book demonstrates how U.S. multiethnic cultural movements, located in political parties, small journals, labor unions, and struggles for racial liberation, helped construct a common sense of international solidarity that critiqued ideas of nationalism and essentialized racial identity. The book thus moves beyond accounts that have tended to view the pre-war “Popular Front” through tropes of national belonging or an abandonment of the cosmopolitanism of previous decades. Impressive archival research brings to light the ways in which a transnational vision of modernism and modernity was fashioned through anti-colonial networks of North/South solidarity.

Chapters examine farmworker photographers in California’s central valley, a Nez Perce intellectual traveling to the Soviet Union, imaginations of the Haitian Revolution, the memory of the U.S.–Mexico War, and U.S. radical writers traveling to Cuba. The last chapter examines how the Cold War foreclosed these movements within a nationalist framework, when activists and intellectuals had to suppress the transnational nature of their movements, often rewriting the cultural past to conform to a patriotic narrative of national belonging.

View on Amazon View on AbeBooks View on Kobo View on B.Depository View on eBay View on Walmart

Anti-Imperialist Modernism excavates how U.S. cross-border, multi-ethnic anti-imperialist movements at mid-century shaped what we understand as cultural modernism and the historical period of the Great Depression.  The book demonstrates how U.S. multiethnic cultural movements, located in political parties, small journals, labor unions, and struggles for racial liberation, helped construct a common sense of international solidarity that critiqued ideas of nationalism and essentialized racial identity. The book thus moves beyond accounts that have tended to view the pre-war “Popular Front” through tropes of national belonging or an abandonment of the cosmopolitanism of previous decades. Impressive archival research brings to light the ways in which a transnational vision of modernism and modernity was fashioned through anti-colonial networks of North/South solidarity.

Chapters examine farmworker photographers in California’s central valley, a Nez Perce intellectual traveling to the Soviet Union, imaginations of the Haitian Revolution, the memory of the U.S.–Mexico War, and U.S. radical writers traveling to Cuba. The last chapter examines how the Cold War foreclosed these movements within a nationalist framework, when activists and intellectuals had to suppress the transnational nature of their movements, often rewriting the cultural past to conform to a patriotic narrative of national belonging.

More books from University of Michigan Press

Cover of the book Congressional Parties, Institutional Ambition, and the Financing of Majority Control by Benjamin Balthaser
Cover of the book Facing It by Benjamin Balthaser
Cover of the book The Impossible Machine by Benjamin Balthaser
Cover of the book Microdramas by Benjamin Balthaser
Cover of the book The Politics of Intimacy by Benjamin Balthaser
Cover of the book Good Vibrations by Benjamin Balthaser
Cover of the book Acts by Benjamin Balthaser
Cover of the book Proofs of Genius by Benjamin Balthaser
Cover of the book The Social Life of Criticism by Benjamin Balthaser
Cover of the book Paul Wellstone by Benjamin Balthaser
Cover of the book Untimely Interventions by Benjamin Balthaser
Cover of the book The Role of the Judge in International Trade Regulation by Benjamin Balthaser
Cover of the book Competitiveness Matters by Benjamin Balthaser
Cover of the book Veto Power by Benjamin Balthaser
Cover of the book Slaves to Fashion by Benjamin Balthaser
We use our own "cookies" and third party cookies to improve services and to see statistical information. By using this website, you agree to our Privacy Policy