SSR #1

Ryan Um

Due Date: 02-19-2018

Professor Brooks

English 320

SSR #1: The Sounds of Race

Summary:

            In chapter fourth of The Sonic Color Line, Jennifer Lynn Stoever talks about the relationship between Richard Wright, an American novelist, and Huddie “Lead Belly” Ledbetter, an American musician. Throughout the chapter there are notes that concerned audiences with the media that they were producing, most notably, Stoever writes that Ledbetter was “... simultaneously ‘too black’ and ‘not black enough’...” (Stoever, 181). This strange phenomenon was determined to be two different voices that were speaking their opinions. It seemed that, without Ledbetter meaning for it too, his music was trying to appeal to both audiences at the same time but consequently alienating both groups: a trend has always been abundant in society despite trying to eliminate the racial undertones of sound.

Synthesis:

            In chapter two, Stoever explains the significance of singers Jenny Lind and Elizabeth Taylor Greenfield and how, while sang very similar songs, appealed to different audiences for various reasons, one of which includes the comparison between their voices and their physical appearance. Greenfield was often seen as either “betraying” her black heritage or “contaminating” the white voice by singing opera songs (Stoever, 79). First judgement of Greenfield’s songs did not come from her musical abilities and instead focused on her appearance as a black woman. To a certain extent, there was judgement on Lind’s part as well; many people depicted Lind as someone who looked as well as she sounded. While the sentiment comes from the same place, the implication becomes the more disturbing part of the analysis. Besides some of the differences in their voices (timbre, pitch, etc.) it seems like the only difference between the two come from their race. In fact, when it came to judge their prejudice by listening to Greenfield without using their eyes, they found that they could enjoy the music better (Stoever, 115). Whether people like to mention it or not, race plays a big role into how you perceive an artist and how that music genre is impacting you as a person.

            Chapter three introduces the Jubilee Singers who took the blind listening factor people had for Greenfield to a whole new level. Instead of simply having people close their eyes to enjoy the music better and yield better results from their music, W. E. B. Dubois wanted to completely eliminate race as a factor when people were listening to the artist. He would have them perform behind a curtain and then reveal them when the time was right (132). The fact that they had to listen to music in such a way in order to enjoy it fully shows the prejudice that was instilled in listening as well as seeing. They challenged the sonic color line, but it was made very clear that they only way that they were going to become popular in the first place was if they were to hide their identity. In the end, it seemed like the only interest white people had in the music that was displayed by the Jubilee Singers were the differences in style that they were more used to listening to (Stoever, 143). This yields its own issues. When people are not appreciating the fine works that they were trying to do in bringing their own culture around the world, it makes it difficult for anyone to actually take them seriously.

            In the end though, race is a made up function to try and get people to distinguish between different groups of people. People assign different names to the sounds that they hear and what they perceive to be “black” and “white” can be different from person to person. It is a stereotype that we give in our heads. In cases in America, whatever seemed to be in “defiance of the norms” was deemed to be “black” and not “white” while the opposite was true as well (Stoever, 33). It also explains why we perceive things differently and attempt to find race in things that do not really need to be classified as such. On page 35, Stoever even states that “Douglass and Jacobs expose the partiality of white listening practices and the enabling privilege of whites…” Allowing this distinction to still occur allows people to distinguish improperly between people and genres. It is like trying to figure out the end of a story without reading the entire book.

            Even in the introduction, this phenomena can still be evident. Stoever tells us that when she was writing this book in a coffee shop, there were some people who were interested in the topic that she was trying to write about. This often ended in a typically racist depiction of what they think “black” sounds like (assuming that the person who asked her was white to begin with) (Stoever, 8). Even without trying to be intentionally racist, people already have what they perceived to be “white” and “black” in their heads. Internally judging whatever is given to them.

            In the early introduction to the Auditory Culture Reader, by Michael Bull and Les Back, they tell a story about someone auditioning for a part that required the actor to sing in a country accent. When they were done, the director asked for another accent as he thought that the one he had was not his real accent (Bull, 17). It becomes clear that because of the directors internalized notion of what he was supposed to sound like, he became frustrated when the face did not match the voice. Because he was of a certain race, he was expected to sound a certain way, but when he did not meet expectations, the director got frustrated.

Questions:

1.     In what ways does the “sonic color line” affect your daily life?

2.     Where in media can we see this difference in taste besides music?

Words: 953