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JVN dissertation april 17.pdf (9.21 MB)

ETD Abstract Container

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The Future of the Race: Black Americans' Debates Over Interracial Marriage

Vinas-Nelson, Jessica
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu155557927861785

Abstract Details

2019, Doctor of Philosophy, Ohio State University, History.
While much has been written about white fears over the “danger” of interracial marriage, little has been devoted to understanding black perspectives—how Black Americans thought and talked about the topic. This dissertation examines debates among Black Americans about interracial marriage in the late 19th and early 20th centuries. Many personally opposed interracial marriage, but they publicly defended and fought for the legal right to such unions. Their fight became an integral part of the battle to gain basic citizenship rights and helped forge a collective identity as they offered, and argued over, competing solutions for racial advancement and visions of the future of the race. Examining Black Americans’ internal debates reveals much about their intra-racial tensions, intraracial cooperation, racial identity formation, and the evolution of thought and strategy over time. The dissertation uncovers a vigorous debate with a diverse set of opinions, paradoxes, and complex implications for African American and American history. Black proponents and opponents of interracial marriage alike sought their race’s collective advancement and attainment of rights and did so in part by projecting a particular community image. The study therefore engages with notions of respectability, uplift, patriarchy, power, privilege, gender, and sexuality. Altogether, the study broadens understanding of “the Long Civil Rights Movement.”
Stephanie Shaw (Advisor)
Paula Baker (Committee Member)
Kenneth Goings (Committee Member)
327 p.
African American Studies; African Americans; American History; Black History; Black Studies; History
African American History; Black Intellectual History; Interracial Marriage; Amalgamation; Miscegenation; Racial Formation; Respectability; Uplift; Rights

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Vinas-Nelson, J. (2019). The Future of the Race: Black Americans' Debates Over Interracial Marriage [Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu155557927861785

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Vinas-Nelson, Jessica. The Future of the Race: Black Americans' Debates Over Interracial Marriage. 2019. Ohio State University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu155557927861785.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Vinas-Nelson, Jessica. "The Future of the Race: Black Americans' Debates Over Interracial Marriage." Doctoral dissertation, Ohio State University, 2019. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=osu155557927861785

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

osu155557927861785
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© 2019, all rights reserved.
This open access ETD is published by The Ohio State University and OhioLINK.
Release 3.2.12