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WORK TITLE: Rhythms of Race
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http://class.georgiasouthern.edu/history/home/faculty/abreu/ * https://www.uncpress.org/book/9781469620848/rhythms-of-race/
RESEARCHER NOTES:
PERSONAL
Married; husband’s name Eric.
EDUCATION:Ursinus College, B.A., 2004; Purdue University, M.A., 2006; University of Michigan, Ph.D., 2012.
ADDRESS
CAREER
Writer and educator. Georgia Southern University, Statesboro, assistant professor of history.
AWARDS:Fellowships from Purdue University and the University of Michigan.
WRITINGS
Contributor to periodicals, including the Journal of Historical Biography, Journal of Sport History, and Latin American Music Review.
SIDELIGHTS
Christina D. Abreu is a writer and educator. She holds a bachelor’s degree from Ursinus College, a master’s degree from Purdue University, and a Ph.D. from the University of Michigan. Abreu is an assistant professor in the history department at Georgia Southern University. Her research is focused on Latino/a history, culture, migration, race, and music. She has written articles that have appeared in academic journals, including the Journal of Historical Biography, Journal of Sport History, and Latin American Music Review.
In 2015, Abreu released her first book, Rhythms of Race: Cuban Musicians and the Making of Latino New York City and Miami, 1940-1960. In this volume, she summarizes the contributions of Cuban musicians to the culture of two major U.S. cities, focusing on the middle portion of the twentieth century. Abreu draws her information from periodicals, other printed documents, and interviews with those connected to or knowledgeable about the Cuban music scene. The book begins with an introduction and goes on to focus on Cubans’ place in the Latino community in New York City during the era in the first chapter. Abreu explains how African ethnic backgrounds influence Cubans’ cultural identity. In the following two chapters, she examines social clubs in the United States and how Cuban Americans figured into them. Chapter four finds Abreu looks into how Cubans were represented in print media. She highlights music festivals that featured Cuban artists and identifies the ways in which those artists were introduced or described. In chapter five, Abreu discusses the portrayal of Cuban musicians in television programs geared toward an Anglo-American audience. She focuses in part on the Ricky Ricardo character on the I Love Lucy television show, who was played by the Cuban actor and musician Desi Arnaz. The final chapter of the book finds Abreu examining the Latinization of Miami, Florida.
Critics offered favorable assessments of Rhythms of Race. Mario Rey, a contributor to the Journal of Southern History, described the volume as “a sprawling, yet detailed account that advances our understanding of Cuban American popular music practices and racial discourses.” Rey also stated: “The critical analysis of the historical data presented provides an insightful tool for the study of music production as a vehicle facilitating the articulation of hyphenated identities. Rhythms of Race is a valuable addition to the Latino music-making historiography.” “This significant study helps elucidate the multiple evolving meanings of Cubanidad and Latino/a identity in the U.S.,” asserted B.A. Lucero in Choice: Current Reviews for Academic Libraries. Lucero categorized the book as “highly recommended.”
BIOCRIT
PERIODICALS
Choice: Current Reviews for Academic Libraries, September, 2015, B.A. Lucero, review of Rhythms of Race: Cuban Musicians and the Making of Latino New York City and Miami, 1940-1960, p. 76.
Journal of Southern History, November, 2016, Mario Rey, review of Rhythms of Race, p. 969.
ONLINE
Georgia Southern University Web site, http://class.georgiasouthern.edu/ (July 17, 2017), faculty profile.*
Christina Abreu is assistant professor of history at Georgia Southern University.
Dr. Christina D. Abreu
Assistant Professor of History (2013) Abreu
B.A. (2004) Ursinus College
M.A. (2006) Purdue University
Ph.D. (2012) University of Michigan
Teaching and Research Interests:
Latinos/as in the United States, Modern Caribbean (especially Cuba),
Music and popular culture, Comparative race and ethnicity,
International migration and Transnationalism, African Diaspora
Upper division courses:
Cuba from Emancipation to Revolution
Latinos/as in the U.S.
Modern Caribbean
Popular Culture in America
Website:
Twitter: https://twitter.com/ChristinaDAbreu
Contact Information:
Department of History
Georgia Southern University
P. O. Box 8054
Statesboro, GA 30460-8054
Office: 1207 Forest Drive Bldg.
Tel.: (912) 478-5797
cdabreu@georgiasouthern.edu
Selected Publications:
Rhythms of Race: Cuban Musicians and the Making of Latino New York City and Miami, 1940-1960 (University of North Carolina Press, Spring 2015).
“Huber Matos and Cuba Independiente y Democrática (CID): Exile Leadership beyond Cuban Miami’s Geo-Political Borders.” Journal of Historical Biography 15, no. 1 (2014): 34-71.
“The Story of Benny ‘Kid’ Paret: Cuban Boxers, the Cuban Revolution, and the U.S. Media, 1959-1962.” Journal of Sport History 38, no. 1 (Spring 2011): 401-419.
“Celebrity, ‘Crossover,’ and Cubanidad: Celia Cruz as ‘La Reina de Salsa,’ 1971-2003.” Latin American Music Review 28, no. 1 (Spring/Summer 2007): 94-124.
Current Research
“Freddie Prinze, Chico and the Man, and the Racialization of Latino Humor” (article in progress)
Nitza Villapol: The Life and Times of a Cuban Culinarian (proposed next book project)
Professional Activities, Honors, and Awards:
Rackham Merit Fellowship, University of Michigan, 2006-2011
Strategic Initiatives Fellowship, Purdue University, 2005-2006
Lynn Fellowship, Purdue University, 2004-2005
Advanced Placement U.S. History Examination Reader
Last updated: 11/10/2014
QUOTED: "a sprawling, yet detailed account that advances our understanding of Cuban American popular music practices and racial discourses."
"The critical analysis of the historical data presented provides an insightful tool for the study of music production as a vehicle facilitating the articulation of hyphenated identities. Rhythms of Race is a valuable addition to the Latino music-making historiography."
Rhythms of Race: Cuban Musicians and the Making of Latino New York City and Miami, 1940-1960
Mario Rey
82.4 (Nov. 2016): p969.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2016 Southern Historical Association
http://www.uga.edu/~sha
Rhythms of Race: Cuban Musicians and the Making of Latino New York City and Miami, 1940-1960. By Christina D. Abreu. Envisioning Cuba. (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2015. Pp. xvi, 303. Paper, $29.95, ISBN 978-1-4696-2084-8.)
In Rhythms of Race: Cuban Musicians and the Making of Latino New York City and Miami, 1940-1960, Christina D. Abreu presents a reconstruction of the experiences and contributions of racially diverse Cuban musicians to the commercial music entertainment industry of the mid-twentieth-century United States. Mining oral history interviews, archival news sources, and print media, Abreu offers a comparative analysis of cultural self-representations in the diasporic enclaves of New York and Miami, focusing on popular music production and consumption and their role in the local construction of Latino identity.
The book is organized in six chapters framed by an introduction and a brief conclusion. In the first chapter, Abreu examines the professional lives and participation of musicians in New York's Hispanic community, positioning Afro-Cubanness as central to nationalistic cultural reaffirmation, while problematizing "Cuban" and "Latin" as static identity categories. Chapters 2 and 3 investigate the racial component in Cuban American associational life, underscoring the exclusionary practices sanctioned by the social clubs and community institutions that forged separate discursive spaces and challenged the fluidity of identity categories. In chapter 4, Abreu uses print culture to explore the maintenance of cultural memory in the promotion of Cubanness within music festivals and contests, underlining the use of Afro-Cuban idioms in such forums. Chapter 5 centers on dance hall performance of Cubanness for English-speaking audiences, exploring the fictionalized narratives of Desi Amaz as Ricky Ricardo in the television program I Love Lucy. Chapter 6 relocates the narrative to the social spaces associated with Miami's tourism industry, tracing the city's "Latinization" before the mass influx and politicization of Cuban exiles after the 1959 revolution (p. 4).
Clearly, the book does not provide a balance of historical coverage between the two cities in a comprehensive manner. Abreu surprisingly devotes only one chapter to Miami, a curious imbalance given the city's subsequent status as the capital of the Latin recording industry. This disproportion undermines her assertion of an active Cuban presence before the revolution of 1959 and weakens the comparative approach implicit in the book's title. While the chapters contain substantive information speckled with many astute observations, there are also redundancies in content. Moreover, the persistent racialized readings and color categorizations that understandably permeate the study may become wearisome to the reader.
These criticisms notwithstanding, Abreu's historiographical approach is successful on the whole. Addressing postmodern preoccupations with cultural displacement and the varied constructs of identity, ethnicity, and nationality, she engages many provocative issues that intersect with music, including the effects of race on the attribution of musical authenticity, the purveyance of exotica, the dispensation of Jim Crow laws with regard to black "otherness," and the notion of "black innovation and white commercialization" (p. 73).
Abreu's avoidance of musical transcriptions and specialized terminology renders the book accessible to general readership. The multilayered narratives are suited to both undergraduates and casual readers interested in Latino cultural studies, musical migrations, and identity politics. While the Floridian locus deserves a more thorough treatment, the book is nonetheless a sprawling, yet detailed account that advances our understanding of Cuban American popular music practices and racial discourses as they existed before the postrevolution period that currently dominates Cuban cultural studies. The critical analysis of the historical data presented provides an insightful tool for the study of music production as a vehicle facilitating the articulation of hyphenated identities. Rhythms of Race is a valuable addition to the Latino music-making historiography.
MARIO REY
East Carolina University
Rey, Mario
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Rey, Mario. "Rhythms of Race: Cuban Musicians and the Making of Latino New York City and Miami, 1940-1960." Journal of Southern History, vol. 82, no. 4, 2016, p. 969+. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA470867717&it=r&asid=4888c9c8a9ed8246fa40801461726181. Accessed 21 June 2017.
QUOTED: "This significant study helps elucidate the multiple evolving meanings of Cubanidad and Latino/a identity in the US."
"highly recommended."
Gale Document Number: GALE|A470867717
Abreu, Christina D.: Rhythms of race: Cuban musicians and the making of Latino New York City and Miami, 1940-1960
B.A. Lucero
53.1 (Sept. 2015): p76.
Copyright: COPYRIGHT 2015 American Library Association CHOICE
http://www.ala.org/acrl/choice/about
Abreu, Christina D. Rhythms of race: Cuban musicians and the making of Latino New York City and Miami, 1940-1960. North Carolina, 2015. 303p bibl index afp ISBN 9781469620848 pbk, $29.95
53-0143
ML480
2014-34895 CIP
Rhythms of Race examines the ways Cuban musicians in New York and Miami contributed to the formation of Cuban and Latino identity and community. Abreu (history, Georgia Southern Univ.) focuses on the 1940s and 1950s, bridging two chronological poles that have typically defined studies of Cuban migration: the turn of the 20th century and the period following the 1959 Cuban Revolution. Abreu emphasizes the everyday ideas and experiences of black and white Cuban musicians in these centers of Latino/a identity, juxtaposing them with the popular representations of Cuban and Latin culture that prevailed in the mid-century US. One of the most fascinating aspects of this textured account is the author's emphasis on the multiplicity of Cuban musical and cultural authenticities, a framework that enables her to examine the diverging understandings of race and nationality among black and white Cubans while decentering elite white experiences of Cuban migration to the US. Dialoguing with some of the most important scholarship in the field, this significant study helps elucidate the multiple evolving meanings of Cubanidad and Latino/a identity in the US. Summing Up: *** Highly recommended. All readers.--B. A. Lucero, University of Texas-Pan American
Lucero, B.A.
Source Citation (MLA 8th Edition)
Lucero, B.A. "Abreu, Christina D.: Rhythms of race: Cuban musicians and the making of Latino New York City and Miami, 1940-1960." CHOICE: Current Reviews for Academic Libraries, Sept. 2015, p. 76. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA428874744&it=r&asid=f4c2bbe3ac17c4710ad5562e6c60b025. Accessed 21 June 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A428874744