Contemporary Authors

• Blowin' Hot and Cool: Jazz and Its Critics University of Chicago Press (Chicago, IL), 2006
• Flavor and Soul: Italian America at Its African American Edge University of Chicago Press (Chicago, IL), 2017

1. Flavor and soul : Italian America at its African American edge LCCN 2016029051 Type of material Book Personal name Gennari, John, author. Main title Flavor and soul : Italian America at its African American edge / John Gennari. Published/Produced Chicago ; London : The University of Chicago Press, [2017] Description 295 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm ISBN 9780226428321 (cloth : alk. paper) CALL NUMBER E184.I8 G43 2017 CABIN BRANCH Copy 1 Request in Jefferson or Adams Building Reading Rooms - STORED OFFSITE 2. Blowin' hot and cool : jazz and its critics LCCN 2005030539 Type of material Book Personal name Gennari, John. Main title Blowin' hot and cool : jazz and its critics / John Gennari. Published/Created Chicago : University of Chicago Press, 2006. Description xiv, 480 p. ; 24 cm. ISBN 0226289222 (cloth : alk. paper) Links Table of contents only http://www.loc.gov/catdir/toc/ecip062/2005030539.html Contributor biographical information http://www.loc.gov/catdir/enhancements/fy0666/2005030539-b.html Publisher description http://www.loc.gov/catdir/enhancements/fy0666/2005030539-d.html CALL NUMBER ML3506 .G46 2006 Copy 1 Request in Performing Arts Reading Room (Madison, LM113) CALL NUMBER ML3506 .G46 2006 Copy 2 Request in Performing Arts Reading Room (Madison, LM113)

• University of Vermont - https://www.uvm.edu/~english/?Page=JohnGennari.php

  Faculty - John Gennari

  John Gennari
  John Gennari,
  Associate Professor
  Ph.D. Univesity of Pennsylvania, 1993
  C.V. (PDF)
  Area of expertise
  U.S. Ethnic Studies, Jazz Studies, Food Studies, Popular Culture and the Expressive Arts, U.S. Cultural History, Cultural Criticism
  Contact Information
  Email: john.gennari@uvm.edu
  Phone: (802) 656-3435 Office: 425 Old Mill
  Fall 2017 Office Hours: M, W 2:00 - 3:30 and by appointment
  John Gennari is an American Studies-trained U.S. cultural historian and nonfiction writer with specializations in jazz and popular music studies, Italian American cultural studies, food studies, race and ethnic studies, and cultural criticism. He is the author of “Blowin’ Hot and Cool: Jazz and Its Critics (University of Chicago Press, 2006), which won an ASCAP-Deems Taylor Award for Excellence in Music Criticism and the John Cawelti Award for the Best Book in American Culture. He is currently completing a book examining how practices of expressive ethnicity in music, film, sports, cooking, and eating reconfigure our understanding of Italian American culture. He has held fellowships from the National Endowment for the Humanities, the W.E.B. Du Bois Institute at Harvard University, and the Carter G. Woodson Institute at the University of Virginia. An active member of the American Studies Association since 1993, he chaired the association’s Gabriel Dissertation Prize committee in 2008, and served on the Romero Book Prize committee in 2010.

  Selected Publications:
  Blowin’ Hot and Cool: Jazz and Its Critics (University of Chicago Press, 2006)

  [Awarded the John G. Cawelti Award for the Best Book in American Culture Studies and the ASCAP-Deems Taylor Prize for Excellence in Music Criticism, 2007].

  “Sideline Shtick: The Italian American Basketball Coach and Ethnic Masculinity,” in Making Italian America: Consumer Culture and the Production of Ethnic Identities, ed. Simone Cinotto (New York: Fordham University Press, 2014).

  “The Knife and the Bread, the Brutal and the Sacred: Louise DeSalvo at the Family Table,” in Personal Effects: Essays on Memory, Culture, and Women in the Work of Louise DeSalvo, eds. Nancy Caronia and Edvige Giunta (New York: Fordham University Press, 2014).

  “Eccentric, Gifted, and Black: Thelonious Monk Revealed,” Du Bois Review 7:2 (2010)

  “The Other Side of the Curtain: U.S. Jazz Discourse, 1950s America, and the Cold War,” in Gertrude Pickhan and Rudiger Ritter, eds. Jazz Behind the Iron Curtain (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2010)

  “Blaxploitation Bird,” in Thriving on a Riff, ed. Graham Lock and David Murray (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008)

  Courses taught: Jazz, Literature, and Film; Italian American Literature and Culture; Food and American Culture; Multiracialism and American Culture; Black Popular Culture

• University of Vermont - https://www.uvm.edu/~english/documents/GennariJohnCV2017.pdf

  -1-
  JOHN GENNARI
  Associate Professor of English and Critical Race and Ethnic Studies
  University of Vermont
  Office address: Home address:
  Old Mill 425 28 Proctor Avenue
  Burlington, VT 05405 South Burlington, VT 05403
  office: 802-656-3435 fax: 802-656-3055 cell: 802-922-4378
  e-mail: jgennari@uvm.edu
  EDUCATION
  Ph.D. University of Pennsylvania, 1993. American Civilization.
  M.A. University of Pennsylvania, 1986. American Civilization.
  B.A. Harvard College, 1982. Social Studies.
  PROFESSIONAL EXPERIENCE
  Interim Director, Critical Race and Ethnic Studies Program, University of Vermont, 2016.
  Associate Professor of English and ALANA U.S. Ethnic Studies, University of Vermont, 2007-
  Visiting Research Scholar, American Studies Department, Yale University, 2008-09
  Director, ALANA U.S. Ethnic Studies Program, University of Vermont, 2004-2009
  Interim Director, ALANA U.S. Ethnic Studies Program, University of Vermont, 2003-04.
  Assistant Professor of English and ALANA U.S. Ethnic Studies, University of Vermont, 2001-2005
  Assistant Professor of American Studies and History, Penn State-Harrisburg, 1999-2001.
  Instructor, African American Studies Program, University of Virginia, 1998-99.
  Instructor, Division of Technology, Culture, and Communication, University of Virginia, 1999.
  Instructor, Sewall Residential Program in American Studies, University of Colorado-Boulder, 1994-1997.
  Visiting Assistant Professor of History, Wabash College, 1993-94.
  Adjunct Instructor, Department of History, Pace University, 1989-91.
  Adjunct Instructor, Department of History, Fordham University, 1990-91.
  Adjunct Instructor, Division of Humanities, Philadelphia College of Pharmacy, 1988-89.
  FELLOWSHIPS
  Carter G. Woodson Institute, University of Virginia, Visiting Scholar, 1997-98.
  National Endowment for the Humanities Fellowship, 1996.
  American Council of Learned Societies Fellowship, 1996-97 (declined).
  W.E.B. Du Bois Institute, Harvard University, Visiting Scholar, 1996.
  Smithsonian Institution Predoctoral Fellow, 1992-93.
  AWARDS
  University of Vermont, College of Arts and Sciences, Dean’s Lecture Award, Spring 2008
  ASCAP-Deems Taylor Prize for Excellence in Music Criticism, 2007
  (for Blowin’ Hot and Cool: Jazz and Its Critics).
  John G. Cawelti Award for the Best Book in American Culture Studies, 2007
  (for Blowin’ Hot and Cool: Jazz and Its Critics).
  Tim Shiner Ally Award (“for strong commitment to work within the UVM ALANA community in an
  effort to create social change”), 2007
  UVM Women’s Center Outstanding Ally Award (“for your significant contribution to feminist and anti-sexist activism on the campus”), 2007.
  -2-
  PUBLICATIONS
  (*connotes peer-reviewed publication; # connotes publication prior to my coming to UVM)
  BOOKS
  * Flavor and Soul: Italian America at its African American Edge
  (University of Chicago Press, 2017)
  * Blowin’ Hot and Cool: Jazz and Its Critics (University of Chicago Press, 2006; second edition,
  2017).
  ARTICLES, CHAPTERS, AND ESSAYS
  *“Groovin’: A Condensed History of Italian Americans in Popular Music and Jazz,” in The Routledge History of Italian Americans, ed. William J. Connell and Stanislao Pugliese (in press).
  *“Jazz in American after 1945,” in The Oxford Research Encyclopedia of American History, ed. Jon Butler.
  *“The Sound and the Fury: The Acoustics of Afro-Italian Life in Kym Ragusa’s The Skin Between Us,” Voices in Italian Americana 26/2 (Fall 2015): 34-46.
  “Remapping the Boundaries of Jazz: The Case of Jason Moran,” in Wolfram Knauer, ed. Jazz
  Debates/Jazzdebatten, Darmstadt Studies in Jazz Research, vol. 13. (Darmstadt:
  Jazzinstitut Darmstadt, 2014): 93-108.
  *“The Knife and the Bread, the Brutal and the Sacred: Louise DeSalvo at the Family Table,” in
  Personal Effects: Essays on Memory, Culture, and Women in the Work of Louise DeSalvo, eds. Nancy Caronia and Edvige Giunta (New York: Fordham University Press. 2014): 233-50.
  * “Sideline Shtick: The Italian American Basketball Coach and Consumable Images of Racial and Ethnic Masculinity,” in Making Italian America: Consumer Culture and the Production of Ethnic Identities (New York: Fordham University Press, 2014): 207-224.
  *“The Other Side of the Curtain: U.S. Jazz Discourse, 1950s America, and the Cold War,” in
  Gertrude Pickhan and Rudiger Ritter, eds. Jazz Behind the Iron Curtain (Frankfurt am Main: Peter Lang, 2010): 25-34.
  * “Blaxploitation Bird,” in Thriving on a Riff, ed. Graham Lock and David Murray (New York: Oxford University Press, 2008): 163-183.
  “Red Sox Reflection,” Vermont Quarterly (Fall 2008): 18-19.
  * “Mammissimo: Dolly and Frankie Sinatra and the Italian American Mother/Son
  Thing,” in Frank Sinatra: History, Politics, and Italian American Culture, ed. Stanislao G. Pugliese (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004): 127-134.[revision of essay that appeared earlier in Italian Americana (Winter 2001): 6-10].
  * “Passing for Italian: Crooners and Gangsters in Crossover Culture,” in Frank Sinatra: History, Politics, and Italian American Culture, ed. Stanislao G.Pugliese (New York: Palgrave Macmillan, 2004): 127-34 [revised version of essay that appeared earlier in Italian Americana (Winter 2001): 6-10].
  “Nearer, My God, To Thee,” in Some of My Best Friends: Essays on Interracial Friendship, ed. Emily Bernard (New York: HarperCollins, 2004): 32-53.
  * “Hipsters, Bluebloods, Rebels, and Hooligans: The Cultural Politics of the Newport Jazz Festival, 1954-1960,” in Uptown Conversations: New Essays in Jazz Studies, eds. Robert
  O’Meally, Brent Edwards, and Farah Jasmine Griffin (Columbia University Press, 2004): 126-149.
  * “Giancarlo Giusseppe Alessandro Esposito: Life in the Borderlands,” in Are Italians White? How Race is Made in America, ed. Jennifer Guglielmo and Salvatore Salerno (New York and London: Routledge, 2003): 234-249.
  -3-
  * “Baraka’s Bohemian Blues,” African American Review, 37 (Fall 2003): 95-101.[revised version translated and published as “I blues bohemian di Baraka,” in Amiri Baraka: Ritratto Dell’Artista in Nero, eds. Franco Mingati and Giorgio Rimondi (Baccilega Editore, 2007): 58-68.
  * # “Bridging the Two Americas. LIFE Looks at The 1960s,” in Looking at LIFE Magazine, ed. Erika Doss (Washington, D.C.: Smithsonian Institution Press, 2001): 261-277.
  * # “Miles Davis and the Jazz Critics,” in Miles Davis and American Culture, ed. Gerald Early (St. Louis: Missouri Historical Society Press, 2001): 66-77.
  # “On Black Goombahs and ‘Da Moulon Yan,’” Common Quest 4/2 (Winter 2000): 56.
  # “Pulp Addiction: Tracking the Bird Obsession in Ross Russell’s The Sound,” Brilliant Corners 2/1 (December 1997): 38-51.
  # “Slumming in High Places: Albert Murray’s Intercontinental Ballistics,” Brilliant Corners 1 (1996): 59-67.
  # * “‘A Weapon of Integration’: Frank Marshall Davis and the Politics of Jazz,” The Langston Hughes Review 14 (Fall 1995/Spring 1996): 15-32.
  # * “Jazz Criticism: Its Development and Ideologies,” Black American Literature Forum, 25 (Fall 1991): 449-523. [Excerpted in Riffs & Choruses: A New Jazz Anthology, ed. Andrew Clark (London and New York: Continuum, 2001): 62-67.
  # “Jazz and the Cultural Canon,” Reconstruction, 1/3 (1991). 25-32 [excerpted as “Jazz and Modernism,” The Chronicle of Higher Education, September 11, 1991:B2].
  PUBLICATIONS: REVIEWS, BIBLIOGRAPHIC ESSAYS, AND ENCYCLOPEDIA
  ENTRIES
  Review of Rolando Vitale, The Real Rockys: A History of the Golden Age of Italian Americans in Boxing,
  1900-1955, Italica (forthcoming).
  Review of Carrie Pitzulo, Bachelors and Bunnies: The Sexual Politics of Playboy, American
  Studies, 53/2 (2014): 213-14.
  “Miles Davis,” Encyclopedia of American Studies (Johns Hopkins University Press), 2013
  (online).
  “Frank Sinatra,” Encyclopedia of American Studies (Johns Hopkins University Press), 2013
  (online).
  “Eccentric, Gifted, and Black: Thelonious Monk Revealed,” Du Bois Review 7:2 (2010): 6-14.
  Review of Carol Bonomo Albright and Joanna Clapps Herman, Wild Dreams: The Best of Italian
  Americana, Altreitalie, 38-39 (January-December 2009): 344-6.
  Review of Karen McNally, When Frankie Went to Hollywood: Frank Sinatra and American
  Male Identity, Men and Masculinities, 12/2 (October 2009): 261-3.
  “Jazz in African-American Culture,” Encyclopedia of African-American Culture and History, 2nd Edition: The Black Experience in the Americas (Macmillan Reference USA, 2006).
  “Truth and Beauty in the Rust Belt,” review of Carlo Rotella, Good With Their Hands: Boxers, Bluesmen, and Other Characters From The Rust Belt, American Quarterly, 55 (June 2003): 285-293.
  Review of HR-57 Center for the Preservation of Jazz and Blues, The Public Historian 25 (Spring 2003): 110-113.
  Review of Paul Allen Anderson, Deep River: Music and Memory in Harlem Renaissance Thought, American Literature (September 2002): 649-652.
  Review of David Evanier, Making the Wiseguys Weep: The Jimmy Roselli Story. Italian Americana (Winter 2003): 114-15.
  # “Art” [with Betty Gubert], [a bibliographic essay on source materials for the study of African American art], The Harvard Guide to African-American History, ed. Evelyn Brooks Higginbotham (Cambridge: Harvard University Press, 2001): 125-138.
  -4-
  # Review of Lewis Erenberg, Swingin’ the Dream: Big Band Jazz and the Rebirth of American Culture, The Annals of the American Academy of Political and Social Science 570/2 (July 2000): 201-202.
  # Entries on Muhammad Ali, Wilt Chamberlain, and Jack Johnson in Encyclopedia Africana, ed. Kwame Anthony Appiah and Henry Louis Gates, Jr. (New York: Perseus Books, 1999): 73-5, 409-10, 1054-55.
  # Review of Jon Panish, The Color of Jazz: Race and Representation in Post-war American Culture, American Literature 71/1 (March 1999): 130-31.
  # Review of Burton Peretti, Jazz in American Culture, American Studies 39/1 (Spring 1998): 149-151.
  # “Recovering the ‘Noisy Lostness’: History in the Age of Jazz,” review of Burton Peretti, The Creation of Jazz: Music, Race, and Culture in Urban America, William Kenney, Chicago Jazz: A Cultural History: 1904-1930, and David Stowe, Swing Changes: Big Band Jazz in New Deal America, Journal of Urban History 24/2 (January 1998): 226-234.
  # “But Is It Jazz?,” review of John Hasse, Beyond Category: The Life and Genius of Duke Ellington and Ronald Radano, New Musical Figurations: Anthony Braxton’s Cultural Critique, Reviews in American History , 23 (March 1995): 91-97.
  # “The Ellington Library,” review of Mark Tucker, The Early Ellington, Reconstruction, 1/4 (1992) :108-113.
  # “The Achievement of Billie Holiday,” review of Robert O’Meally, Lady Day: The Many Faces of Billie Holiday, Reconstruction, 2/1 (1992): 78-80.
  KEYNOTE LECTURES
  “Meditations on Italian American Soundfulness,” Italian Sonorities and Acoustic Communities:
  Listening to the Soundscapes of Italianità, The John D. Calandra Italian American Institute, New
  York, April 2017.
  “Who Owns Jazz History,?” 11th Nordic Jazz Conference, Oslo, Norway, October 23, 2015.
  “Rethinking Jazz and Jazz Studies through Jason Moran’s Multimedia Performance,” Jazz
  Beyond Borders Conference, Amsterdam, Netherlands, September 2014.
  “Remapping the Boundaries of Jazz: The Case of Jason Moran,” 13th Darmstadt Jazzforum,
  Darmstadt Jazzinstitut, Darmstadt, Germany, September 2013.
  “Fughettaboutit: Toward an Acoustics of Italian America,” For a Dangerous Pedagogy: A
  Manifesto for Italian and Italian American Studies, Hofstra University, April 2010.
  “Why Italian American Studies and Hip-Hop Need Each Other,” Eye-Talian Flava: The Italian
  American Experience in Hip Hop,” The John D. Calandra Italian American Institute, New York,
  October 2002.
  INVITED LECTURES
  “Frank Sinatra and Italian American Culture,” Sinatra: A Centenary Tribute, November 19,
  2015, Hofstra University, Hempstead, NY
  “The Jazz Salon: Lenox, Music Inn, and the American 1950s,” Yale University, Photography
  and Memory Workshop, January 2010.
  “The Jazz Word: Reflections on Music and Writing,” Berklee College of Music, October 2009.
  “The First Time: Notes on Race and Adoption,” Yale University, Department of African
  American Studies, March 2009.
  “The Sounds and the Fury: The Acoustics of Afro-Italian Life in Kym Ragusa’s The Skin Between Us: A Memoir of Race, Beauty, and Belonging,” College of Arts and Sciences Dean’s Lecture, University of Vermont, April 2008; Yale University, American Studies Department, April 2009.
  ‘The Celluloid Professor,” Blackboard Jungle: Navigating Race, Gender, and Sexuality in the New Classroom Culture, University of Vermont, March 2008.
  -5-
  “In a Sentimental Mood: Duke Ellington and Jazz’s Language of Love,” UVM Alumni New York Regional Board event at Jazz at Lincoln Center, February 2008.
  “Tenor Madness: Joe Lovano’s Viva Caruso and the Italian Jazz Diaspora,” Calandra Italian
  American Institute, New York, NY, May 2006.
  “Mainstream, Third Stream, Multiple Streams: Mapping the Cultural Currents of Post-1960 Jazz,” The Black Artists Group of St. Louis, St. Louis, February 2006.
  “Blaxploitation Bird: Charlie Parker, Ross Russell, and the Racialized Masculinity of Jazz Writing,” Pursuance: Avant-Garde Jazz and Innovative Writing, DePaul University, Chicago, May 2004.
  “Baraka’s Bohemian Blues,” Blues People: Forty Years Later, Sarah Lawrence College, Bronxeville, NY, February 2004.
  “Jazz and African American Culture,” Middlebury College, February 2004.
  “Jazz Historiography and Political Economy,” Jazz Study Group, Columbia University, October 2003.
  ‘Writer’s Writers and Sensitive Cats: Notes on the Craft of Jazz Writing,” Terni Jazz Festival Symposium, Terni, Italy, June 2003.
  “Duke Ellington, John Hammond, and the ‘Lost Cause,’” The Fourth Annual Duke Ellington Society Conference, The Institute of Jazz Studies, Rutgers University-Newark, November 2002.
  “Tangled Up in the Blues: Jazz, Race, and Avant-Garde Modernism,” Drew University, April
  2001.
  “Crooners, Gangsters, Guidos, and Homeboys: Notes on Black/Italian Masculinity,” Penn State-Harrisburg Downtown Center, March 2001.
  “Hipsters, Bluebloods, Rebels, and Hooligans: The Cultural Politics of the Newport Jazz Festival, 1954-1960,” The College of William and Mary, February 2001.
  “Race and Nation in 4/4 Swing Time: Riffing on the Jazz Mainstream,” JVC Jazz Festival Symposium, The Meanings of Jazz , Newport, R.I., August 2000.
  “Canonizing Jazz,” Department of Black Studies, Amherst College, February 1999.
  “Race-ing the Bird: Jazz, Racial Representation, and the Obsessive Pursuit of Charlie Parker,” Changing Cultures of Race Seminar, Carter G. Woodson Institute, University of Virginia, April 1998.
  “Entering the Mainstream: Jazz and Cultural Politics in the 1950s,” W.E.B. Du Bois Institute Colloquium, Harvard University, December 1996.
  “Critiquing Jazz,” W.E.B. Du Bois Institute Colloquium, Harvard University, May 1996.
  “Jazz at Lincoln Center: Culture Wars in Contemporary Jazz,” University of Colorado, School of Music, Colloquium Series, February 1995.
  CONFERENCE PRESENTATIONS
  1. INTERNATIONAL
  “Everybody Eats: Jazz, Food, and Black/Italian Discourses of Flavor-and-Soul,” Jazz Utopia,
  Birmingham, UK, April 2016.
  “Joe Lovano and the Italian Jazz Disapora,” Jazz and National Identities, Amsterdam,
  Netherlands, September 2011.
  “The Other Side of the Curtain: U.S. Jazz Discourse, 1950s America, and the Cold War,” Jazz
  Behind the Iron Curtain, Warsaw, Poland, September 2008.
  “Blaxploitation Bird: Charlie Parker, Ross Russell, and the Racialized Masculinity of Jazz Writing,” Criss Cross: Confluence and Influence in 20th Century African American Music, Visual Art and Literature, University of Nottingham, UK, June 2004.
  “Jazz and the Politics of the Popular Front,” Windows and Mirrors: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on American Popular Culture at Home and Abroad, Toronto, March 2004.
  “Rebels and Hooligans: The Cultural Politics of the 1960 Newport Jazz Festival,” American Studies Association Conference, Montreal, October 1999.
  -6-
  “Really the Blues: Authenticating the “Folk” in Jazz Criticism, History, and Polemics, 1938-1945,” Organization of American Historians Conference, Toronto, April 1999.
  “Paris Blues: Albert Murray’s Trans-Atlantic Riff,” African-American Music and Europe Conference, Paris, April 1996.
  “Gender and Jazz Discourse: A Reading of Billie Holiday’s ‘Fine and Mellow,” Canadian American Studies Association Conference, Ottawa, November 1994.
  “The Italo-Africano Crossover in American Popular Culture,” Czechoslovakian English Language Teachers Conference, Hradec Kralove, Czechoslovakia, November 1992.
  2. NATIONAL
  “Seeing in the Dark: Military Vision Here and Elsewhere,” American Studies Association
  Conference, Denver, CO, November 2016.
  “Everybody Eats: Jazz, Food, and Black/Italian Discourses of Flavor-and-Soul,” Italian
  American Studies Association Conference, Long Branch, CA, November 2016.
  “Sports on Screen: Visual Economies of Representation in Film, Television, and Digital Media,”
  (session chair and commentator), American Studies Association Conference, Toronto, October 2015.
  “Reel Fun: Community Filmmaking in the 1960s and 1970s,” (session chair and commentator)
  American Studies Association Conference, Los Angeles, CA, November 2014.
  “Gangster Shtick, Ethnic Kitsch, and the Italian Americanization of College Basketball,”
  MAFIAs: Realities and Representation of Organized Crime, Calandra Italian American
  Institute, New York, April 2014.
  “Family Trauma, Retaliatory Gastronomy, and Transnational Italian Americanism,” American
  Studies Association Conference, Washington D.C. November 2013.
  “Carry Me Back: Romanticized Souths and Musical Black Italianità,” Due South: Roots,
  Songlines, Musical Geographies, Experience Music Project Conference at Tulane
  University, New Orleans, LA, April 2013.
  “Jazz and the Voices of Empire and Resistance,” American Studies Association Conference,
  San Juan, Puerto Rico, November 2012 (session chair and commentator).
  “Sideline Shtick: The Italian American Basketball Coach and Consumable Images of Racial and
  Ethnic Masculinity,” Society for Cinema and Media Studies Conference, Boston, MA, March 2012.
  “All in the Family: Gangster Shtick, Sentimental Ethnicity, and the Italian American Basketball Coach,” American Studies Association Conference, San Antonio, TX, November 2010.
  “Contemporary Displacements of Humanitarianisms,” American Studies Association Conference, Washington D.C., November 2009 (session chair).
  “’Killer Vees’ Whistling Dixie: Jim Valvano, Dick Vitale, and ACC Basketball as Ethnic Shtick,” American Italian Historical Association Conference, Baton Rouge, October 2009.
  “The Grain of the Voice, The Cry of the Fazool: Annie Lanzillotto, Bard of the Bronx, Sings Arthur Avenue,” American Italian Historical Association Conference, New Haven, CT, November 2008.
  “New Directions in Italian American Popular Cultural Studies,” American Studies Association Conference, Albuquerque, October 2008.
  “Teaching the Unknown Classics in Italian and Italian American Studies: The Case of Joe Lovano,” New Jersey Italian and Italian American Heritage Commission Symposium, Rutgers University, March 2008.
  “Troppo Mario: Italian Cooking, American Celebrity,” American Italian Historical Association Conference, Denver, November 2007.
  “The First Time: A Memoir of Race and Adoption,” American Italian Historical Association, Denver November 2007.
  -7-
  “Kym Ragusa Beats Her Drums,” American Italian Historical Association Conference, Orlando, October 2006.
  “Jazz, Ethnicity, and Global Culture,” New Directions in U.S. Ethnic Studies Conference, Burlington, Vermont, June 2006.
  “Tenor Madness: Joe Lovano’s Viva Caruso and the Italian Jazz Diaspora,” American Italian Historical Association Conference, Los Angeles, November 2005.
  “Coolin’ Out at the Jazz Salon: The Lenox School of Jazz and the 1950s ‘Mainstream,’” Society of American Music Conference, Eugene, Oregon, February 2005.
  “Taking a Pass on Passing: The White Jazz Critic as Anti-White Negro,” American Studies Association Conference, Atlanta, November 2004.
  “What is Jazz? The Case of Promoter/Impresario George Wein,” Experience Music Project Pop Conference, Skip a Beat: Challenging Popular Music Orthodoxy, Seattle, April 2003.
  “Baraka’s Bohemian Blues,” American Studies Association Conference, Houston, November 2002.
  “Vocalizing Race: The Politics of Music in the 20th Century,” (session commentator), Organization of American Historians Conference, Washington D.C., April 2002.
  “Remembering Popular Music in the 20th Century,” (session organizer and chair), Mid-Atlantic American Studies Conference, Johnstown, PA, April 2001.
  “Intimate Enemies: Spike Lee and His Goombahs,” American Studies Association Conference, Detroit, October 2000.
  “Mammissimo: Dolly and Frankie Sinatra and the Italian American Mother/Son Thing” (paper)
  and “Frank Sinatra and Italian American Culture” (discussant), The Frank Sinatra Conference, Hofstra University, November 1998.
  “Race and Nation in 4/4 Swing Time: Albert Murray’s Riff on the Jazz Mainstream,” American Studies Association Conference, Seattle, October 1998.
  “Monk, Modern Jazz, and Postwar American Culture,” panel discussant, “Brilliant Corners”: A Symposium Celebrating Thelonious Monk, University of North Carolina/Chapel Hill, February 1998.
  “Global Circuits of Popular Music,” (session commentator), American Studies Association Conference, Washington, D.C., October 1997.
  “Flaming Dis-Chord: Civility, Censorship, and Pop Music,” Civility and Censorship: Critical Conversations in a Civil Society, Center for the Humanities and Arts, University of Colorado, April 1997.
  “Crooners and Gangsters: Love and Violence in Italian/Black Crossover,” American Studies Association Conference, Kansas City, November 1996.
  “Race, Gender, and Nationality in American Popular Music, 1890-1945,” (session commentator), Organization of American Historians Conference, Chicago, March 1996.
  “Revisiting Civil Religion” (session commentator), The Conference on Media, Religion, and Culture, University of Colorado, January 1996.
  “Salsa Meets Jazz: Popular Memory, Cultural Politics, and the Afro-Latin New York Sound,” American Studies Association Conference, Pittsburgh, November 1995.
  “The Times They Are A’ Changin’: LIFE and the Counterculture,” Looking at
  LIFE: Rethinking America’s Favorite Magazine, 1936-1972, University of Colorado, September, 1996.
  “’A Weapon of Integration’: Frank Marshall Davis and the Politics of Jazz,” Midwestern Modern Language Association Conference, Chicago, November 1994.
  “Critical ‘Passing’: Black Music and Cultural Critique,” American Studies Association Conference, Boston, November 1993.
  “Rhythmic Integration: The Politics of Race, Culture and Criticism in the Swing Era,” New England American Studies Association Conference, April 1993.
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  “Jazz and Multiculturalism: The Implications of Wyntonism,” New England American Studies Association Conference, Boston, April 1992.
  EDITORIAL BOARDS
  American Studies (2013- )
  Italian American Review (2009- )
  Jazz Research Journal (2006- )
  Transformations: The Journal of Inclusive Scholarship and Pedagogy (2007- 2014)
  EXHIBITIONS, PUBLIC PROGRAMS, MEDIA
  Interview subject, “Race and Jazz Criticism,” All About Jazz (www.allaboutjazz.com),
  October 3, 2011 (Part 1), February 6, 2012 (Part 2).
  Discussant, The Anatomy of Vince Guaraldi, screening and discussion of documentary film
  with its director, Calandra Italian American Institute, New York, October 2011.
  Consultant, film documentary on life and career of jazz musician Tony Scott (Tecnicocinico
  Cinema, Italy, 2010)
  Radio program panelist, Rhode Island Public Radio’s “Action Speaks,” program on Norman
  Mailer’s “The White Negro,” October 2008.
  Panelist, “The Influence of Ornette Coleman,” Burlington Discover Jazz Festival, June 2008.
  Consultant to Missouri Historical Society, exhibit on life and career of Miles Davis (exhibit opening, May 2001).
  Consultant to National Music Foundation (Lenox, MA) for commemorative program on the Jazz Roundtables and the School of Jazz at Music inn (1950-1961), summer 1998.
  Co-curator and project coordinator, “The Holsinger Studio Photograph Traveling Exhibit: History, Memory, Race, and Place in America, 1900-1925,” Carter G. Woodson Institute, University of Virginia, 1998-99.
  Text writer and consultant, “’Somebody’s Done Me Wrong’”: African American Sheet Music, 1890-1930,” Carter G. Woodson Institute, University of Virginia, April 1998.
  Researcher, “Seeing Jazz,” Smithsonian Institution Traveling Exhibition Service, 1994.
  UVM CONFERENCE AND SYMPOSIUM ACTIVITY
  Co-organizer, The 12th Annual Race, Gender, and Sexuality Student Conference, March 2016.
  Panel organizer, chair, and commentator, “Ways of Talking, Ways of Being: Language and
  Identity in the Classroom and Beyond,” Blackboard Jungle 7- Expanding Diversity: Speaking Up, Reaching Out, and Stepping Beyond, University of Vermont, March 2014
  Panel chair and commentator, “Research and Scholarship for Social Change,” Blackboard Jungle 5 – Teaching to Cultural Diversity: A Realm of Possibilities, University of Vermont, March 2012.
  Workshop panelist, “The U.S. The They: Crossing Cultural Border,” Blackboard Jungle 4 – Engaging the Silences: Transformative Conversations in Classrooms and Communities, University of Vermont, March 2011.
  Workshop discussant, “Social Justice in the Classroom,” Blackboard Jungle 3, University of
  Vermont, March 27, 2010.
  Workshop panelist, “Eureka Moments in Teaching Diversity,” Blackboard Jungle, March 2008.
  Organizer and director, New Directions in U.S. Ethnic Studies, sponsored by the ALANA
  U.S. Ethnic Studies Program, University of Vermont, June 6-8, 2006.
  Workshop instructor, “Jazz, Literature, and the Cultural Imagination,” Vermont Alliance for the Social Sciences/UVM Center for World Education summer institute for Vermont high school teachers, June 2005.
  -9-
  OTHER PROFESSIONAL ACTIVITY
  Dissertation Committee Member, Loes Rusch, University of Amsterdam, “Jazz Practice in the
  Netherlands, 1960-1980” (defense, May 2016).
  Dissertation Committee Member, Christopher Robinson, University of Kansas, “Firing the
  Canon: Multiple Insularities in Jazz Criticism,” American Studies Ph.D., 2014 (winner
  of KU’s Argersinger Prize for Outstanding Doctoral Dissertation).
  Member, Lara Romero Prize Committee (awarded to the best first book), American
  Studies Association, 2010.
  Chair, Ralph Henry Gabriel Dissertation Prize Committee (awarded to the best dissertation in American Studies), American Studies Association, 2008.
  Manuscript reviews for American Quarterly, American Studies, Jazz Perspectives, Journal of Popular Music Studies, University of Chicago Press, University of Illinois Press, University of Massachusetts Press, Smithsonian Institution Press, University of California Press, University of Pennsylvania Press, Wesleyan University Press.
  Workshop instructor, “Blues to You,” Oscar Micheaux Film and Book Festival, Gregory, South Dakota, August 2005.
  Editor and writer, The Encyclopedia Africana, W.E.B. Du Bois Institute/Microsoft CD-ROM project (content editor and writer of entries on African-American athletes).
  Writer, Footprints (contributor of essays on sports and music figures to magazine for African American young adults).
  Lecturer on “Themes in American Culture,” English Language Programs, University of Pennsylvania (audiences have included scholars and teachers from Western and Eastern Europe, Fulbright Scholars from over thirty countries, business professionals from over ten countries).
  PERFORMANCES
  “Annie Lanzillotto’s Fritattagoraphobia with John Gennari,” book launch event for Gastropolis:
  Food and New York City, ed. Annie Hauck-Lawson and Jonathan Deutsch, New York,
  December 2008 (http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Css07MuQUhY)
  “Jazz-Lit.Com,” Burlington Discover Jazz Festival, June 2004 (spoken word collaboration with
  jazz musicians).
  “BebopAraka,” Burlington Discover Jazz Festival, June 2005
  “Brush Strokes: Painting, Poetry, and Jazz,” Burlington Discover Jazz Festival, June 2006
  TEACHING INTERESTS
  U.S. Cultural History
  African American culture
  Race and Ethnicity in U.S. Literary and Cultural Studies
  Popular Culture and the Arts
  Post-World War II America
  Jazz
  Italian American Studies
  UVM SERVICE
  English Department:
  2016-17 Chair, Personnel Committee
  2016-17 Executive Committee
  2015-16 Curriculum Committee
  2013-14 Executive Committee
  -10-
  2013-14 Chair, Personnel Committee
  2012-13 Search Committee for Rhetoric/Composition position
  2010-13 Personnel Committee
  2009-10 Resources Committee
  2008 UVM Film Festival judge
  2005-06 Member of Albee Awards Committee for student writing
  2005-06 Search committee for Early American literature and culture position
  2004-05 Search committee for ALANA position
  2002-03 Executive Committee
  2001-02 Search committee for 20th Century American literature position
  College of Arts and Sciences:
  2016-17 Faculty Standards Committee
  2016 Interim Director, Critical Race and Ethnic Studies Program
  2015-16 Organizing and programming committee, Race, Gender,
  and Sexuality Student Conference
  2012-14 Dean’s Ad Hoc Committee on ALANA U.S. Ethnic Studies
  2012 Search committee for one-year position in ALANA/Sociology
  2011-12 ALANA U.S. Ethnic Studies Program curriculum committee
  2010-12 Organizing and programming committee, Race, Gender,
  and Sexuality Student Conference
  2006-07 Coordinator, CAS Faculty Diversity Initiative
  2003-06 Admissions Committee
  2004-09 Director, ALANA U.S. Ethnic Studies Program
  2003-04 Chair of Search Committee for two ALANA U.S. Ethnic Studies positions
  2003-04 Interim Director, ALANA U.S. Ethnic Studies Program
  2005-06 Director, Living/Learning Center Program, “Whiteness of a Different Color:
  Italian Americans and Race”
  2002-04 Co-director (with Emily Bernard) of Living/Learning Center Program,
  “Race and Ethnicity in American Culture”
  University:
  2015-16 Food Systems Faculty Membership Committee
  2015 Co-chair, United Academics Civil Rights Committee
  2013- Blackboard Jungle Symposium planning committee
  2012- Food Systems Affiliated Faculty
  2009-11 Faculty adviser, Multiracial Student Group
  2008 Delivered “Closing Reflection” at University Commencement
  2010 Search Committee for Women’s Basketball Coach
  2007-10 Blackboard Jungle Symposium planning committee
  2009-11 Chair, Athletic Advisory Board
  2007-08 Athletic Department Diversity Subcommittee
  2007-11 Athletic Advisory Board
  2005-08 Faculty adviser, WRUV
  2003-06 United Academics (UA) Delegate
  2004-06 President’s Commission on Diversity and Inclusion
  2006 Honors College Diversity Task Force
  2003-08 Honors College Council
  2004-05 Search Committee for Dean of the College of Arts and Sciences
  -11-
  2003-04 Search Committee for Executive Director of Affirmative Action
  PROFESSIONAL AFFILIATIONS
  American Studies Association
  Italian American Studies Association
  Society for Cinema and Media Studies
  Modern Language Association
  Organization of American Historians
  Jazz Study Group (Columbia University)

• University of Chicago Press - http://press.uchicago.edu/ucp/books/author/G/J/au5092406.html

  About the Author

  John Gennari is associate professor of English and critical race and ethnic studies at the University of Vermont. He lives in South Burlington, Vermont, with his wife and their twin daughters.

9/27/2017 General OneFile - Saved Articles
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Print Marked Items
Flavor and Soul: Italian America at Its African
American Edge
Publishers Weekly.
264.2 (Jan. 9, 2017): p56.
COPYRIGHT 2017 PWxyz, LLC
http://www.publishersweekly.com/
Full Text:
Flavor and Soul: Italian America at Its African American Edge
John Gennari. Univ. of Chicago, $30 (296p)
ISBN 978-0-226-42832-1
In this thought-provoking, academic, yet often lively study, Gennari, an associate professor of English and ethnic
studies at the University of Vermont, explores the intersections between African-American and Italian-American
culture. He notes, for instance, how men from both groups have been stigmatized as "dangerous public enemies" while
black and Italian-American mothers, epitomized by Aunt Jemima and Mamma Mia, are sentimentalized "as crucial to
the 'mothering' of a nation." Gennari also explores how Italian and black musicians, such as Enrico Caruso and Louis
Armstrong, helped replace the U.S.'s Puritan mores with a new, more physically expressive and emotional popular
culture. And Frank Sinatra, besides being a "state-sanctioned compulsory experience" for the author's Italian-American
New Jersey relatives, was revered by rappers like Puff Daddy and Jay Z for his "stylish virility." In his analysis of Spike
Lee's movies, especially Do the Right Thing and Jungle Fever, Gennari convincingly shows how the black film
director, who grew up in a multiethnic Brooklyn neighborhood, adroitly captures Italian-American life. Whether he's
discussing the relationship between Italian-American basketball coaches and black players or the importance of food to
both cultures, Gennari shows that despite tensions between them, black and Italian-Americans have much in common
and understand one another better than many outsiders realize. (Mar.)
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
"Flavor and Soul: Italian America at Its African American Edge." Publishers Weekly, 9 Jan. 2017, p. 56+. General
OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA477339335&it=r&asid=db971b5c27b75a1a0210cd580dbd7ced.
Accessed 27 Sept. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A477339335
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Gennari, John. Blowin' Hot and Cool: Jazz and
Its Critics
Todd Spires
Library Journal.
131.11 (June 15, 2006): p70.
COPYRIGHT 2006 Library Journals, LLC. A wholly owned subsidiary of Media Source, Inc. No redistribution
permitted.
http://www.libraryjournal.com/
Full Text:
Gennari, John. Blowin' Hot and Cool: Jazz and Its Critics. Univ. of Chicago. Jun. 2006. c.480p. index. ISBN 0-226-
28922-2. $35. MUSIC
When this reviewer thinks of jazz critics, he thinks of pretentious, opinionated white men with little or no musical talent
arguing among themselves about obscure artists and recordings. Gennari (English, Univ. of Vermont) does not do a lot
to change that perception, but he does perform something magical: he manages to make the role and history of the jazz
critic interesting. This finely written, thought-provoking chronicle of the most prominent jazz writers of the past
century begins with pioneers John Hammond and Leonard Feather (who helped the likes of Duke Ellington get much
needed attention) and ends with modern-day jazz critics like Stanly Crouch and Gary Giddens. Gennari connects the
critic to the musicians, showing the roles they played in disseminating information and connecting the acts to the
audience. For example, in the chapter on novelist Ralph Ellison's jazz interpretations, he links Ellison's childhood in
Oklahoma to his insistence in the 1950s that jazz was not part of the American mainstream but merely part of the
folklore of society. This is an essential purchase for any comprehensive jazz collection. Highly recommended--Todd
Spires, Bradley Univ. Lib., Peoria, IL
Spires, Todd
Source Citation (MLA 8th
Edition)
Spires, Todd. "Gennari, John. Blowin' Hot and Cool: Jazz and Its Critics." Library Journal, 15 June 2006, p. 70.
General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do?
p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA147792903&it=r&asid=94ee703217838fae507d986899144589.
Accessed 27 Sept. 2017.
Gale Document Number: GALE|A147792903

"Flavor and Soul: Italian America at Its African American Edge." Publishers Weekly, 9 Jan. 2017, p. 56+. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do? p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA477339335&it=r. Accessed 27 Sept. 2017. Spires, Todd. "Gennari, John. Blowin' Hot and Cool: Jazz and Its Critics." Library Journal, 15 June 2006, p. 70. General OneFile, go.galegroup.com/ps/i.do? p=ITOF&sw=w&u=schlager&v=2.1&id=GALE%7CA147792903&it=r. Accessed 27 Sept. 2017.

• All About Jazz
  https://www.allaboutjazz.com/blowin-hot-and-cool-jazz-and-its-critics-by-norman-weinstein.php
  Word count: 559

  Blowin' Hot And Cool: Jazz And Its Critics

  By NORMAN WEINSTEIN
  September 1, 2006
  Sign in to view read count
  Blowin' Hot And Cool: Jazz And Its Critics
  John Gennari
  Cloth; 494 pages
  ISBN 0-22-28922
  University Of Chicago Press
  2006
  There is a fascinating Trojan horse aspect to this magnificient study of the roles jazz critics have played in the shaping of jazz over the past century. As clear, fair-minded and comprehensive as John Gennari, an English professor at the University of Vermont, is in writing the first comprehensive study of jazz critics, the book is really a heady meditation on the fundamental question: what is jazz?

  It's worth emphasising this half-hidden central theme, because it's hard to imagine any reader coming away from Blowin' Hot And Cool without new perspectives on that question of questions—which might more accurately be expressed as: what exactly is this music I love? Unfortunately, there's a danger the book might go unnoticed by non-academics. Its title, as well as the academic approach suggested by the author's profession and the publisher, could suggest a book aimed at an ivory tower audience.

  Gennari dives into the issues of race (mostly white critics writing about mostly African-American music), and politics (the identification of jazz with leftist agendas), by showing how various jazz critics brought their own racial and political beliefs into their writing. For anyone who thinks the controversies surrounding Wynton Marsalis, Ken Burns' Jazz documentary, and Jazz at Lincoln Center programming are new issues, Gennari reveals the long history of the complex racial, political and cultural clashes undergirding such present day headline grabbers.

  Jazz critics of a century ago, as now, grappled with issues of authenticity, and it is very much to Gennari's credit that his vision is generous enough sympathetically to portray critics whose definitions of "real jazz" rage across a massive spectrum: from New Orleans traditionalism to rock-flavored, multicultural musical hybrids. By being this broad minded, Gennari can appreciate critic Greg Tate's hip hop-hyped up, postmodern prose as much as he can Ralph Ellison's classically measured writing. He is able to show how the styles of critics as diverse as Gene Lees and Gary Giddins reveal affinities to the sounds of the music they celebrate.

  Best of all, Gennari maintains a remarkably free-thinking stance when examining the covert political agendas attached to the jazz criticism of John Hammond and Amiri Baraka. He is as acutely thoughtful in tracking the dogmatically narrow, more-Communist-than-thou gospel of Frank Kofsky (who attempted in a Coltrane interview to have Coltrane sound like a proto-Marxist), as he is dispassionate in questioning the assumptions of arch-conservatives like Ralph de Toledano. How welcome would be books on modern art, architecture, and other musical styles if they were created by writers as agenda-free as Gennari.

  Thoughtfully questioning one's taste in jazz is like cleansing your palate between the courses of a rich meal. Only the very best writing can provoke such fundamental questioning. Count Gennari among the very best jazz writers. He can provoke you into listening to albums by Anthony Braxton and Wynton Marsalis albums on the same day, in order to sort out the virtues in both. If you're ready to open your mind, this book is for you.

• Jazz Times
  https://jazztimes.com/reviews/books/blowin-hot-and-cool-jazz-and-its-critics-by-john-gennari/
  Word count: 326

  Published 12/01/2006 By Mike Shanley

  Blowin’ Hot And Cool: Jazz And Its Critics by John Gennari

  University of Vermont professor John Gennari has taken on a daunting and admirable mission, tracing the way jazz writers have shaped the perception of the music. He begins in the 1930s with early critics John Hammond and Leonard Feather, working up through “writer’s writers and sensitive cats” (Nat Hentoff, Ira Gitler, Martin Williams) to Gary Giddins and Stanley Crouch. Along with individual writers, Gennari discusses the critical impact of the Newport Jazz Festival and the Lenox School of Jazz and devotes a chapter to Ross Russell’s quest for the definitive Charlie Parker biography.

  The book offers honest critiques of most of his subjects, using extensive references to present their strengths and shortcomings. In doing so, Gennari traces the social and political climate that fueled critics and the way they were perceived. But a good deal of his writing comes off as dry and excessively academic, especially in the early chapters. (He frequently throws the term “jeremiad” around, a $9 college word if there ever was one.) And Gennari regularly buries valid points in run-on sentences that blunt his ideas. Further, he doesn’t always take a linear path in his discussions. In the midst of discussing one writer, he often goes off on tangents about someone else. Coupled with his writing style, it makes the reading a little lugubrious for anyone who’s just here for the music.

  In his introduction, Gennari says work for the book began in 1990, and his 57 pages of footnotes indicate that he did plenty of research within that time. The fruits of his labor definitely provide some strong insight into the workings of veteran jazz scribes, especially when he discusses the output of the 1950s and beyond. But ultimately, Blowin’ Hot and Cool seems more like a resource for literary criticism studies than jazz history.

• I Italy
  http://www.iitaly.org/magazine/focus/art-culture/article/flavor-and-soul-john-gennari-discusses-his-new-book
  Word count: 838

  Flavor and Soul: John Gennari Discusses His New Book
  JOELLE GROSSO (March 17, 2017)

  The Cannistraro Seminar Series organizer, Rosangela Briscese

  John Gennari

  Professor John Gennari at the Calandra Institute

  The Dean of the Calandra Institute, Anthony Tamburri, introducing the writer
  Through studies of music and sound, film and media, sports and foodways, Gennari shows how an Afro-Italian sensibility has nourished and vitalized American culture

  The cover of Gennari's new book
  It’s a book that’s largely about cultural representation and performance, but it’s also my story, so it means a lot to me on that level, and I hope that comes across on the page.

  The Cannistraro Seminar Series organizer, Rosangela Briscese

  John Gennari
  Expand
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  Professor John Gennari recently held a seminar at the John D. Calandra Italian American Institute about his new book, “Flavor and Soul: Italian America at Its African American Edge.”
  Tweet Google + Email PermalinkPermalink PrintPrint PdfPdf
  As part of the Philip V. Cannistraro Seminar Series in Italian American Studies, Anthony J. Tamburri, the Dean of the Calandra Institute, and Rosangela Briscese, the organizer of this special event, welcomed Professor John Gennari to speak about his latest publication. The book entitled Flavor and Soul: Italian America at Its African American Edge was published by the University of Chicago Press and depicts the intertwining of African American and Italian American cultures for more than a hundred years.

  Professor John Gennari at the Calandra Institute

  The Dean of the Calandra Institute, Anthony Tamburri, introducing the writer
  Through studies of music and sound, film and media, sports and foodways, Gennari shows how an Afro-Italian sensibility has nourished and vitalized American culture

  The cover of Gennari's new book
  It’s a book that’s largely about cultural representation and performance, but it’s also my story, so it means a lot to me on that level, and I hope that comes across on the page.

  The Cannistraro Seminar Series organizer, Rosangela Briscese
  Flavor and Soul

  In this book, John Gennari spotlights the affinity between African American and Italian American cultures calling it “the edge.” Through studies of music and sound, film and media, sports and foodways, he shows how an Afro-Italian sensibility has nourished and vitalized American culture writ large, even as Italian Americans and African Americans have fought each other for urban space, recognition of overlapping histories of suffering and exclusion, and political and personal rispetto. It is only at such cultural edges, Gennari argues, that the nation can come to truly understand its racial and ethnic dynamics.

  Gennari comments, “we all know that we live our lives in ways that defy the breaking up of people and culture so we need to get a deeper understanding of Italian Americans and their history in relation to our own families but we also need to understand the connections that we’ve had with other groups.”

  A Very Personal Book

  John Gennari is a Professor at the University of Vermont and an American Studies-trained U.S. cultural historian and nonfiction writer with specializations in jazz and popular music studies, Italian American cultural studies, food studies, race and ethnic studies, and cultural criticism. He is the author of Blowin’ Hot and Cool: Jazz and Its Critics which won an ASCAP-Deems Taylor Award for Excellence in Music Criticism as well as the John Cawelti Award for the Best Book in American Culture.

  Despite all the praise his work has received in the past, Gennari’s claims that Flavor and Soul: Italian America at Its African American Edge is his most personal book to date.

  He elaborates, “this is a very personal book owing to my own Italian American background, my interest is in African American music, and my training in the history of jazz, that’s really a big part of my identity. I’m married to an African American woman who grew up in Nashville, Tennessee, we adopted our twin daughters from Ethiopia 10 years ago, in other words I live in a Black-Italian family.”

  “I think more of us have to put ourselves into these stories and create a record of this cross cultural experience. It’s a book that’s largely about cultural representation and performance but it’s also my story so it means a lot to me on that level and I hope that comes across on the page.”

  John Gennari is an American Studies-trained U.S. cultural historian and nonfiction writer with specializations in jazz and popular music studies, Italian American cultural studies, food studies, race and ethnic studies, and cultural criticism. For those who are interested in purchasing Flavor and Soul: Italian America at Its African American Edge, the book is now available in bookstores everywhere. Click here for more information.

• Manchester Journal
  http://www.manchesterjournal.com/stories/book-review-flavor-and-soul-is-thoroughly-enlightening-perspective,510744?
  Word count: 511

  Book review: 'Flavor and Soul' is thoroughly enlightening perspective

  Posted Friday, June 16, 2017 4:36 pm
  By Colin Harrington, Special to The Eagle
  "Flavor and Soul: Italian America and Its African American Edge," by Lenox native John Gennari, is a thoroughly enlightening cultural perspective and retrospective on the mythical and well-known burgeoning effects of Italian American and African American cultural icons and identity on America.

  In the author's introduction he suggests that, "performances at the boundary between Italian culture and black culture — the mutual and interdependent creation of an Italian cultural self and a black cultural self — have made an indelible mark on American culture writ large." The histories of Italian American life from personal and well-charted academic investigations and a full appreciation and identification with African American cultural influences (also supported by a background of scholarship and teaching) come together in a joyful understanding of race and ethnicity in America.

  This textured volume drives deep into the cultural experience in America from food and family, to neighborhoods and regions, city and country, music and films, to sports and politics. In-depth looks at how famous and iconic personalities — such as Frank Sinatra, Spike Lee, Francis Ford Coppola, Giancarlo Esposito and Cab Calloway, as well as sports legends, such as ESPN's Dick Vitale, just to name a very few — support the reader in understanding, "more deeply and in more subtle and nuanced ways about race and ethnicity," in America. It also looks at how these two cultures have influenced and identified with each other to create the rich cultural experience we have now. This book will strengthen anyone's ability to talk about race and cultural diversity in America like no other for its complete and fascinating litany of histories, commentaries and wide reach on everything cultural.

  The reading in "Flavor and Soul" moves forward in a clear, unmitigated flow and connection of ideas and historical times that many will remember and others will learn. Allowing for varied points of view, the author nevertheless references strong voices on the matters of race, ethnicity and identity in America rolling with the evolving predominant societal attitudes of the times and making connections with how these play out in our own world of diversity. Every connection made, such as that between Frank Sinatra and Italian Americans and African American musical legends, strikes a resonant tone on the bell of multi-cultural harmonics. Gennari succeeds in making clear how inevitable and beautiful, even if oft times difficult and sometimes violent, the mutual understanding and appreciation of races and cultures is when each benefits from and supports the other while always recognizing, preserving and nurturing what is good. What is good is always what we find in our own reinvention.

  A book event for "Flavor and Soul" is scheduled for 5:30 p.m. Friday, July 14, at The Bookstore & Get Lit Wine Bar on Lenox.

  Colin Harrington is the events manager at The Bookstore & Get Lit Wine Bar in Lenox. He welcomes reader comments at charrington686@gmail.com

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