Dartmouth Events

From the speaker:

In this talk, I embark on an exploration of interiority animated by deep, intense reflection about existential crises through the landscape of Rhythm and Blues music and culture. I set forth on this voyage with Mary J. Blige’s 1992 debut album What’s the 411?, with a focus on the evocative way she reimagines the contours of interiority and emotional topography. Included in this preoccupation with interiority is the Black portraiture that Blige’s cover art represents, and I use the cover art or exterior to expand the geographical boundaries of the interior, where R&B often reigns supreme. I embrace this paradox as a way to revisit and remix our characterization of interiority. Keeping my ear to the portrait, I work in this outsideness, grappling with how the husk and hood of record sleeves uncover polyphonic routes for interior wayfaring and woolgathering. 

About the Speaker:

Aneeka Ayanna Henderson is an Associate Professor of American Studies at Amherst College with affiliations in Black Studies, English, and Film and Media Studies. Her first book, Veil and Vow: Marriage Matters in Contemporary African American Culture, critically examines how the political and the popular are deeply intertwined through an examination of courtship and marriage in late 20th and early 21st fiction, film, music, and book covers including work by Sister Souljah and Terry McMillan, music by Anita Baker, films such Love and Basketball and The Best Man alongside legislation like the 1996 Defense of Marriage Act and the 1996 Welfare Reform Act. Her research has been supported by the American Association of University Women Research Leave Fellowship, Andrew W. Mellon Summer Institute on Tenure & Professional Advancement Fellowship, and the Andrew W. Mellon