W. C. Handy waking up to the blues on a train platform, Buddy Bolden eavesdropping on the drums a... more W. C. Handy waking up to the blues on a train platform, Buddy Bolden eavesdropping on the drums at Congo Square, John Lomax taking his phonograph recorder into a southern penitentiary—some foundational myths of the black vernacular remain inescapable, even as they come under increasing pressure from skeptics.
In Disturbing the Peace, Bryan Wagner revises the history of the black vernacular tradition and gives a new account of black culture by reading these myths in the context of the tradition’s ongoing engagement with the law. Returning to some familiar examples (trickster tales, outlaw legends, blues lyrics) central to previous studies of the black vernacular expression, Wagner uses an analytic framework he has developed from the historical language of the law to give new and surprising analyses. Wagner’s work draws both on his deep understanding of history and on a wealth of primary sources that range from novels to cartoons to popular ballads and early blues songs to newspapers and court reports. Through his innovative engagement with them, Wagner gives us a new and deeper understanding of black cultural expression, revealing its basis in the relational workings of African Americans in the social world.
Edited by Marianne Constable, Leti Volpp and Bryan Wagner
For many inside and outside the legal ... more Edited by Marianne Constable, Leti Volpp and Bryan Wagner
For many inside and outside the legal academy, the right place to look for law is in constitutions, statutes, and judicial opinions. This book looks for law in the “wrong places”—sites and spaces in which no formal law appears. These may be geographic regions beyond the reach of law, everyday practices ungoverned or ungovernable by law, or works of art that have escaped law’s constraints.
Looking for Law in All the Wrong Places brings together essays by leading scholars of anthropology, cultural studies, history, law, literature, political science, race and ethnic studies, religion, and rhetoric, to look at law from the standpoint of the humanities. Beyond showing law to be determined by or determinative of distinct cultural phenomena, the contributors show how law is itself interwoven with language, text, image, and culture.
Many essays in this volume look for law precisely in the kinds of “wrong places” where there appears to be no law. They find in these places not only reflections and remains of law, but also rules and practices that seem indistinguishable from law and raise challenging questions about the locations of law and about law’s meaning and function. Other essays do the opposite: rather than looking for law in places where law does not obviously appear, they look in statute books and courtrooms from perspectives that are usually presumed to have nothing to say about law.
Looking at law sideways, or upside down, or inside out defamiliarizes law. These essays show what legal understanding can gain when law is denied its ostensibly proper domain.
Contributors: Kathryn Abrams, Daniel Boyarin, Wendy Brown, Marianne Constable, Samera Esmeir, Daniel Fisher, Sara Ludin, Saba Mahmood, Rebecca McLennan, Ramona Naddaff, Beth Piatote, Sarah Song, Christopher Tomlins, Leti Volpp, Bryan Wagner
We are a collaborative research project dedicated to preserving, digitizing, transcribing, transl... more We are a collaborative research project dedicated to preserving, digitizing, transcribing, translating, and analyzing manuscripts related to two slave conspiracies organized at the Pointe Coupée Post in the Spanish territory of Louisiana in 1791 and 1795. Our website (lsc.berkeley.edu) uses a custom facing-page display to present French and Spanish manuscripts alongside original transcriptions and English translations, permitting users to search, browse, and navigate among documents and interactive maps derived from a database tracking persons, places, and assertions.
“Police,” in Erica R. Edwards, Roderick Ferguson, and Jeffrey Ogbar, eds., Keywords for African A... more “Police,” in Erica R. Edwards, Roderick Ferguson, and Jeffrey Ogbar, eds., Keywords for African American Studies (New York UP, 2019), 152-155.
Bryan Wagner, “The Wild Tchoupitoulas,” National Recording Registry (Library of Congress, 2019). ... more Bryan Wagner, “The Wild Tchoupitoulas,” National Recording Registry (Library of Congress, 2019). Excerpted from Bryan Wagner, The Wild Tchoupitoulas (33 1/3 Series, Bloomsbury Publishing, 2019).
“The Trial of Romeo Rosebud,” in Marianne Constable, Leti Volpp, and Bryan Wagner, ed., Looking f... more “The Trial of Romeo Rosebud,” in Marianne Constable, Leti Volpp, and Bryan Wagner, ed., Looking for Law in All the Wrong Places (Fordham UP, 2019), 287-298.
“A Jazz Origin Myth: Bras-Coupé in History, Folklore, and Literature,” in T. R. Johnson, ed., New... more “A Jazz Origin Myth: Bras-Coupé in History, Folklore, and Literature,” in T. R. Johnson, ed., New Orleans: A Literary History (Cambridge UP, 2019), 148-164.
Remaking New Orleans: Beyond Exceptionalism and Authenticity (editors Thomas Adams and Matt Sakakeeny), 2019
New Orleans is associated with authenticity in culture. The city, however, has also made crucial ... more New Orleans is associated with authenticity in culture. The city, however, has also made crucial contributions to inauthentic culture, specifically in the field of professional wrestling. This chapter considers the rise and fall of Mid-South Wrestling (1979-1986) by focusing on the development its biggest star, the Junkyard Dog, the first black headliner in the history of the sport. Conceptualized by Sylvester Ritter (who acted the part) and Cowboy Bill Watts (the architect behind Mid-South), the Junkyard Dog was a character suited to a city with an emerging black majority that had only just elected its first black mayor. At times awkward in adapting themes from rural territories (like the Oklahoma circuit where Watts had his start) for an urban multiracial audience, Mid-South was nevertheless successful in marketing the Dog by combining vernacular storylines (like the legend of Stagolee) with formal innovations (such as ring music) that quickly became standard practice throughout the wrestling world.
We are a collaborative research project dedicated to preserving, digitizing, transcribing, transl... more We are a collaborative research project dedicated to preserving, digitizing, transcribing, translating, and analyzing manuscripts related to two slave conspiracies organized at the Pointe Coupée Post in the Spanish territory of Louisiana in 1791 and 1795. Our website (lsc.berkeley.edu) uses a custom facing-page display to present French and Spanish manuscripts alongside original transcriptions and English translations, permitting users to search, browse, and navigate among documents and interactive maps derived from a database tracking persons, places, and assertions.
Bryan Wagner, "Historical Method in the Study of Law and Culture," in Markus D. Dubber and Christ... more Bryan Wagner, "Historical Method in the Study of Law and Culture," in Markus D. Dubber and Christopher Tomlins, eds., The Oxford Handbook of Legal History (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018), 193-206.
... The first transformation comes with the rise of radical abolitionism in the 1830s, a movement... more ... The first transformation comes with the rise of radical abolitionism in the 1830s, a movement that depicted slavery ... In his polemics, William Lloyd Garrison made the slave states seem dystopically modern by transposing scenes from northern cities onto the southern plantation. ...
117 BRYAN WAGNER Disarmed and Dangerous: The Strange Career of Bras-Coupe´ ... Who will defend yo... more 117 BRYAN WAGNER Disarmed and Dangerous: The Strange Career of Bras-Coupe´ ... Who will defend you from Bras-Coupé, this propaganda suggested, if not the police? And how will the police defend you if they are stripped of their capacity to act by any means necessary? ...
W. C. Handy waking up to the blues on a train platform, Buddy Bolden eavesdropping on the drums a... more W. C. Handy waking up to the blues on a train platform, Buddy Bolden eavesdropping on the drums at Congo Square, John Lomax taking his phonograph recorder into a southern penitentiary—some foundational myths of the black vernacular remain inescapable, even as they come under increasing pressure from skeptics.
In Disturbing the Peace, Bryan Wagner revises the history of the black vernacular tradition and gives a new account of black culture by reading these myths in the context of the tradition’s ongoing engagement with the law. Returning to some familiar examples (trickster tales, outlaw legends, blues lyrics) central to previous studies of the black vernacular expression, Wagner uses an analytic framework he has developed from the historical language of the law to give new and surprising analyses. Wagner’s work draws both on his deep understanding of history and on a wealth of primary sources that range from novels to cartoons to popular ballads and early blues songs to newspapers and court reports. Through his innovative engagement with them, Wagner gives us a new and deeper understanding of black cultural expression, revealing its basis in the relational workings of African Americans in the social world.
Edited by Marianne Constable, Leti Volpp and Bryan Wagner
For many inside and outside the legal ... more Edited by Marianne Constable, Leti Volpp and Bryan Wagner
For many inside and outside the legal academy, the right place to look for law is in constitutions, statutes, and judicial opinions. This book looks for law in the “wrong places”—sites and spaces in which no formal law appears. These may be geographic regions beyond the reach of law, everyday practices ungoverned or ungovernable by law, or works of art that have escaped law’s constraints.
Looking for Law in All the Wrong Places brings together essays by leading scholars of anthropology, cultural studies, history, law, literature, political science, race and ethnic studies, religion, and rhetoric, to look at law from the standpoint of the humanities. Beyond showing law to be determined by or determinative of distinct cultural phenomena, the contributors show how law is itself interwoven with language, text, image, and culture.
Many essays in this volume look for law precisely in the kinds of “wrong places” where there appears to be no law. They find in these places not only reflections and remains of law, but also rules and practices that seem indistinguishable from law and raise challenging questions about the locations of law and about law’s meaning and function. Other essays do the opposite: rather than looking for law in places where law does not obviously appear, they look in statute books and courtrooms from perspectives that are usually presumed to have nothing to say about law.
Looking at law sideways, or upside down, or inside out defamiliarizes law. These essays show what legal understanding can gain when law is denied its ostensibly proper domain.
Contributors: Kathryn Abrams, Daniel Boyarin, Wendy Brown, Marianne Constable, Samera Esmeir, Daniel Fisher, Sara Ludin, Saba Mahmood, Rebecca McLennan, Ramona Naddaff, Beth Piatote, Sarah Song, Christopher Tomlins, Leti Volpp, Bryan Wagner
We are a collaborative research project dedicated to preserving, digitizing, transcribing, transl... more We are a collaborative research project dedicated to preserving, digitizing, transcribing, translating, and analyzing manuscripts related to two slave conspiracies organized at the Pointe Coupée Post in the Spanish territory of Louisiana in 1791 and 1795. Our website (lsc.berkeley.edu) uses a custom facing-page display to present French and Spanish manuscripts alongside original transcriptions and English translations, permitting users to search, browse, and navigate among documents and interactive maps derived from a database tracking persons, places, and assertions.
“Police,” in Erica R. Edwards, Roderick Ferguson, and Jeffrey Ogbar, eds., Keywords for African A... more “Police,” in Erica R. Edwards, Roderick Ferguson, and Jeffrey Ogbar, eds., Keywords for African American Studies (New York UP, 2019), 152-155.
Bryan Wagner, “The Wild Tchoupitoulas,” National Recording Registry (Library of Congress, 2019). ... more Bryan Wagner, “The Wild Tchoupitoulas,” National Recording Registry (Library of Congress, 2019). Excerpted from Bryan Wagner, The Wild Tchoupitoulas (33 1/3 Series, Bloomsbury Publishing, 2019).
“The Trial of Romeo Rosebud,” in Marianne Constable, Leti Volpp, and Bryan Wagner, ed., Looking f... more “The Trial of Romeo Rosebud,” in Marianne Constable, Leti Volpp, and Bryan Wagner, ed., Looking for Law in All the Wrong Places (Fordham UP, 2019), 287-298.
“A Jazz Origin Myth: Bras-Coupé in History, Folklore, and Literature,” in T. R. Johnson, ed., New... more “A Jazz Origin Myth: Bras-Coupé in History, Folklore, and Literature,” in T. R. Johnson, ed., New Orleans: A Literary History (Cambridge UP, 2019), 148-164.
Remaking New Orleans: Beyond Exceptionalism and Authenticity (editors Thomas Adams and Matt Sakakeeny), 2019
New Orleans is associated with authenticity in culture. The city, however, has also made crucial ... more New Orleans is associated with authenticity in culture. The city, however, has also made crucial contributions to inauthentic culture, specifically in the field of professional wrestling. This chapter considers the rise and fall of Mid-South Wrestling (1979-1986) by focusing on the development its biggest star, the Junkyard Dog, the first black headliner in the history of the sport. Conceptualized by Sylvester Ritter (who acted the part) and Cowboy Bill Watts (the architect behind Mid-South), the Junkyard Dog was a character suited to a city with an emerging black majority that had only just elected its first black mayor. At times awkward in adapting themes from rural territories (like the Oklahoma circuit where Watts had his start) for an urban multiracial audience, Mid-South was nevertheless successful in marketing the Dog by combining vernacular storylines (like the legend of Stagolee) with formal innovations (such as ring music) that quickly became standard practice throughout the wrestling world.
We are a collaborative research project dedicated to preserving, digitizing, transcribing, transl... more We are a collaborative research project dedicated to preserving, digitizing, transcribing, translating, and analyzing manuscripts related to two slave conspiracies organized at the Pointe Coupée Post in the Spanish territory of Louisiana in 1791 and 1795. Our website (lsc.berkeley.edu) uses a custom facing-page display to present French and Spanish manuscripts alongside original transcriptions and English translations, permitting users to search, browse, and navigate among documents and interactive maps derived from a database tracking persons, places, and assertions.
Bryan Wagner, "Historical Method in the Study of Law and Culture," in Markus D. Dubber and Christ... more Bryan Wagner, "Historical Method in the Study of Law and Culture," in Markus D. Dubber and Christopher Tomlins, eds., The Oxford Handbook of Legal History (New York: Oxford University Press, 2018), 193-206.
... The first transformation comes with the rise of radical abolitionism in the 1830s, a movement... more ... The first transformation comes with the rise of radical abolitionism in the 1830s, a movement that depicted slavery ... In his polemics, William Lloyd Garrison made the slave states seem dystopically modern by transposing scenes from northern cities onto the southern plantation. ...
117 BRYAN WAGNER Disarmed and Dangerous: The Strange Career of Bras-Coupe´ ... Who will defend yo... more 117 BRYAN WAGNER Disarmed and Dangerous: The Strange Career of Bras-Coupe´ ... Who will defend you from Bras-Coupé, this propaganda suggested, if not the police? And how will the police defend you if they are stripped of their capacity to act by any means necessary? ...
The Harlem Renaissance was a cultural movement of black artists and writers in the 1920s and 1930... more The Harlem Renaissance was a cultural movement of black artists and writers in the 1920s and 1930s. Centered in New York, the movement extended outward through international collaboration. We will be reading works by writers including Claude McKay, Langston Hughes, Nella Larsen, and Zora Neale Hurston and as well as manifestos about the nature and function of black art. Course themes include migration and metropolitan living, primitivism and the avant garde, diaspora and exile, passing and identity, sexuality and secrecy, and the relationship between modern art and vernacular tradition.
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Books by Bryan Wagner
In Disturbing the Peace, Bryan Wagner revises the history of the black vernacular tradition and gives a new account of black culture by reading these myths in the context of the tradition’s ongoing engagement with the law. Returning to some familiar examples (trickster tales, outlaw legends, blues lyrics) central to previous studies of the black vernacular expression, Wagner uses an analytic framework he has developed from the historical language of the law to give new and surprising analyses. Wagner’s work draws both on his deep understanding of history and on a wealth of primary sources that range from novels to cartoons to popular ballads and early blues songs to newspapers and court reports. Through his innovative engagement with them, Wagner gives us a new and deeper understanding of black cultural expression, revealing its basis in the relational workings of African Americans in the social world.
For many inside and outside the legal academy, the right place to look for law is in constitutions, statutes, and judicial opinions. This book looks for law in the “wrong places”—sites and spaces in which no formal law appears. These may be geographic regions beyond the reach of law, everyday practices ungoverned or ungovernable by law, or works of art that have escaped law’s constraints.
Looking for Law in All the Wrong Places brings together essays by leading scholars of anthropology, cultural studies, history, law, literature, political science, race and ethnic studies, religion, and rhetoric, to look at law from the standpoint of the humanities. Beyond showing law to be determined by or determinative of distinct cultural phenomena, the contributors show how law is itself interwoven with language, text, image, and culture.
Many essays in this volume look for law precisely in the kinds of “wrong places” where there appears to be no law. They find in these places not only reflections and remains of law, but also rules and practices that seem indistinguishable from law and raise challenging questions about the locations of law and about law’s meaning and function. Other essays do the opposite: rather than looking for law in places where law does not obviously appear, they look in statute books and courtrooms from perspectives that are usually presumed to have nothing to say about law.
Looking at law sideways, or upside down, or inside out defamiliarizes law. These essays show what legal understanding can gain when law is denied its ostensibly proper domain.
Contributors: Kathryn Abrams, Daniel Boyarin, Wendy Brown, Marianne Constable, Samera Esmeir, Daniel Fisher, Sara Ludin, Saba Mahmood, Rebecca McLennan, Ramona Naddaff, Beth Piatote, Sarah Song, Christopher Tomlins, Leti Volpp, Bryan Wagner
Websites by Bryan Wagner
Papers by Bryan Wagner
https://www.loc.gov/static/programs/national-recording-preservation-board/documents/WildTchoupitoulas.pdf
In Disturbing the Peace, Bryan Wagner revises the history of the black vernacular tradition and gives a new account of black culture by reading these myths in the context of the tradition’s ongoing engagement with the law. Returning to some familiar examples (trickster tales, outlaw legends, blues lyrics) central to previous studies of the black vernacular expression, Wagner uses an analytic framework he has developed from the historical language of the law to give new and surprising analyses. Wagner’s work draws both on his deep understanding of history and on a wealth of primary sources that range from novels to cartoons to popular ballads and early blues songs to newspapers and court reports. Through his innovative engagement with them, Wagner gives us a new and deeper understanding of black cultural expression, revealing its basis in the relational workings of African Americans in the social world.
For many inside and outside the legal academy, the right place to look for law is in constitutions, statutes, and judicial opinions. This book looks for law in the “wrong places”—sites and spaces in which no formal law appears. These may be geographic regions beyond the reach of law, everyday practices ungoverned or ungovernable by law, or works of art that have escaped law’s constraints.
Looking for Law in All the Wrong Places brings together essays by leading scholars of anthropology, cultural studies, history, law, literature, political science, race and ethnic studies, religion, and rhetoric, to look at law from the standpoint of the humanities. Beyond showing law to be determined by or determinative of distinct cultural phenomena, the contributors show how law is itself interwoven with language, text, image, and culture.
Many essays in this volume look for law precisely in the kinds of “wrong places” where there appears to be no law. They find in these places not only reflections and remains of law, but also rules and practices that seem indistinguishable from law and raise challenging questions about the locations of law and about law’s meaning and function. Other essays do the opposite: rather than looking for law in places where law does not obviously appear, they look in statute books and courtrooms from perspectives that are usually presumed to have nothing to say about law.
Looking at law sideways, or upside down, or inside out defamiliarizes law. These essays show what legal understanding can gain when law is denied its ostensibly proper domain.
Contributors: Kathryn Abrams, Daniel Boyarin, Wendy Brown, Marianne Constable, Samera Esmeir, Daniel Fisher, Sara Ludin, Saba Mahmood, Rebecca McLennan, Ramona Naddaff, Beth Piatote, Sarah Song, Christopher Tomlins, Leti Volpp, Bryan Wagner
https://www.loc.gov/static/programs/national-recording-preservation-board/documents/WildTchoupitoulas.pdf