Thesis Chapters by Dr Craig Doughty
Boston is a city steeped in history. Beyond the struggle for abolition, however, the historical e... more Boston is a city steeped in history. Beyond the struggle for abolition, however, the historical experiences of the majority of black Bostonians, especially during the early twentieth-century, are lacking recognition. In this respect, the Jazz Age (represented here as circa 1919 – 1929) serves as a noteworthy case-in-point. For insofar as the impact of jazz music on social, political, and economic climates in cities such as New York, New Orleans, and even Kansas have been recorded, the music’s impact on and significance in Boston is yet to be addressed in any great detail. Simply put, the history of jazz in Boston, and with it an important period for black development in the city, exists in fragments such as discographies, newspaper listings, musical handbooks, potted witness accounts among others. Therefore, the principle aim of this thesis is to piece-together these fragments to form a mosaic history that reveals instances of black struggle, resistance, and progress during a period of heightened racial (Jim Crow segregation), political (the Red Scare), and economic tension. Essential to this process is not only the need to locate the voices of Boston’s black past, whether in text, testimony, sound and beyond, but also to create the conditions to hear them on their own terms. In order to achieve this, emphasis here is placed on tracing instances of voice, and as a by-product heritage, in musical form from the arrival of the first slaves to Boston in the first-half of the seventeenth century and analysing the ways in which these voices were perpetuated through methods of adaptation, appropriation, and evolution. This approach would ultimately assist in enriching the Jazz Age with a black art form that was not only unique but a distinct form of expression for a race lacking a significant voice in America at the time. In this respect, this thesis looks at the ways in which homegrown Boston musicians, such as Johnny Hodges and Harry Carney, and frequenting players, such as Duke Ellington, used jazz music as a way to oppose standard forms of white dominance, cultural elitism, and economic subjugation.
The Boston Radio Experience: Pioneering New Technology in the Early Twentieth Century, 2019
Central to early radio exploration and development was the city of Boston, Massachsuetts. Through... more Central to early radio exploration and development was the city of Boston, Massachsuetts. Through its early amateur wireless clubs and societies and on to its pioneering amateurs and leading entrepreneurs, including merchant, John Shepard III, the city can lay claim to its share of pivotal advances in the growth of the medium: the first known continuous transmission, the earliest daily news program, the initial chain broadcast (Boston to New York), as well as several openings for black performers, including African-American vaudeville stars Noble Sissle and Eubie Blake. This article reflects on the significant involvement that two Boston radio stations, 1XE and WNAC, had on the trajectory of early radio, with particular emphasis on their roles in construction, transmission, and programming. While the success of radio was for the most part a national progression, arguably nowhere else were the foundations for its success more decisively laid than in Boston.
On September 11th 1973, the Chilean military, led by General Augusto Pinochet, overthrew the demo... more On September 11th 1973, the Chilean military, led by General Augusto Pinochet, overthrew the democratically elected Unidad Popular government of Salvador Allende, bringing forty years of democracy to an end in Chile. As troops blasted buildings and helicopters sprayed bullets into the top floors of the British Embassy, the Presidential Palace was ablaze following a direct-hit from an aerial strike. The country was in the final throws of ‘self-managed socialism’ and Salvador Allende in the midst of the epilogue of his reign. The Marxist experiment, or as some have labelled it, the initiation and implementation of radical and social reforms, crashed to a violent and bloody end. In a single day, a lifetime of work and dreams was torn asunder in a campaign of random violence and terror.
This thesis reconstructs a history of life in Santiago, Chile in the aftremath of Allende's death by analysis the street murals of the Brigada Ramona Parra and the poetry of Raul Zurita through a microhistorical and subaletrn methodological framework. In doing so, aspects of personal and group suffering emegre as well as a sense of collective action in the face of unrelenting subjugation at the hands of the Pinochet regime.
Papers by Dr Craig Doughty
In 1946, while demonstrating in support of a group of striking nitrate workers, a twenty-year-old... more In 1946, while demonstrating in support of a group of striking nitrate workers, a twenty-year-old female communist named Ramona Parra was shot to death by police in Santiago, Chile,[i]in what has come to be known as the Bulnes Square Massacre.A product of political marginalisation, the details of Parra's life are sketchy. But for fleeting mentions in art history books she is otherwise a mystery.[ii]Her death, however, has had a far-reaching significance, for she became and remains a martyr symbol of the Chilean struggle against oppression. In particular, her name was proudly taken to identify the artistic movements of the muralist brigade of the Chilean Communist Party (CCP), the Brigada Ramona Parra (BRP) in 1968.[iii] On September 11,1973, Chile, and with it the CCP, was thrown into turmoil. The country that homegrown poet Pablo Neruda once described as a 'long petal of sea, wine, and snow' was transformed from Latin America's foremost social democracy under Salvad...
American Research Journal of English and Literature, 2019
This article presents an analytical insight into the characters of Marlowe in Joseph Conrad's nov... more This article presents an analytical insight into the characters of Marlowe in Joseph Conrad's novella, 'Heart of Darkness' and Francis Ford Coppola's appropriation of that character, Willard in the film, ' Apocalypse Now'. Both characters are used to document and deal with concepts of colonialism and the impact of foreign interference in lands deemed harsh and unforgiving: the Congo and Mekong respectively. In doing so, Marlowe and Willard make relentless journeys during periods of heightened historical conflict that lead both characters down spirals of emotional suffering. Interwoven into the fabric of these journeys are the distresses and pains of their creators. As such, Marlowe and Willard act as vessels for autobiographical forays.Principally, however, Conrad and Coppola use Marlowe and Willard as reference points for concepts of human morality. They compel the reader and the viewer, respectively, to question to what extent common morality is shared by most or all human beings and furthermore, is accessible to, and binding upon, all rational beings.
European journal of American studies, 2019
In her 1994 study, The Other Brahmins: Boston's Black Upper Class, 1750-1950, Adelaide Cromwell a... more In her 1994 study, The Other Brahmins: Boston's Black Upper Class, 1750-1950, Adelaide Cromwell acknowledges the existence of class differences in Boston, placing emphasis on a small black upper-crust. These people, consisting of business professionals, clerks, teachers, caterers, and small merchants had moderate wealth, were college educated, attended churches, and had some standing in community matters. 1 Amongst this small collective was a group of upwardly mobile African-American females, who functioned under the group heading of the League of Women for Community Service (LWCS). 2 This group pursued their own advancement through community activities in the arts, incorporating the tastes, organisational practices and aesthetic sensibilities of Boston's Anglo-American cultural elites, the Brahmins. In doing so, they sought to advocate and promote a brand of high culture stewardship that, as Paul DiMaggio states, equated to 'black cultural capitalism', albeit within a context of rigid racial boundaries during an era of widespread discrimination. In the process of promoting an aesthetic hierarchy of distinction, the LWCS excluded the black the working class and poor and rejected mainstream musical forms, including Jazz and the Blues. This article explores the impact of black cultural entrepreneurship on black uplift within the developing social, cultural, and political landscape of early twentieth century Boston.
Boston is a city steeped in history. Beyond the struggle for abolition, however, the historical e... more Boston is a city steeped in history. Beyond the struggle for abolition, however, the historical experiences of the majority of black Bostonians, especially during the early twentieth-century, are lacking recognition. In this respect, the Jazz Age (represented here as circa 1919 – 1929) serves as a noteworthy case-in-point. For insofar as the impact of jazz music on social, political, and economic climates in cities such as New York, New Orleans, and even Kansas have been recorded, the music’s impact on and significance in Boston is yet to be addressed in any great detail. Simply put, the history of jazz in Boston, and with it an important period for black development in the city, exists in fragments such as discographies, newspaper listings, musical handbooks, potted witness accounts among others. Therefore, the principle aim of this thesis is to piece-together these fragments to form a mosaic history that reveals instances of black struggle, resistance, and progress during a period...
One of the most interesting developments in contemporary subaltern studies has been its growing e... more One of the most interesting developments in contemporary subaltern studies has been its growing engagement with culture, particularly music. Where once Gayatri Chakravorty Spivak, in the context of postcolonial research, asked, ‘Can the Subaltern Speak?’, media scholars, including Emma Baulch, Rebecca Romanow, and Anne Schumann, through the fusing of subaltern studies, comparative cultural studies and anthropological perspectives on musical play, are now asking broader and somewhat heterogenous questions about protest and resistance in the lyricism and vocalisations found in heavy metal, folk, and American hip-hop music. Through an interdisciplinary approach to interpretation that draws on historical reconstruction, musicological close-listening, cultural poetics, and audial discourse, my current research project asks, ‘Can the Subaltern Play?’ In doing so, the objective of this project is to locate and interpret notions of ‘voice’ - i.e., a metaphorical language of protest and resistance - present in instrumental jazz music produced by black musicians in Boston, Massachusetts between 1910 and 1939.
Drafts by Dr Craig Doughty
In 1946, while demonstrating in support of a group of striking nitrate workers, a twenty-year-old... more In 1946, while demonstrating in support of a group of striking nitrate workers, a twenty-year-old female communist named Ramona Parra was shot to death by police in Santiago, Chile, in what has come to be known as the Bulnes Square Massacre. A product of political marginalisation, the details of Parra’s life are sketchy. But for fleeting mentions in art history books she is otherwise a mystery. Her death, however, has had a far-reaching significance, for she became and remains a martyr symbol of the Chilean struggle against oppression. In particular, her name was proudly taken to identify the artistic movements of the muralist brigade of the Chilean Communist Party (CCP), the Brigada Ramona Parra (BRP) in 1968.
On September 11, 1973, Chile, and with it the CCP, was thrown into turmoil. The country that homegrown poet Pablo Neruda once described as a ‘long petal of sea, wine, and snow’ was transformed from Latin America's foremost social democracy under Salvador Allende to the region's darkest dictatorship under the military regime of Augusto Pinochet. The latter ushered in a period of widespread torture and the murder of an estimated 3000 Chileans. Furthermore, the regime carried out an assault on culture that saw the erasure of swathes of leftist literature, film, music, and art, which included the whitewashing of BRP murals that had for five years colourfully decorated and secured Santiago’s streets for Salvador Allende. As Geoffrey Hutton stated in the immediate aftermath of the coup, ‘Now, a bullet through the head is more effective than a vote in the ballot-box’.
In the process of writing a brief history of the BRP collective, this article contextualises the violence imposed on Chile by Pinochet’s Military Regime; and in doing so documents how members of the left perpetuated modes of artistic expression and protest at home and in exile throughout dictatorial rule. By attributing meaning to the murals of the BRP, the aim is also to contribute, if only moderately, to the reconstruction of a fragmented, distorted, and, in part, whitewashed (i.e., destroyed) past. Interwoven is an acknowledgment of the role the BRP played in the 1988 ‘No’ campaign; in this respect, the efforts of the BRP, which are largely without recognition, to paint and ultimately reclaim Santiago’s streets served as an essential subsidy to the widely lauded and successful savoir-faire TV campaign orchestrated by Eugenio García.
American Research Journal of England and Literature, 2019
This article presents an analytical insight into the characters of Marlowe in Joseph Conrad’s nov... more This article presents an analytical insight into the characters of Marlowe in Joseph Conrad’s novella, ‘Heart of Darkness’ and Francis Ford Coppola’s appropriation of that character, Willard in the film, ‘Apocalypse Now’. Both characters are used to document and deal with concepts of colonialism and the impact of foreign interference in lands deemed harsh and unforgiving: the Congo and Mekong respectively. In doing so, Marlowe and Willard make relentless journeys during periods of heightened historical conflict that lead both characters down spirals of emotional suffering. Interwoven into the fabric of these journeys are the distresses and pains of their creators. As such, Marlowe and Willard act as vessels for autobiographical forays. Principally, however, Conrad and Coppola use Marlowe and Willard as reference points for concepts of human morality. They compel the reader and the viewer, respectively, to question to what extent common morality is shared by most or all human beings and furthermore, is accessible to, and binding upon, all rational beings.
LWCS Black Elitism and Cultural Entrepreneurship in 1920's Boston, 2019
In her 1994 study, The Other Brahmins: Boston's Black Upper Class, 1750-1950, Adelaide Cromwell a... more In her 1994 study, The Other Brahmins: Boston's Black Upper Class, 1750-1950, Adelaide Cromwell acknowledges the existence of class differences in Boston, placing emphasis on a small black upper-crust. These people, consisting of business professionals, clerks, teachers, caterers, and small merchants, had some wealth, were college educated, attended churches, and had some standing in community matters. Amongst this small collective was a group of upwardly mobile African-American females, who functioned under the group heading of the League of Women for Community Service (LWCS). This group pursued their own advancement through community activities in the arts, incorporating the tastes, organisational practices and aesthetic sensibilities of Boston’s Anglo-American cultural elites, the Brahmins. In doing so, they sought to advocate and promote a brand of high culture stewardship that, as Paul DiMaggio states, equated to ‘black cultural capitalism’, albeit within a context of rigid racial boundaries during an era of widespread discrimination. In the process of promoting an aesthetic hierarchy of distinction, the LWCS, perhaps inadvertently, essentially excluded the black the working class and poor, groups from which many of the city’s jazz musicians originated. This article explores, in brief, the impact of black cultural entrepreneurship on black uplift within the developing social, cultural, and political landscape of early twentieth century Boston.
The broader focuses of my PhD research concentrates on the labours of black females to garner social uplift via culture in 1920’s Boston, Massachusetts. I am particularly interested in the efforts of female collectives who promoted artistic expression, principally in the spheres of music and theatre, against a backdrop of rigid racial and gendered oppression.
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Thesis Chapters by Dr Craig Doughty
This thesis reconstructs a history of life in Santiago, Chile in the aftremath of Allende's death by analysis the street murals of the Brigada Ramona Parra and the poetry of Raul Zurita through a microhistorical and subaletrn methodological framework. In doing so, aspects of personal and group suffering emegre as well as a sense of collective action in the face of unrelenting subjugation at the hands of the Pinochet regime.
Papers by Dr Craig Doughty
Drafts by Dr Craig Doughty
On September 11, 1973, Chile, and with it the CCP, was thrown into turmoil. The country that homegrown poet Pablo Neruda once described as a ‘long petal of sea, wine, and snow’ was transformed from Latin America's foremost social democracy under Salvador Allende to the region's darkest dictatorship under the military regime of Augusto Pinochet. The latter ushered in a period of widespread torture and the murder of an estimated 3000 Chileans. Furthermore, the regime carried out an assault on culture that saw the erasure of swathes of leftist literature, film, music, and art, which included the whitewashing of BRP murals that had for five years colourfully decorated and secured Santiago’s streets for Salvador Allende. As Geoffrey Hutton stated in the immediate aftermath of the coup, ‘Now, a bullet through the head is more effective than a vote in the ballot-box’.
In the process of writing a brief history of the BRP collective, this article contextualises the violence imposed on Chile by Pinochet’s Military Regime; and in doing so documents how members of the left perpetuated modes of artistic expression and protest at home and in exile throughout dictatorial rule. By attributing meaning to the murals of the BRP, the aim is also to contribute, if only moderately, to the reconstruction of a fragmented, distorted, and, in part, whitewashed (i.e., destroyed) past. Interwoven is an acknowledgment of the role the BRP played in the 1988 ‘No’ campaign; in this respect, the efforts of the BRP, which are largely without recognition, to paint and ultimately reclaim Santiago’s streets served as an essential subsidy to the widely lauded and successful savoir-faire TV campaign orchestrated by Eugenio García.
The broader focuses of my PhD research concentrates on the labours of black females to garner social uplift via culture in 1920’s Boston, Massachusetts. I am particularly interested in the efforts of female collectives who promoted artistic expression, principally in the spheres of music and theatre, against a backdrop of rigid racial and gendered oppression.
This thesis reconstructs a history of life in Santiago, Chile in the aftremath of Allende's death by analysis the street murals of the Brigada Ramona Parra and the poetry of Raul Zurita through a microhistorical and subaletrn methodological framework. In doing so, aspects of personal and group suffering emegre as well as a sense of collective action in the face of unrelenting subjugation at the hands of the Pinochet regime.
On September 11, 1973, Chile, and with it the CCP, was thrown into turmoil. The country that homegrown poet Pablo Neruda once described as a ‘long petal of sea, wine, and snow’ was transformed from Latin America's foremost social democracy under Salvador Allende to the region's darkest dictatorship under the military regime of Augusto Pinochet. The latter ushered in a period of widespread torture and the murder of an estimated 3000 Chileans. Furthermore, the regime carried out an assault on culture that saw the erasure of swathes of leftist literature, film, music, and art, which included the whitewashing of BRP murals that had for five years colourfully decorated and secured Santiago’s streets for Salvador Allende. As Geoffrey Hutton stated in the immediate aftermath of the coup, ‘Now, a bullet through the head is more effective than a vote in the ballot-box’.
In the process of writing a brief history of the BRP collective, this article contextualises the violence imposed on Chile by Pinochet’s Military Regime; and in doing so documents how members of the left perpetuated modes of artistic expression and protest at home and in exile throughout dictatorial rule. By attributing meaning to the murals of the BRP, the aim is also to contribute, if only moderately, to the reconstruction of a fragmented, distorted, and, in part, whitewashed (i.e., destroyed) past. Interwoven is an acknowledgment of the role the BRP played in the 1988 ‘No’ campaign; in this respect, the efforts of the BRP, which are largely without recognition, to paint and ultimately reclaim Santiago’s streets served as an essential subsidy to the widely lauded and successful savoir-faire TV campaign orchestrated by Eugenio García.
The broader focuses of my PhD research concentrates on the labours of black females to garner social uplift via culture in 1920’s Boston, Massachusetts. I am particularly interested in the efforts of female collectives who promoted artistic expression, principally in the spheres of music and theatre, against a backdrop of rigid racial and gendered oppression.