Vogue: Compare and Contrast Mini-Essay

Here are some clips for the mini-compare and contrast group essay. I found them on Youtube and I think that for the movie, Paris is Burning, these clips correspond with what we saw in class.

And then here is the Madonna video:

Try to work out with your group the thesis, and see how you are going to divide the work. It might be helpful to ask yourselves what does the evolution from "reading" to "shade" to "vogue" imply. How do the images and references used by Madonna change their meaning once they are removed from the ballroom community? Is the relationship between Madonna's promotion of this dance similar to the relationship that Baldwin spoke about when he accused white America of taking phrases of Black American English and altering their meaning so they promoted a style but lacked meaning?

Baldwin connects the oppression experienced by Black Americans as the cause of this separate language beginning with the suppression of the slaves' original languages, a strong church influence, and the poverty and despair of the everyday experience of a Black American. Baldwin concentrates on the negative of this language dynamic, i.e that the absorption of Black English into White American English covers up the continual oppression of the Black Americans, and that by denying that their langauge is separate this also denies the experience that makes Black American English necessary.

See if thinking about the relationship between Black American English and White American English helps you as you watch these clips.

And be creative in your comparisons! Have fun with it.