Hannah Durkin is a lecturer in literature and film at Newcastle University. She is a coeditor of Visualising Slavery: Art Across the African Diaspora.

"Josephine Baker and Katherine Dunham is a tour-de-force brilliantly analyzing the cinematic depictions in a black Atlantic context. The full implications of the European depictions of these wonderful dancers is teased out through exhaustive attention to dancing techniques, cinematography and the two women's autobiographical writings. A must read for all scholars of African American performance and cultural politics."--Alan Rice, author of Creating Memorials, Building Identities: The Politics of Memory in the Black Atlantic"Makes a significant contribution to the field. . . . The dance performances of these artists as recreated onscreen are interpreted and read through the lens of a dance critic who interrogates the dancing body which appropriated diasporic dance techniques over which the artist did not always control."--Charlene B. Regester, African American Actresses: The Struggle for Visibility, 1900–1960

• CoverTitleCopyrightContentsList of IllustrationsAcknowledgmentsIntroduction1. The Dancer in Translation: Baker's Coauthored Narratives2. The Dancer as Translator: Dunham's Ethnographic Memoirs3. Performing within Primitivism: Baker on the French Silent Screen4. Cinematic Stardom: Baker and the 1930s French Musical Film5. Cinematic Segregation: Dunham in World War II Hollywood6. Navigating Primitivism's Persistent Gaze: Dunham in Postwar European CinemaConclusionNotesSelected BibliographyIndexBack cover

Hannah Durkin is a lecturer in literature and film at Newcastle University. She is a coeditor of Visualising Slavery: Art Across the African Diaspora.

"Josephine Baker and Katherine Dunham is a tour-de-force brilliantly analyzing the cinematic depictions in a black Atlantic context. The full implications of the European depictions of these wonderful dancers is teased out through exhaustive attention to dancing techniques, cinematography and the two women's autobiographical writings. A must read for all scholars of African American performance and cultural politics."--Alan Rice, author of Creating Memorials, Building Identities: The Politics of Memory in the Black Atlantic"Makes a significant contribution to the field. . . . The dance performances of these artists as recreated onscreen are interpreted and read through the lens of a dance critic who interrogates the dancing body which appropriated diasporic dance techniques over which the artist did not always control."--Charlene B. Regester, African American Actresses: The Struggle for Visibility, 1900–1960

• CoverTitleCopyrightContentsList of IllustrationsAcknowledgmentsIntroduction1. The Dancer in Translation: Baker's Coauthored Narratives2. The Dancer as Translator: Dunham's Ethnographic Memoirs3. Performing within Primitivism: Baker on the French Silent Screen4. Cinematic Stardom: Baker and the 1930s French Musical Film5. Cinematic Segregation: Dunham in World War II Hollywood6. Navigating Primitivism's Persistent Gaze: Dunham in Postwar European CinemaConclusionNotesSelected BibliographyIndexBack cover