Al Jolson

Al Jolson’s The Jazz Singer opened in 1927 to critical acclaim and widespread popular acclamation. The film is focused on young, Jewish Jakie Rabinowitz, who defies his devoutly religious family in order to pursue a career on stage as a jazz singer. Significantly, this film features copious uses of blackface, which is not only narratively but thematically central to the message of the film—the necessary rebellion of modernity against tradition, of New World dynamism against Old World stagnation. In terms of race, the film depicts a significant amount of hybridity, or assimilation, on Jack Robin’s part, and that assimilation is characterized by the transference of his own Jewishness to the melting pot of American culture. However, while little…

mnemonic F-E-A-R has two meanings: “Forget Everything and Run” or “Face Everything And Rise.” For most people, it is much easier to run away from fear, as is the case with the female narrator from “In the Cemetery Where Al Jolson Is Buried” and Murphy from “Murphy’s X-mas.” Each of them ran away from their fears for a long time, and it wasn’t until the very end of their stories that they decided to face them. The narrator ran from her fear for two months and faced it for only one day. Murphy ran…

Macaih described the motorcycle accident he encounters on the west side of Detroit and show us a video of him and a partner rail jumping from Oregon to Salt Lake City, Utah. The song of the day was Al Jolson singing Brother Can You Spare a Dime, a definitive rendition depicting the sentiment during the Great Depression. In 1927 there was a world depression and, the Soviet Union with Josef Stalin created the Gulag a labor camp in which many people died. World War I veterans created the Bonus Army…

meaning keep stretching us thin and turn each other on one another. They are looking for America to collapse. The citizens of the United States need our government to do anything necessary to keep our population safe. One thing the government is in fact in charge of would be making sure the United States citizens are safe through any mean of punishment. Human rights activists believe this is not the case and there should be no reason for using harsh interrogation techniques. Guantanamo Bay is…

“Should national security override free speech?” Freedom of speech was first established in the First Amendment of the United States Constitution in 1791, and almost two centuries later, in the International Declaration of Human Rights, the UN recognised freedom of speech as a human right (reference). The question of whether or not national security should override the freedom of speech has been, and continues to be a controversial subject, particularly among governments and law-abiding…

If I were to name the twenty-first century, I would call it the Age of Disaster. Many events have happened throughout the course of the twenty-first century that forever changed lives all around the world. To kick off the twenty-first century, a group named Al-Qaeda, planned a terrorist attack. The plan went in full force on September 11, 2001. Two planes crashed into the Twin Towers, destroying the towers within hours. A second plane also crashed into the Pentagon. A final plane was thought to…

Al Capone Al Capone was a crime boss and his success flourished in the 1920s. He owned towns, and almost owned the nation. Throughout the years, he has been a subject of many art forms such as movies and books. Even though he was responsible for many violent murders, Capone was still a celebrity during the 1920s. Capone caused the people that knew him to shrink in fear, while still making America awe at him. When Prohibition was put into place, people like Capone stepped in and took…

Al Qaeda is a terror group with a deep religious ideology, which it uses to justify their actions. Al Qaeda has a Salafi-Jihadi ideology, a dogma that has found its beginnings with Jamal al Din al Afghani. Four main terms that formulate this ideology are Salifism, Jihad, Hijra, and Jahiliyya. Al Qaeda engages in what is called a lesser jihad, meaning creating a better community, expanding it or defending it through terror attacks or war. Greater Jihad includes betterment of the community and the…

misrepresented and viewed in that way, so for the show to present this issue in that derogatory way is very influential and offensive to Muslim Americans. In other television shows such as the very popular fictional drama Homeland where Brody the main character who was captured and tortured in Afghanistan. When Brody returned he announced his Islamic faith, which resulted in hate towards him and then was assigned a CIA officer to look after him in case he was a threat or a spy. In this…

During the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, there were many ideas/ forces used in our history that were most accountable for maintaining the power of the West. Nations such as Europe, the United States, and Great Britain used their superior power to their own advantage. Technology and great resources were things that helped them succeed in controlling and maintaining their hold over the West. Without their superior thinking, these nations would not have been able to keep their power without…