This talk will highlight the ways in which Langston Hughes and Ryan Coogler represent and exemplify salient elements of the Blues ethos, while doing so nearly a century apart in nonmusical mediums. Central in this regard are the comparatively high degrees of significance that Hughes and Coogler attribute to dancing in Blues Aesthetics. Additional focus will spotlight the artist's representations of blues-based values and their methods of stimulating and/or simulating common elements of blues-based music. Parallels between Hughes's depictions of dancers and Coogler's funk sub-motif, which includes P-Funk's symbolish, will be briefly discussed as well.
Co-sponsored by the UCLA Department of African American Studies.