Masquerade Politics: Explorations in the Structure of Urban Cultural Movements

by Abner Cohen

Overview

Carnival, that image of sensuous frivolity, is shown by Abner Cohen to be a masquerade for the dynamic relations between culture and politics. His masterful study details the transformation of a local, polyethnic London fair to a massive, exclusively West Indian carnival, known as "Europe's biggest street festival," which in 1976 occasioned a bloody confrontation between black youth and the police and which has since become a fiercely contested cultural event.

Cohen contrasts the development of the London carnival with the development of other carnivalesque movements, including the Renaissance Pleasure Faire of California. His valuable analysis of these relatively little-explored urban cultural movements advances further the theoretical formulations developed in his previous studies.

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780520912571
Publisher:	University of California Press
Publication date:	04/28/2023
Sold by:	Barnes & Noble
Format:	eBook
Pages:	180
File size:	5 MB

About the Author

Abner Cohen is Emeritus Professor of Anthropology at the University of London. California published three of his earlier books: The Politics of Elite Culture (1981), Two-Dimensional Man (1974), and Custom and Politics in Urban Africa (1969).

Table of Contents

	Preface	ix
	Introduction	1
1	Resurrected London Fair	10
2	Corporate Organisation and the Trinidad Conventions	21
3	Youth Rebellion and the Jamaican Connection	33
4	The Carnival is Contested	45
5	The Carnival is Contained	62
6	Communal Organisation	79
7	The Political Dimension of Art and Music	92
8	The Leadership Process	106
9	The Politics of Joking Relationships	120
10	The Aestheticisation of Politics	133
	Conclusion	148
	Bibliography	156
	Index	162

Editorial Reviews

Cohen's work is a welcome departure from the academically popular analyses of both Turner and Bakhtin, neither of whom systematically argues from ethnography of any particular festival, including the many contexts which become defined in multiple styles for participation in and resistance to it. Such approcahes tend to obscure the relations between culture and politics. Cohen's discussion of the many styles for participation in and resistance to the Notting Hill Carnival and of the utility of these in political mobilisation makes this work a major contribution to the anthropology of urban festivals.

Anthropological Forum

The book is built up in a lucid way and written in a clear style. It may be of value for scholars interested in the subject of political aspects of cultural events, carnival, as well as the politico-cultural situation of West Indians living in Britain.

Social Anthropology

"The book is built up in a lucid way and written in a clear style. It may be of value for scholars interested in the subject of political aspects of cultural events, carnival, as well as the politico-cultural situation of West Indians living in Britain." —Social Anthropology

"Cohen's discussion of the many styles for participation in and resistance to the Notting Hill Carnival and of the utility of these in political mobilisation makes this work a major contribution to the anthropology of urban festivals." —Anthropological Forum

"Cohen's work is a welcome departure from the academically popular analyses of both Turbaner and Bakhtin, neither of whom systematically argues from ethnography of any particular festival, including the many contexts which become defined in multiple styles for participation in and resistance to it. Such approcahes tend to obscure the relations between culture and politics. Cohen's discussion of the many styles for participation in and resistance to the Notting Hill Carnival and of the utility of these in political mobilisation makes this work a major contribution to the anthropology of urban festivals." —Anthropological Forum

From the Publisher