Performing Visibility: Freaknic and the Spatial Politics of Sexuality, Race, and Class in Atlanta

Thompson, Krista A.

doi:10.1162/dram.2007.51.4.24

Cited by 19 publications

(11 citation statements)

References 6 publications

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“…The earliest expressions of Black girlhood performances in support of the Atlanta hip-hop scene are in the extension and inclusion of a variety of performances in Atlanta's Spring Break party known as Freaknik. Curated by Atlanta's HBCUs, Black women produced, transformed and defined cultural interactions within this street party (Thompson 2007). The participants of Freaknik in Atlanta were Black collegiate youth who were key components of booty shaking and twerking performances that occurred in the streets of Atlanta by Black women (Halliday 2020;Thompson 2007).…”

Section: Southern Girl and Atlantamentioning

confidence: 99%

“…Curated by Atlanta's HBCUs, Black women produced, transformed and defined cultural interactions within this street party (Thompson 2007). The participants of Freaknik in Atlanta were Black collegiate youth who were key components of booty shaking and twerking performances that occurred in the streets of Atlanta by Black women (Halliday 2020;Thompson 2007). The annual event specifically highlighted how Black women could shape southern culture through dance and street performance.…”

Section: Southern Girl and Atlantamentioning

confidence: 99%

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Dirty South Feminism: The Girlies Got Somethin’ to Say Too! Southern Hip-Hop Women, Fighting Respectability, Talking Mess, and Twerking Up the Dirty South

Johnson

2021

Religions

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Within southern hip-hop, minimal credit has been given to the Black women who have curated sonic and performance narratives within the southern region. Many southern hip-hop scholars and journalists have centralized the accomplishments and masculinities of southern male rap performances. Here, dirty south feminism works to explore how agency, location, and Black women’s rap (lyrics and rhyme) and dance (twerking) performances in southern hip-hop are established under a contemporary hip-hop womanist framework. I critique the history of southern hip-hop culture by decentralizing male-dominated and hyper-masculine southern hip-hop identities. Second, I extend hip-hop feminist/womanist scholarship that includes tangible reflections of Black womanhood that emerge out of the South to see how these narratives reshape and re-inform representations of Black women and girls within southern hip-hop culture. I use dirty south feminism to include geographical understandings of southern Black women who have grown up in the South and been sexually shamed, objectified and pushed to the margins in southern hip-hop history. I seek to explore the following questions: How does the performance of Black women’s presence in hip-hop dance localize the South to help expand narratives within dirty south hip-hop? How can the “dirty south” as a geographical place within hip-hop be a guide to disrupt a conservative hip-hop South through a hip-hop womanist lens?

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Section: Southern Girl and Atlantamentioning

confidence: 99%

Section: Southern Girl and Atlantamentioning

confidence: 99%

Dirty South Feminism: The Girlies Got Somethin’ to Say Too! Southern Hip-Hop Women, Fighting Respectability, Talking Mess, and Twerking Up the Dirty South

Johnson

2021

Religions

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“…Connected to the increased attention to Buckhead's emerging 'problem' was Atlanta's hosting of Freaknic, the spring weekend celebration by African-American college students, which was held in Atlanta from 1983 until 1999, peaking in the mid1990s with around 200,000 revelers from HBCUs (see Thompson 2007 for an exploration of the spatial politics of Freaknic). In its last year, the city of Atlanta cracked down on the spring break activities, arresting 350 people and towing 400 cars (Suggs 2008).…”

Section: Buckhead As Black: 1990s-2006mentioning

confidence: 99%

“…7 In a letter to editor during the summer of 2003, the author comments on the increase in the population of partiers in Buckhead during the NBA All-Star weekend: 'Buckhead was once again invaded by unruly, uncivilized college students and wannabe hip-hop artists' (AJC 2003). By describing the crowd as 'wannabe hip-hop artists,' this reader suggests the presence of African-Americans (and also references Atlanta's recent experience with Freaknic; see Thompson 2007). The inclusion of college students implies that the problem is 388 Katherine B. Hankins et al…”

Section: Buckhead As Black: 1990s-2006mentioning

confidence: 99%

Making space, making race: reconstituting white privilege in Buckhead, Atlanta

Hankins

Cochran

Derickson

2012

Social & Cultural Geography

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The comfortable relationship between the overwhelmingly white, southern Atlanta neighborhood of Buckhead and a major hub of nightlife in the region unraveled in the early 2000s as the entire nightclub cluster was delegitimized, discursively constructed as dangerous and out of control, and ultimately razed to make space for luxury shopping. This paper sets out to query what social and cultural relations account for this massive and unpredicted reconfiguration of urban space in the epicenter of wealth, whiteness, and power in Atlanta. By mobilizing the concept of the socio-spatial dialectic (Soja 1980, Annals of the Association of American Geographers 70: 207 -225), we draw on Pulido's (2000, Annals of the Association of American Geographers 90: 12-40) work on the construction and perpetuation of white privilege to argue that the racialized production of space is a relevant framework for understanding the processes at work in Buckhead. We argue that race was an unstated but deeply important social relation shaping the process by which this particular space was remade. In so doing, we seek to advance the literature on whiteness by demonstrating the ways in which it articulates with the political economy of cities in the present conjuncture.

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“…Although it shared some similarities with the established Spring Breaks, Atlanta's "Freaknik" Spring Break was quite different: it was attended predominantly by African-American students and the festivities took place in parks and on streets rather than on the beach. 77 It all began for Atlanta in 1983 when a picnic was held for the city's college students who could not afford to travel during their Spring Break. Initially it was a small gathering; about fifty people showed up the first year.…”

Section: Freaknik and Black College Reunion: Race And Rebellionmentioning

confidence: 99%

“The students swarm to these peaceful shores in droves”: An Historical Overview of the Postwar Spring Break Phenomenon

Dawson¹,

Doiron²,

Gidney³

2012

HSE/RHE

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Despite the cultural and economic influence of Spring Break, and the fact that it has become asignificant area of study in other fields of research such as psychology, sociology, college health,and business and marketing, historians have largely overlooked the phenomenon. This articleprovides an overview of Spring Break’s postwar history by focusing primarily upon developmentsin the American Southeast, especially Fort Lauderdale, Daytona Beach and Atlanta. Inbridging the histories of higher education and tourism we focus on three key developments:tensions between visiting students and host communities, commercialization and corporatization,and the racial dynamics of Spring Break. In our conclusion we briefly examine the phenomenonof “alternative” Spring Breaks and offer reflections on Spring Break’s overall historicalsignificance.RésuméMalgré l’influence culturelle et économique de la semaine de relâche universitaire, le « SpringBreak » et le fait que de nombreux chercheurs en psychologie, sociologie, santé des étudiantsuniversitaires, commerce et publicité s’y soient intéressés, les historiens ont négligé ce phénomène.Cet article fournit une vue d’ensemble de l’histoire de la semaine de relâche dans lapériode d’après-guerre, centrée sur le déroulement des activités dans le sud-est des États-Uniset, en particulier, Fort Lauderdale, Daytona Beach et Atlanta. Nous effectuons un rapprochemententre l’histoire de l’enseignement supérieur et celle du tourisme et nous mettonsl’accent sur trois aspects clés de l’événement : les tensions entre les étudiants en vacances et lescommunautés hôtes, la commercialisation et le corporatisme et enfin la dynamique raciale dela semaine de relâche. Dans notre conclusion, nous considérons le phénomène des semaines derelâche « alternatives » et nous réfléchissons sur l’importance historique du « Spring Break ».

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Performing Visibility: Freaknic and the Spatial Politics of Sexuality, Race, and Class in Atlanta

Cited by 19 publications

References 6 publications

Dirty South Feminism: The Girlies Got Somethin’ to Say Too! Southern Hip-Hop Women, Fighting Respectability, Talking Mess, and Twerking Up the Dirty South

Dirty South Feminism: The Girlies Got Somethin’ to Say Too! Southern Hip-Hop Women, Fighting Respectability, Talking Mess, and Twerking Up the Dirty South

Making space, making race: reconstituting white privilege in Buckhead, Atlanta

“The students swarm to these peaceful shores in droves”: An Historical Overview of the Postwar Spring Break Phenomenon

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