Gerald L. Early (born April 21, 1952
in Philadelphia
, Pennsylvania
) is an American essayist and
American culture
critic. He is currently the
Merle Kling Professor of Modern letters,
of English, African studies, African American studies , American
culture studies, and Director, Center for Joint Projects in the
Humanities and Social Sciences at Washington
University
in St. Louis
, Missouri
.
He also served as a consultant on
Ken
Burns'
documentary films
Baseball and
Jazz and
Unforgivable
Blackness: The Rise and Fall of Jack Johnson and
The War. He is a regular
commentator on
National Public
Radio's
Fresh Air. His essays
have appeared in numerous editions of
Best American Essays series. He
writes on topics as diverse as
American literature, the
Korean War,
African American culture,
Afro-American
autobiography,
non-fiction prose,
baseball,
jazz,
prizefighting,
Motown,
Miles Davis,
Muhammad Ali and
Sammy Davis Jr.
Background and education
Gerald Lyn Early was born April 21, 1952, in
Philadelphia, PA; son of Henry
Early and Florence Fernandez Oglesby. His father (a baker) died
when Early was nine months old, leaving his mother (a preschool
teacher) to rear him and his two sisters on her own. Living in a
poor area of the city, Early grew up befriending members of the
Fifth and the South Street gangs, though he never became a member
himself. Instead he focused on scholarly pursuits, graduating cum
laude from the University of Pennsylvania in 1974. During Early's
undergraduate years, he was introduced to the writings of Amiri
Baraka and later credited the poet and playwright with influencing
his own work. Early developed much of his writing style through
involvement with the university newspaper. Ironically, his first
major piece was a journalistic foray into the gang-related murder
of a cousin.
After earning his B.A., Early returned to Philadelphia, where he
became employed by the city government. He also spent six months
monitoring gang activities through the Crisis Intervention Network
before resuming his course work at Cornell University, where he
eventually earned a doctorate in English literature in 1982. Early
landed his first teaching job as an assistant professor of black
studies at St. Louis's Washington University in 1982. He would
steadily rise to a full professorship in both the English and the
renamed African and Afro-American studies departments by
1990.
Personal life
On August 27, 1977, Early married Ida Haynes, a college
administrator, They have two children, Linnet Kristen Haynes Early
and Rosalind Lenora Haynes Early.
Awards and honors
Early won the 1994
National
Book Critics Circle Award for essay collection
The Culture
of Bruising: Essays on Prizefighting, Literature, and Modern
American Culture.
He has been nominated for the
Grammy
Award Best Album Notes twice in
2001 for
Yes I Can! The Sammy Davis Jr. Story and
in 2002 for
Rhapsodies in Black: Music and Words From The
Harlem Renaissance.
On September 5, 2007, Professor Early was honored by Washington
University with the unveiling of a portrait painted by
Jamie Adams which hangs in the Journals Reading
Room of the university's
Olin
Library.
Works
- Tuxedo Junction: Essays on American Culture
(1989)
- Life with Daughters:Watching the Miss America Pageant
(1990)
- The Culture of Bruising: Essays on Prizefighting,
Literature, and Modern American Culture (1994)
- Daughters: On Family and Fatherhood (1994) (memoir)
- One Nation Under a Groove: Motown & American
Culture (1994) (music
history)
- How the War in the Streets Is Won: Poems on the Quest of
Love and Faith (1995) (poetry)
- Yes I Can! The Sammy Davis Jr. Story (2001)
(nominated for a (nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Album
Notes)
- Rhapsodies in Black: Music and Words From the Harlem
Renaissance (2002) (nominated for a Grammy Award for Best Album
Notes)
Editing work
- Lure and Loathing: Essays on Race, Identity and the
Ambivalence of Assimilation (1993)
- Ain't But a Place: An Anthology of African American
Writings About St. Louis (1998)
- Body Language: Writers on Sport (1998)
- The Muhammad Ali Reader (1998)
- Miles Davis and American Culture (2001)
- The Sammy Davis, Jr. Reader (2001)
- Black America in the 1960s (2003)
- My Soul's High Song: The Collected Writings of Countee
Cullen(1991)
- Speech and Power: The African-American Essay in Its
Cultural Content(1993)
References
- Washington University Faculty Page: Gerald L. Early: Merle
Kling Professor of Modern Letters. [1]
- Washington University Faculty Page. Ibid
- Answers.com Profile of Gerald Early
- Answers.com Ibid
External links
Wikis
Map
Search
