THE QUESTION OF INTERRACIAL SEXUAL RELATIONSHIPS AND INTERMARRIAGE

Abstract

This chapter details how the Black Press created a black sexual public sphere, which fostered lively discussions about the benefits and consequences of intermarriage for African American advancement. Viewed by African American newspapers and by many readers, as the most racially and sexually charged topic of the 1920s and 1930s, readers responded to coverage with a variety of positions that both countered and supported the views of black leaders. Chapter 4 uncovers an ongoing debate between readers on intermarriage and interracial sexuality, which, appeared in papers through much of the 1930s. The Black Press served as a space for discourse on interracial sexual relationships that was at once entertaining as well as deployed in the fight for civil rights.