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Aerial Archives of Race
African American Cultural Expressions and the Black Nuclear Pacific
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Etsuko Taketani
Language:
English
Published/Copyright:
2026
About this book
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Opening new archives and narratives that emerge when we take an aerial turn in transpacific studies, Etsuko Taketani examines the genealogy and contours of the aerial imaginary and the corollary shifting planetary imaginary that evolved in a transnational space she terms the "black nuclear Pacific." Following the first aerial drop of an atom bomb on humans and the subsequent military occupation of Japan by the United States, African American–Japanese encounters happened on a scale unimaginable before the war. Through texts from a diverse range of artists, writers, and political thinkers—such as the NAACP's Walter White, lawyer Edith Sampson, Josephine Baker, Langston Hughes, Lorraine Hansberry, and Malcolm X—who had formative interactions with occupied Japan, Taketani uncovers and analyzes African American cultural expressions that include a quasi-alien abduction narrative, a creation of a new tribe in the image of a rainbow on Earth, a black futuristic apocalypse, and a racial fantasy of the Mother Plane. Through these cultural expressions, Aerial Archives of Race tracks the black networks and exchanges with Japan from above that provoked new ways of thinking about (human) races on planet Earth.
Opening new archives and narratives that emerge when we take an aerial turn in transpacific studies, Etsuko Taketani examines the genealogy and contours of the aerial imaginary and the corollary shifting planetary imaginary that evolved in a transnational space she terms the "black nuclear Pacific." Following the first aerial drop of an atom bomb on humans and the subsequent military occupation of Japan by the United States, African American–Japanese encounters happened on a scale unimaginable before the war. Through texts from a diverse range of artists, writers, and political thinkers—such as the NAACP's Walter White, lawyer Edith Sampson, Josephine Baker, Langston Hughes, Lorraine Hansberry, and Malcolm X—who had formative interactions with occupied Japan, Taketani uncovers and analyzes African American cultural expressions that include a quasi-alien abduction narrative, a creation of a new tribe in the image of a rainbow on Earth, a black futuristic apocalypse, and a racial fantasy of the Mother Plane. Through these cultural expressions, Aerial Archives of Race tracks the black networks and exchanges with Japan from above that provoked new ways of thinking about (human) races on planet Earth.
Author / Editor information
Contributor: Etsuko Taketani
Etsuko Taketani is Professor of American Literature at the University of Tsukuba, Japan. She is author of U.S. Women Writers and the Discourses of Colonialism, 1825–1861 and The Black Pacific Narrative: Geographic Imaginings of Race and Empire between the World Wars.
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Frontmatter
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Contents
ix -
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Introduction
1 -
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1 Aerial Mapping
25 -
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2 Prison Planet
50 -
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3 The Aerial Fairy Tale
75 -
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4 The Black Nuclear Pacific
100 -
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5 Futuristic Remains of a Found-Lost Nation
133 -
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Epilogue
159 -
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Acknowledgments
169 -
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Notes
171 -
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Bibliography
203 -
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INDEX
217
Publishing information
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
eBook published on:
January 6, 2026
eBook ISBN:
9780520416789
Pages and Images/Illustrations in book
Main content:
230
eBook ISBN:
9780520416789
Keywords for this book
Transpacific cultural exchange; African American expatriates in Asia; postwar racial imaginaries; artistic collaborations; black internationalism in East Asia; Japanese media; solidarity movements; cultural narratives; literary influence; political activism; black identity in the Pacific region
