Good Women Die: Re-Envisioning the Life of Philippa Duke Schuyler (1931-1967)

FAIN: HB-289398-23

Rachel Afi Quinn
University of Houston (Houston, TX 77204-3067)

Research and writing leading to a critical biography of Philippa Schuyler (1931-1967), a mixed-race pianist, writer, and Goodwill-Ambassador who was also the daughter of conservative Harlem Renaissance journalist George Schuyler.

Good Women Die is a black feminist critical biography that re-examines the short life of biracial American Philippa Schuyler, a child-prodigy-turned-Goodwill-Ambassador from Harlem. The socially conservative Schuyler traveled the world as a musician, writer and humanitarian. A vast photographic archive documents her social significance during the mid-twentieth century, while numerous choices she made about self-representation reveal how her racial identity shifted across borders. This transnational feminist cultural studies project complicates previous readings of Schuyler's archive and her public personae by centering her voice, her negotiations with whiteness, her interests in dreams and divinations, and her travels across the continent Africa. This biography as an open access digital publication will incorporate many of Schuyler’s audio and visual archives. NEH funding will facilitate the completion of this full manuscript and support its availability to general audiences.