ABSTRACT
The two most important secondary ideas in "Characteristics of Negro Expression" are that African American spirituals have never been authentically performed for white audiences, and that white artists have failed to imitate "Negro" art correctly. Though these arguments are related, both imply the existence of broad misunderstanding of the true nature of African American art. Zora Neale Hurston's claim that spirituals had never been authentically performed for a white audience caused controversy. By the 1920s, black singing groups, including the Fisk Jubilee Singers and Tuskegee Choir, had toured the world for years, singing spirituals to wide acclaim, and generally to the pride of the African American community. But Hurston insists that these groups, by cleaning up arrangements and giving them regular harmonies, "spread a misconception of Negro spirituals". Hurston names many such artists: singer Mae West, composer George Gershwin, dancer Ann Pennington, and the "white damsels who try to sing the blues".
