A Conceptual Falsetto: Re-imagining Black Childhood Via One Girl’s Exploration of Prince

(Nelson 1981)

December 9–14, 1984—Rosemont Horizon, Purple Rain, (Austen 2016).

Although there were schools in my neighborhood, my mom sent me to Wacker Elementary School because it was one block from my grandmother’s home. As a working, custodial parent, my mom needed trusted childcare. Various family members lived at my grandmother’s house throughout my elementary years. Being a “family house,” there was always someone—mostly my grandmother’s sisters—there to care for me. In those days (kindergarten through third grade), I would walk alone one block to school.

Chicago Public Transit Authority.

I attended elementary school 1976–1985, which was post the legal desegregation of school. My schools were segregated by fact (de facto), not by law.

I define “childhood” in the legal sense. This means childhood is defined as the period before a person is legally an adult. By the US law, this can be understood as 0–21 years of age.

Although I am a “girl,” my desire is to create an inclusive narrative that includes Black boys and Black girls. Conceptual falsetto aims to (re)imagine Black childhood more broadly. While a scholar who writes a conceptual falsetto may choose to focus on Black boyhood or Black girlhood, I choose to focus on Black childhood, especially considering I am looking at my own childhood as well as that of Prince’s.

(Prince and the Revolution 1984a)

A person’s life narrative begins in childhood. Carolyn Steedman writes, (Steedman 1995:xi) [People] are: “human beings have bodies that grow through a process of development to full adult stature, and to an adult state; that story starts with childhood…” I introduce the term “once-child” as a referent to the living child within the developed adult. The once-child no longer physically exists, but the once-child lives as the foundational beginning of the adult person’s life narrative. For example, both Prince and I are adults, we are biologically no longer children. However, our childhoods live in the catalog of our lives—in fact, the once-child is the first actor on the life stage of an individual. Because our childhood is our beginning, in some ways, the child still exists; the child is a foundational part of personal narratives; we often return to the once-child for self-reflection or to tell our stories. In my research on Black childhood, the term “once-child,” honors the historical now of the once-child who lives inside the adults they have become, and who still speak through the adult they have become. Through my research, I aim to foreground the “once-child” as valid, and having voice, and the adults’ childhood memory is privileged. Through interviews, personal archival documents, and personal artifacts, memory is triangulated and validated (Morrison 1990). Through the research process, the once-childhood is re-evaluated in the now—by examining the once-child’s past doing, feeling, thinking, and saying (Alanen 2011; Boehm 2012; Dumas and Nelson 2016). Acknowledging the “once-child” is especially important for marginalized peoples, like black children, whose narratives have historically been dismissed, silenced, or completely erased from the dominant American histories (Bernstein 2011; Dumas and Nelson 2016; King 2005, 2011).

see Endnote 1

Thursday, September 1, 2016. “An Evening with The Revolution,” First Avenue; Thursday, October 13, 2016. “Official Prince Tribute: Celebration of Life and Music,” Xcel Energy Center.

see Endnote 2

see Endnote 3

see Endnote 4

Dates I wrote in my journal indicate years between March 10, 1986—December 1988. This would have been spring of ninth grade, through winter of twelfth grade. Essentially ninth through twelfth grade.

A page from my childhood journal, illustrates a sketch. The sketch emulates the artwork on the inside jacket of Prince’s Purple Rain album. I remember being particularly proud. I signed my name and dated the sketch “1986.”

A falsetto is defined as a “method of voice production used by male singers, especially tenors, to sing notes higher than their normal range” (Anon n.d.-a, b, c). By definition, a falsetto voice seeks to do what is unexpected. A falsetto is a higher note, sung by a voice that is only expected to be low (only). By definition, a falsetto resists limitations.

Princ(e)ing is a term my doctoral cohort member, Crystal Wise, and I use to describe time spent listening to, examining, and experiencing Prince. The consumption of Prince’s artistry is an art form to itself. The time my childhood friends and I spent consuming, discussing, and analyzing Prince could be described as Princ(e)ing.

December 9–14, 1984—Rosemont Horizon, Purple Rain Tour “Riding the wave of movie superstardom, Prince puts on an elaborate five-concert stand in Chicagoland (his first suburban trip), in 2-hour shows that eschew catalogue material, feature numerous costume changes, and have Jerome Benton (Morris Day’s valet from the movie) serve as Prince’s man Friday. He also takes an onstage bath” (Austen 2016).

“Mannish” is a term used in my African American community to describe a child (girl or boy) who is trying to emulate adult behavior—particularly around innocent playful gestures of sexuality. These playful gestures could include childish flirting, saying you have a “girlfriend” or “boyfriend,”. Being mannish is not deviant, but considered humorous behaviors where children playfully try to act out adult behaviors.

(Nelson 1982b)

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Contrary to popular belief—Emmett Till was known by friends and family as a jokester. In whistling at the white woman, Till was performing innocence—a boyish play whose goal was to get his cousins to laugh. This behavior is normal, as children grow up engaging in playful shenanigans. The terror of Emmett’s story shows, that for a Black boy, play is deadly.

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Prince’s family migrated from Louisiana, and my family migrated from Alabama. Historically, the Deep South is considered the region of the USA most dependent upon “plantation-type agriculture” and labor via slavery (Anon n.d.-a, b, c; Davis and Dollard 1940).

(Nelson 1981)

(Nelson 1982a)

(Nelson 1980)

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I italicized “Ooooo” because Prince says sings the “Ooooo” in a very sexy, funky, and powerful falsetto, which pulls the listener into this redemptive moment. It is a climax and that “Ooooo” let’s the listener know just how exciting this freedom is.

For me, as a child, Prince’s writings illustrate, how to create a “symbolic universe” or imagine a world beyond what’s in front of you. There is a euphoric, otherworldness that happened to me as a child—to see (and therefore) believe I’m better than how society renders Black children, and my people more generally. To create a “symbolic universe” is to have power, hope, and resolve that one can indeed create his or her own reality and meaning. The symbolic universe becomes creative resistance to a society that unlovingly renders Black childhood a deficient existence.

Ms. Shaw did not indicate the name of the song.

Ransom. C. 2016. Personal communication with Kimberly Ransom. December 24.

This quote is in reference to a conversation with my father circa 2010. As the director of a youth program in Chicago, I was curious about how talents children exhibit in childhood manifest in adulthood. This made me curious about my own talents as a child. I asked my father what I spent most of my time doing as a child. His response was “writing and drawing.”

“Being here before” was a saying used by older people in my community to identify children they thought were wise beyond their years or old souls. They’d been on earth before.

The older women in my family (my grandmother and her sisters) watched daytime soap operas, which they called “The Stories.” Aunt Sue particularly enjoyed, “All My Children.”

(Nelson 1982a)

Prince’s albums “For You” (Nelson 1978) “1999,” (Nelson 1982a) and “Purple Rain,” (Prince and the Revolution 1984b) all begin with a sort of open letter to listeners, calling them into a universal us.

(Nelson 1978)

(Bream 1979)