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Ma Rainey's Mic Drop

HISTORY This Week

CHAPTER

The Blues and the LGBTQ Community

When Ma Rainey is performing in these kind of like vaudeville circuit traveling around contexts in the 1910s, is she already at that point singing songs that are explicitly about her sexual identity? I do think it's entirely possible though that she was singing about her sexuality very early just because the blues allows people to express what they're going through. But all of this remains relatively underground until 1920. When the government passes a constitutional amendment banning the sale of alcohol in the US. One of the best things that happens to the LGBTQ community at this time is prohibition. It's absolutely fantastic.

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