Off-White Hollywood investigates how the 'ethnicity' of white European-American actresses has played a key role in the mythology of American identity and nation building. Negra focuses on key stars of the silent - Colleen Moore and Pola Negri - classical - Sonja Henie and Hedy Lamarr - and post-classical eras - Marisa Tomei and Cher - to demonstrate how each star illuminates aspects of ethnicity, gender, consumerism, and class at work in American culture.

Diane Negra is Assistant Professor in the Department of Radio, TV and Film at the University of North Texas. She is the co-editor of A Feminist Reader in Early Cinema (Duke University Press 2002).

1 Hollywood film and the narrativization of ethnic femininity 2 The wearing of the green: Irishness as a promotional discourse in the career of Colleen Moore 3 Immigrant stardom in imperial America: Pola Negri and the problem of typology 4 Sonja Henie in Hollywood: Whiteness, athleticism and Americanization 5 Ethnicity and the interventionist imagination: Domesticity, exoticism and scandal in the persona of Hedy Lamarr 6 Marisa Tomei and the fantasy of ethnicity 7 Stardom, corporeality and ethnic indeterminacy: Cher's disrupted/disruptive body