Walter Pitts

Biographic Data

ID78316
NAMEWalter Pitts
GIVEN NAMESWalter
FAMILY NAMEPitts
SIGNATUREPITTS W
AFFILIATIONSLouisiana State University
VERIFIEDNo
TOTAL WORKS17
TOTAL CITATIONS17
AUTHOR COUNT17
EDITOR COUNT0
FIRST PUBLICATION YEAR1943
LATEST PUBLICATION YEAR2011
H-INDEX3

  • Linguistic Variation as a Function of Ritual Structure in the Afro-Baptist Church

    Open AccessWalter PittsARTICLEProceedings of the Annual Meeting…2011

    Proceedings of the Eleventh Annual Meeting of the Berkeley Linguistics Society (1985), pp. 294-304

  • Old Ship of Zion: The Afro-Baptist Ritual in the African Diaspora

    Cyprian Davis, Walter Pitts et al.ARTICLEJournal of American History1996

    Journal Article Old Ship of Zion: The Afro-Baptist Ritual in the African Diaspora. By Walter F. Pitts. (New York: Oxford University Press, 1993. xvi, 199 pp. $29.95, ISBN 0-19-507509-9.) Get access Cyprian Davis, O.S.B. Cyprian Davis, O.S.B. St. Meinrad School of Theology, St. Meinrad, Indiana Search for other works by this author on: Oxford Academic Google Scholar Journal of American History, Volume 83, Issue 2, September 1996, Page 629, https:/…

  • Old Ship of Zion: The Afro-Baptist Ritual in the African Diaspora

    Gerald Horne, Walter Pitts et al.ARTICLEThe Journal of Interdisciplinary…1996

    This book retraces the African origins of African-American forms of worship. During a five-year period in the field, Pitts played the piano at and recorded numerous worship services in black Baptist churches throughout rural Texas. His historical comparisons and linguistic analyses of this material uncover striking parallels between Afro-Baptist services and the religious rituals of Western and Central Africa, as well as other African-derived rit…

  • Old Ship of Zion: The Afro-Baptist Ritual and the African Diaspora

    D Glazier, Stephen D Glazier et al.ARTICLEJournal of American Folklore1995

  • Old Ship of Zion: The Afro-Baptist Ritual in the African Diaspora

    Walter Pitts, Walter F PittsBOOKOld ship of Zion1993Cited by: 6

    This is a major new study of the African origins of African-American forms of worship, based on the author’s fieldwork in black Baptist churches in rural Texas. Through historical comparisons and linguistic analysis, Pitts uncovers striking parallels between “Afro-Baptist” services and the religious rituals of Western and Central Africa, as well as other African-derived rituals in the Caribbean, Brazil etc

  • Like a Tree Planted by the Water: The Musical Cycle in the African-American Baptist Ritual

    Walter PittsARTICLEJournal of American Folklore1991Cited by: 2

    L'eglise baptiste afro-americaine du Texas montre que les attentes rituelles et les variations musicales contribuent toutes deux a maintenir la tradition religieuse. Ce rituel baptismal plonge ses racines dans des rites d'initiation et des transes de possession africains

  • West African Poetics in the Black Preaching Style

    Walter PittsARTICLEAmerican Speech1989Cited by: 4References: 3

    IN SPITE OF THE INTEREST THAT THE BLACK fundamentalist preaching style has raised in scholarly research, very little is known about the actual mechanics used by black preachers to effect their sermons. Since Rosenberg's seminal study (1970), scholars of the black preaching style have consistently reported three stages in the organization of the black folk sermon: a conversational introduction lasting only a few minutes, an emotional buildup, and …

  • School Day Memories, or Subway Ethnography

    Open AccessWalter PittsARTICLEAnthropology and Humanism Quarterly1989

  • Kambie Sile Chango: Impressions of an Afro-Caribbean Ritual

    Open AccessWalter PittsARTICLEAnthropology and Humanism Quarterly1989Cited by: 1References: 3

  • If you caint get the boat, take a log: Cultural reinterpretation in the Afro-Baptist ritual

    Open AccessWalter PittsARTICLEAmerican Ethnologist1989Cited by: 4References: 19

    The theory of cultural reinterpretation was Melville J. Herskovits' explanation for the retention of African elements in black cultures in the western hemisphere. Although this theory conflicted with prevailing sociopolitical ideas of racial integration when he first introduced it, Herskovits nevertheless provided African Americans with a cross-cultural framework of analysis for evaluating their cultural past. This paper reexamines the validity o…

  • Keep the Fire Bmmiif: Language and Ritual in The Afro-Baptist Church

    Walter PittsARTICLEJournal of the American Academy…1988

  • The Dancer

    Open AccessWalter PittsARTICLEAnthropology and Humanism Quarterly1988

  • The Dancer

    Open AccessWalter PittsARTICLEAnthropology and Humanism Quarterly1988

  • What the Frog's Eye Tells the Frog's Brain

    Open AccessJ Lettvin, Jerome Y Lettvin et al.ARTICLEProceedings of the IRE1959

    In this paper, we analyze the activity of single fibers in the optic nerve of a frog. Our method is to find what sort of stimulus causes the largest activity in one nerve fiber and then what is the exciting aspect of that stimulus such that variations in everything else cause little change in the response. It has been known for the past 20 years that each fiber is connected not to a few rods and cones in the retina but to very many over a fair ar…

  • Notes & Correspondence

    Ludwig Edelstein, Giorgio De Santillana et al.ARTICLEIsis1952

  • Philolaos in Limbo, or: What Happened to the Pythagoreans

    George De Santillana, Walter PittsARTICLEIsis1951

  • A logical calculus of the ideas immanent in nervous activity

    Open AccessWarren S Mcculloch, Walter PittsARTICLEBulletin of Mathematical Biology1943