On the Real Side... (1999)
Watkins locates the origins of the Black comedic tradition to West Africa, but he contends that the true creative force of Black comedy was fomented as a result of the trans-Atlantic slave trade. Watkins traces the history of this tradition from slavery through the era of minstrelsy to vaudeville, and finally through the twentieth century and modern Black comedy as it appears on the stage, screen, radio, and page. The first edition of this text, entitled On the Real Side: Laughing, Lying and Signifying–The Underground Tradition of African American Humor That Transformed American Culture from Slavery to Richard Pryor, in 1994.