African American Writers & Classical Tradition PDF Download
Are you looking for read ebook online? Search for your book and save it on your Kindle device, PC, phones or tablets. Download African American Writers & Classical Tradition PDF full book. Access full book title African American Writers & Classical Tradition by William W. Cook. Download full books in PDF and EPUB format.
Author: William W. Cook
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226789985
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 466
Get Book
Book Description
Constraints on freedom, education, and individual dignity have always been fundamental in determining who is able to write, when, and where. Considering the singular experience of the African American writer, William W. Cook and James Tatum here argue that African American literature did not develop apart from canonical Western literary traditions but instead grew out of those literatures, even as it adapted and transformed the cultural traditions and religions of Africa and the African diaspora along the way.Tracing the interaction between African American writers and the literatures of ancient Greece and Rome, from the time of slavery and its aftermath to the civil rights era and on into the present, the authors offer a sustained and lively discussion of the life and work of Phillis Wheatley, Frederick Douglass, Ralph Ellison, and Rita Dove, among other highly acclaimed poets, novelists, and scholars. Assembling this brilliant and diverse group of African American writers at a moment when our understanding of classical literature is ripe for change, the authors paint an unforgettable portrait of our own reception of “classic” writing, especially as it was inflected by American racial politics.
Author: William W. Cook
Publisher: University of Chicago Press
ISBN: 0226789985
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 466
Get Book
Book Description
Constraints on freedom, education, and individual dignity have always been fundamental in determining who is able to write, when, and where. Considering the singular experience of the African American writer, William W. Cook and James Tatum here argue that African American literature did not develop apart from canonical Western literary traditions but instead grew out of those literatures, even as it adapted and transformed the cultural traditions and religions of Africa and the African diaspora along the way.Tracing the interaction between African American writers and the literatures of ancient Greece and Rome, from the time of slavery and its aftermath to the civil rights era and on into the present, the authors offer a sustained and lively discussion of the life and work of Phillis Wheatley, Frederick Douglass, Ralph Ellison, and Rita Dove, among other highly acclaimed poets, novelists, and scholars. Assembling this brilliant and diverse group of African American writers at a moment when our understanding of classical literature is ripe for change, the authors paint an unforgettable portrait of our own reception of “classic” writing, especially as it was inflected by American racial politics.
Author: Patrice D. Rankine
Publisher: Univ of Wisconsin Press
ISBN: 0299220036
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 268
Get Book
Book Description
In this groundbreaking work, Patrice D. Rankine asserts that the classics need not be a mark of Eurocentrism, as they have long been considered. Instead, the classical tradition can be part of a self-conscious, prideful approach to African American culture, esthetics, and identity. Ulysses in Black demonstrates that, similar to their white counterparts, African American authors have been students of classical languages, literature, and mythologies by such writers as Homer, Euripides, and Seneca. Ulysses in Black closely analyzes classical themes (the nature of love and its relationship to the social, Dionysus in myth as a parallel to the black protagonist in the American scene, misplaced Ulyssean manhood) as seen in the works of such African American writers as Ralph Ellison, Toni Morrison, and Countee Cullen. Rankine finds that the merging of a black esthetic with the classics—contrary to expectations throughout American culture—has often been a radical addressing of concerns including violence against blacks, racism, and oppression. Ultimately, this unique study of black classicism becomes an exploration of America’s broader cultural integrity, one that is inclusive and historic. Outstanding Academic Title, Choice Magazine
Author: T. Walters
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 0230608876
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 197
Get Book
Book Description
This is a groundbreaking study exploring the significant relationship between western classical mythology and African American women's literature. A comparative analysis of classical revisions by eighteenth and nineteenth century Black women writers Phillis Wheatley and Pauline Hopkins and twentieth century writers Gwendolyn Brooks, Toni Morrison, and Rita Dove reveals that Black women writers revise specific classical myths for artistic and political agency. The study demonstrates that women rework myth to represent mythical stories from the Black female perspective and to counteract denigrating contemporary cultural and social myths that disempower and devalue Black womanhood. Through their adaptations of classical myths about motherhood, Wheatley, Ray, Brooks, Morrison, and Dove uncover the shared experiences of mythic mothers and their contemporary African American counterparts thus offering a unique Black feminist perspective to classicism. The women also use myth as a liberating space where they can 'speak the unspeakable' and empower their subjects as well as themselves.
Author: John Levi Barnard
Publisher: Oxford University Press
ISBN: 0190663596
Category : Literary Collections
Languages : en
Pages : 249
Get Book
Book Description
Introduction: Black classicism in the American empire -- Phillis Wheatley and the affairs of state -- In plain sight: slavery and the architecture of democracy -- Ancient history, American time: Charles Chesnutt and the sites of memory -- Crumbling into dust: conjure and the ruins of empire -- National monuments and the residue of history
Author: Tessa Roynon
Publisher: BAAS Paperbacks
ISBN: 9781474434041
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 288
Get Book
Book Description
This book is an invaluable survey of the allusions to ancient Greek and Roman culture in the work of seven major modern American novelists: Willa Cather, F. Scott Fitzgerald, William Faulkner, Ralph Ellison, Toni Morrison, Philip Roth and Marilynne Robinson.
Author: Derrick P. Alridge
Publisher: University of Illinois Press
ISBN: 0252052757
Category : Social Science
Languages : en
Pages : 447
Get Book
Book Description
Considering the development and ongoing influence of Black thought From 1900 to the present, people of African descent living in the United States have drawn on homegrown and diasporic minds to create a Black intellectual tradition engaged with ideas on race, racial oppression, and the world. This volume presents essays on the diverse thought behind the fight for racial justice as developed by African American artists and intellectuals; performers and protest activists; institutions and organizations; and educators and religious leaders. By including both women’s and men’s perspectives from the U.S. and the Diaspora, the essays explore the full landscape of the Black intellectual tradition. Throughout, contributors engage with important ideas ranging from the consideration of gender within the tradition, to intellectual products generated outside the intelligentsia, to the ongoing relationship between thought and concrete effort in the quest for liberation. Expansive in scope and interdisciplinary in practice, The Black Intellectual Tradition delves into the ideas that animated a people’s striving for full participation in American life. Contributors: Derrick P. Alridge, Keisha N. Blain, Cornelius L. Bynum, Jeffrey Lamar Coleman, Pero Gaglo Dagbovie, Stephanie Y. Evans, Aaron David Gresson III, Claudrena N. Harold, Leonard Harris, Maurice J. Hobson, La TaSha B. Levy, Layli Maparyan, Zebulon V. Miletsky, R. Baxter Miller, Edward Onaci, Venetria K. Patton, James B. Stewart, and Nikki M. Taylor
Author: Gayl Jones
Publisher: Harvard University Press
ISBN: 9780674530249
Category : History
Languages : en
Pages : 252
Get Book
Book Description
The powerful novelist here turns penetrating critic, giving usâe"in lively styleâe"both trenchant literary analysis and fresh insight on the art of writing. âeoeWhen African American writers began to trust the literary possibilities of their own verbal and musical creations,âe writes Gayl Jones, they began to transform the European and European American models, and to gain greater artistic sovereignty.âe The vitality of African American literature derives from its incorporation of traditional oral forms: folktales, riddles, idiom, jazz rhythms, spirituals, and blues. Jones traces the development of this literature as African American writers, celebrating their oral heritage, developed distinctive literary forms. The twentieth century saw a new confidence and deliberateness in African American work: the move from surface use of dialect to articulation of a genuine black voice; the move from blacks portrayed for a white audience to characterization relieved of the need to justify. Innovative writingâe"such as Charles Waddell Chesnuttâe(tm)s depiction of black folk culture, Langston Hughesâe(tm)s poetic use of blues, and Amiri Barakaâe(tm)s recreation of the short story as a jazz pieceâe"redefined Western literary tradition. For Jones, literary technique is never far removed from its social and political implications. She documents how literary form is inherently and intensely national, and shows how the European monopoly on acceptable forms for literary art stifled American writers both black and white. Jones is especially eloquent in describing the dilemma of the African American writers: to write from their roots yet retain a universal voice; to merge the power and fluidity of oral tradition with the structure needed for written presentation. With this work Gayl Jones has added a new dimension to African American literary history.
Author: Trudier Harris
Publisher: University of Georgia Press
ISBN: 0820327158
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 250
Get Book
Book Description
With characteristic originality and insight, Trudier Harris-Lopez offers a new and challenging approach to the work of African American writers in these twelve previously unpublished essays. Collectively, the essays show the vibrancy of African American literary creation across several decades of the twentieth century. But Harris-Lopez's readings of the various texts deliberately diverge from traditional ways of viewing traditional topics. South of Tradition focuses not only on well-known writers such as Zora Neale Hurston, Ralph Ellison, James Baldwin, and Richard Wright, but also on up-and-coming writers such as Randall Kenan and less-known writers such as Brent Wade and Henry Dumas. Harris-Lopez addresses themes of sexual and racial identity, reconceptualizations of and transcendence of Christianity, analyses of African American folk and cultural traditions, and issues of racial justice. Many of her subjects argue that geography shapes identity, whether that geography is the European territory many blacks escaped to from the oppressive South, or the South itself, where generations of African Americans have had to come to grips with their relationship to the land and its history. For Harris-Lopez, "south of tradition" refers both to geography and to readings of texts that are not in keeping with expected responses to the works. She explains her point of departure for the essays as "a slant, an angle, or a jolt below the line of what would be considered the norm for usual responses to African American literature." The scope of Harris-Lopez's work is tremendous. From her coverage of noncanonical writers to her analysis of humor in the best-selling The Color Purple, she provides essential material that should inform all future readings of African American literature.
Author: Rafia Zafar
Publisher: Columbia University Press
ISBN: 9780231080941
Category : African Americans
Languages : en
Pages : 270
Get Book
Book Description
Zafar demonstrates that in doing so, these forerunners of modern black American writers both adapted to and reacted against a milieu of social resistance and cultural antipathy. By the end of Reconstruction, this first century of black writers had paved the way for a distinctive, African American literature.
Author: Philip Bader
Publisher: Infobase Publishing
ISBN: 1438107838
Category : Literary Criticism
Languages : en
Pages : 305
Get Book
Book Description
African-American authors have consistently explored the political dimensions of literature and its ability to affect social change. African-American literature has also provided an essential framework for shaping cultural identity and solidarity. From the early slave narratives to the folklore and dialect verse of the Harlem Renaissance to the modern novels of today
