Ethnic Studies Review (ESR) Is the Journal of the National Association for Ethnic Studies (NAES)
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The National Association for Ethnic Studies Ethnic Studies Review (ESR) is the journal of the National Association for Ethnic Studies (NAES). ESR is a multi-disciplinary international journal devoted to the study of ethnicity, ethnic groups and their cultures, and intergroup relations. NAES has as its basic purpose the promotion of activities and scholarship in the field of Ethnic Studies. The Association is open to any person or institution and serves as a forum for its members in promoting research, study, and curriculum as well as producing publications of interest in the field. NAES sponsors an annual spring conference. General Editor: Faythe E. Turner, Greenfield Community College Book Review Editor: Jonathan A. Majak, University of Wisconsin-Lacrosse Editorial Advisory Board Edna Acosta-Belen Rhett S. Jones University at Albany, SUNY Brown University Jorge A. Bustamante Paul Lauter El Colegio de la Frontera Norte (Mexico) Trinity College Duane W. Champagne Robert L. Perry University of California, Los Angeles Eastern Michigan University Laura Coltelli Otis L. Scott Universita de Pisa (Italy) California State University Sacramento Russell Endo Alan J. Spector University of Colorado Purdue University, Calumet David M. Gradwohl K. Victor Ujimoto Iowa State University University of Guelph (Canada) Maria Herrera-Sobek John C. Walter University of California, Irvine University of Washington Evelyn Hu-DeHart Bernard Young University of Colorado, Boulder Arizona State University Designed by Eileen Claveloux Ethnic Studies Review (ESR) is published by the National Associaton for Ethnic Studies for its individual members and subscribing libraries and institutions. NAES is a member of the Council of Editors of Learned Journals. Copyright, ESR, The National Association for Ethnic Studies, 1996. ISSN: 0736-904X ESR ETHNIC STUDIES REVIEW The Journal of the National Association for Ethnic Studies Volume 26, Issue 1 2003 Literature A Special Issue General Editor: Fay the Turner Table of Contents Editor's Note ............................................................................................... ...i Contributors ......... .................................................. ..................... ..................iv ARTICLES Getting into the Game: The Trickster in American Ethnic Fiction Helen Lock..................................................................................................... 1 Middle Passage to Freedom: Black Atlantic Consciousness in Charles Johnson's Middle Passage and S. I. Martin's Incomparable World Robert Nowatzki. ...................................... ....................................... ............. 12 'The Story You Were Telling Us' Re-Reading love in Alice Walker's By The Light of My Father's Smile through luce Irigaray Ozlem Gorey......... ................. ......................................................................29 'Transcending the Tragic Mulatto': The Intersection of Black and Indian Heritage in Contemporary literature Lindsay Claire Smith ..... ..................................................................... .... ..... .45 Chinatown Black Tigers: Black Masculinity and Chinese Heroism in Frank Chin's Gunga Din Highway 67 Crystal S. Anderson ................................................................. ...................... 'Time is Not a River': The Implications of Mumbo Jumbo's Pendulum Chronology for Coalition Politics 87 Tamiko Fiona Nimura............ ............. .......................................................... Breaking the Rules: Innovation and Narrative Strategies in Sandra Cisneros' The House on Mango Street and Ana Castillo's The Mixquiahua/a Letters 108 Carmen Haydee Rivera .................................................. ....... ................. ..... The Politics of Faith in the Work of lorna Dee Cervantes, Ana Castillo, and Sandra Cisneros 121 Darlene Pagan........... ................................................... .............................. (Dis)Claiming Identity: Christina Garda's The Aguero Sisters and Julia Alvarez' How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accents 135 Ozlem Ogut. ............................................................................................... EDITOR'S NOTE This issue of Ethnic Studies Review reflects the important critical work being done in the field of ethnic literature, an indication that this literature is getting the attention it deserves. Professor Helen Lock appropriately opens this issue with "Getting into the Game: The Trickster in American Ethnic Fiction." One could argue that the trickster is the most important single figure in ethnic literature, a figure bewildering and won derfully complex, and as Lock shows, one who destroys ethnic and racial stereotypes. Professor Robert Nowatzki in "Middle Pa ssage to Freedom: Black Atlantic Consciousness in Charles Johnson's Middle Passage and S. I. Martin's Incomparable World" continues the breakdown of stereotypes as he explores the complex identities of black slaves and those who have succeeded them (such as Phillis Wheatley, Miles Davis, Jimi Hendrix) as a result of their contact with other cultures or what he calls "cultural blending." Professor C)zlem Gorey in '' 'The Story You Were Telling Us': Redefinition of Love in Alice Walker's By the Light of My Father's Smile through Luce Irigaray" undertakes another study of the familial relationships that are so often Walker's subject, this time through the theories of French feminist Luce Irigaray. Lindsey Clair Smith confronts a body of earlier American Literature (including works of William Faulkner) that deals with mulatto characters and the tragedies they live in "Transcending the Tragic Mulatto" where she discusses recent American Literature (Leslie Silko, Toni Morrison, Clarence Major) that may reveal a truer "melting pot" than the early mythical one. The multi-racial characters these writers bring into being add sub stantially to the dynamic, the complexities, and the interest of American life. In "Chinatown Black Tigers: Black Masculinity and Chinese Heroism in Frank Chin's Gunga Din Highway" Professor Crystal S. Anderson tackles the issue of masculinity in the United States and how Chin in mirroring another culture critiques and helps to define his own. In '''Time Is Not a River': The Implications of Mumbo Jumbo'S Pendulum Chronology for Coalition Politics" Tamiko Fiona Nimura discusses the implications of Ismael Reed's use of time as an extension of and an addition to history and the fact that opening up our understanding of time will add to our ability to understand the composition of cultures other than our own. The environment of Mumbo Jumbo also offers another opportunity for the trickster figure to appear. Professors Carmen Haydee Rivera, Darlene Pagan, and Ozlem Ogut discuss the work of Latina writers, Sandra Cisneros, Ana Castillo, Lorna Dee Cervantes, Christine Garcia, and Julia Alvarez who are presenting some of the most interesting and insightful literature today. These far-ranging discussions of their work are important for critical work being done in Latina stud ies. This collection of essays includes a broad range of ethnicities and an international flavor that will expand the range of Ethnic Studies. Fay the Turner Greenfield Community College Massachusetts *Please note that the volume information of the last issue of EsR (Immigration: A Special Issue) is incorrect. It should read 2002 Volume 25 Issue 2. A correction sticker has been included. Ethnic Studies Review Volume 26: 1 CONTRIBUTORS Helen Lock is Professor of English at the University of Louisiana at Monroe where she teaches and writes on American, African American, and multicultural literature. She is the author of A Case of Mis-Taken Identity: Detective Undercurrents in Recent African American Fiction and numerous articles. Robert Nowatzki is Assistant Professor of English at Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana. He is currently working on a book-length project that analyzes the ideologically ambiguous representations of African Americans in blackface minstrelsy and abolitionism in the United States and in Britain during the nine teenth century. Ozlem Corey is a graduate of Bogazi<;i University. She received her MA from Leicester University, U.K. in Mass Communication Research. In 2000 she completed her PhD, and her dissertation is "Three Sibyls on a Tripod: Revisionary Mythmaking in the Poetry of H.D., Sylvia Plath, and Adrienne Rich," at the University of Leicester, U.K. Her current research interests are feminist literary theory, African American studies, mythology and contemporary poetry. She is at present teaching at Bogazi<;i University in the Department of Western Languages and Literatures. Lindsey Claire Smith is currently a Teaching Fellow in the English Department and Assistant for American Indian Recruitment in the Graduate School at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. She is of Chickasaw descent, and her research interests include the relationship between African Americans and American Indians in literature. At the 2003 NAES conference she was the recipient of the Phillips G. Davies Graduate Student Paper competition. Crystal S. Anderson is Assistant Professor in the Department of ii English at Ohio University. She currently is working on a book length manuscript on racial discourse in African American and Chinese American novels. She has a forthcoming publication on African Americans, Asian Americans, and the Black Arts Movement. Tamiko Nimura is a 2003 Ford Foundation Dissertation