DOCSLIB.ORG

Postmodern Discourse on Social Movements in the African American Novel

Total Page：16

File Type：pdf, Size：1020Kb

Download full-text PDF Read full-text
Postmodern Discourse on Social Movements in the African American Novel A TANGLE OF DOUBLE BINDS: POSTMODERN DISCOURSE ON SOCIAL MOVEMENTS IN THE AFRICAN AMERICAN NOVEL By JOHN LOVELL GLENN A DISSERTATION PRESENTED TO THE GRADUATE SCHOOL OF THE UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA IN PARTIAL FULFILLMENT OF THE REQUIREMENTS FOR THE DEGREE OF DOCTOR OF PHILOSOPHY UNIVERSITY OF FLORIDA 2012 1 © 2012 John Lovell Glenn 2 To my loving wife, parents, and rather large family: May you all enjoy lives of learning, so that you are apt to teach one another. Thanks for teaching me to love, laugh, and live by the Holy Spirit! 3 ACKNOWLEDGMENTS I thank God for his guiding grace. In addition, I thank my committee chair, Mark Reid. My readers Tace Hedrick, Faye Harrison, and Debra King were indispensable. I am grateful for the careful readings, criticisms, and encouraging smiles given me by wife Rachel Andre Glenn. Without her insight and wit, this project would have much less personality. Much thanks to my mentor/peer Zahir Small whose desire for knowledge enhanced my own. Likewise, Christina Glenn’s attentive ears and largess made me all the more confident. Lastly, thanks to my parents, and my brothers and sisters for their interest in my academic goals; nothing gets completed in isolation. 4 TABLE OF CONTENTS page ACKNOWLEDGMENTS .................................................................................................. 4 ABSTRACT ..................................................................................................................... 7 CHAPTER 1 INTRODUCTION ...................................................................................................... 9 What Will Postmodernism Do With History? ........................................................... 13 Autonomy and the Politics of the Double Bind ........................................................ 18 African American Postmodernism and Radical Democracy .................................... 22 Ontology and the Treatment of Difference in African American Fiction .................. 27 The Politics of Mid-twentieth Century Social Movements ....................................... 29 Conclusion: African American Literary Discourse ................................................... 32 2 REVISING CULTURAL CONCEPTIONS OF PROGRESS: AFROFURISM IN COLSON WHITEHEAD’S THE INTUITIONIST ...................................................... 36 Situating Colson Whitehead’s Representation ........................................................ 37 Afrofuturism’s Industrial Inroads ............................................................................. 39 Postmodernity and Identity Formation .................................................................... 45 Whitehead’s Integration Metropolis ......................................................................... 49 Tokenism and Negro Firsters .................................................................................. 58 Revising Cultural Conceptions of Progress ............................................................. 69 3 RESTLESS QUESTIONING: PSYCHOLOGICAL ANGST IN ALICE WALKER’S MERIDIAN .............................................................................................................. 79 Alice Walker’s Range and Representation .............................................................. 80 The Protocols of Psychological Angst ..................................................................... 82 Apathy and Postmodern Resistance ....................................................................... 87 Civil Rights and Meridian’s Awareness ................................................................... 91 Women and the Movement ..................................................................................... 95 The Man Question .................................................................................................. 98 Meridian’s Restless Questioning ........................................................................... 102 4 RESISTING CONSENSUS: CULTURE WORK IN JOHN OLIVER KILLENS’S THE COTILLION: OR, ONE GOOD BULL IS HALF THE HERD .......................... 114 Killens’s Polemical Influence ................................................................................. 115 A Work of Culture ................................................................................................. 117 Postmodernity and Class Difference ..................................................................... 122 Black Nationalist Culture and the “Real” Yoruba ................................................... 125 Class Consciousness and Religion ....................................................................... 128 5 Gender and Its Psychological Ramifications ......................................................... 131 Lumumba’s Trailblazing ........................................................................................ 133 The Fabric of Relations and Dissent ..................................................................... 137 5 MULTIPLE TRUTHS: JOURNEYS AND PROSPECTS IN TONI MORRISON’S TAR BABY ............................................................................................................ 145 Morrison’s Philosophical Leanings ........................................................................ 146 On the Move: Open Journeys ............................................................................... 148 Postmodern Truth ................................................................................................. 153 The Post-Civil Rights Domain: The Street Household .......................................... 160 Gender, Philosophy, and Cultural Narratives ........................................................ 167 A Native Son ......................................................................................................... 170 Multiple Truths ...................................................................................................... 173 LIST OF REFERENCES ............................................................................................. 179 BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH .......................................................................................... 192 6 Abstract of Dissertation Presented to the Graduate School of the University of Florida in Partial Fulfillment of the Requirements for the Degree of Doctor of Philosophy A TANGLE OF DOUBLE BINDS: POSTMODERN DISCOURSE ON SOCIAL MOVEMENTS IN THE AFRICAN AMERICAN NOVEL By John Lovell Glenn December 2012 Chair: Mark Reid Major: English A Tangle of Double Binds: Postmodern Discourse on Social Movements in the African American Novel examines the ways in which novels by African American writers have interrogated fifties and sixties black social movements. Within the context of postmodernism, I analyze the portrayal of several cultural and philosophical tensions that emerged out of concerns for racial equality and justice. I argue that the social changes occurring during the mid-twentieth century in America have impacted African Americans in two ways. For example, the first involves the cultural and generational tensions surfacing in black communities throughout the Civil Rights Movement. Second, the rights gained as a result of civic struggles, while contributing to the accessibility of mainstream sectors, have come at a high social cost to black individuals. In addition, these shifts result in a social dynamic that I describe as a double bind, in which an individual coming of age must not only negotiate the constraints of in-group traditions but also must navigate his or her way through repressive institutions in mainstream society. Ultimately, the novels I cover in this project constitute discourses on postmodernity and black social movements. In particular, African American writers 7 have developed men and women protagonists who deploy a self-concept that embraces the social fragmentation rife in the contemporary era. With this perspective, I give close readings of the following texts: Colson Whitehead’s The Intuitionist, Alice Walker’s Meridian, John Oliver Killens’s The Cotillion: Or, One Good Bull is Half the Herd, and Toni Morrison’s Tar Baby. Throughout this project, I seek to answer the following questions: How have contemporary black writers grappled with the socioeconomic changes in American society since the 1960s? What are the implications of rights movements for postmodern society? And how have particular movements impacted individual autonomy among African Americans? Finally, my reading of each text is organized around the protagonists who enact forms of resistance that hedge against problematic group practices and stave off cooptation in hegemonic American systems. 8 CHAPTER I INTRODUCTION Toni Cade Bambara’s The Salt Eaters is a novel about cultural wholeness and healing. Bambara initiates a journey toward alternatives to dominant American norms, which plays out in spiritual, social, and political matters. Throughout the novel, Velma Henry seeks wholeness while guided by Minnie Ransom, a healer in the Claybourne community. A mother, a Civil Rights activist, and an employee at Transchemical (a chemical plant outside the Claybourne), Velma’s condition is the result of a failed suicide attempt. Even prior to this, her efforts prove to be self-sabotaging. In one scene, Velma participates in a brutal protest march that leaves her sullied and outraged. At the end of the march, a charismatic Civil Rights leader pulls up in a limo: “He looked a bit like King, had a delivery similar to Malcolm’s, dressed like Stokely, had
Load more

Recommended publications
  • The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2018
    The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2018 Through subtle shades of color, the cover design represents the layers of richness and diversity that flourish within minority communities. The Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal 2018 A collection of scholarly research by fellows of the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Program Preface We are proud to present to you the 2018 edition of the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship Journal. For more than 30 years, the Mellon Mays Undergraduate Fellowship (MMUF) program has endeavored to promote diversity in the faculty of higher education, specifically by supporting thousands of students from underrepresented minority groups in their goal of obtaining PhDs. With the MMUF Journal, we provide an additional opportunity for students to experience academia through exposure to the publishing process. In addition to providing an audience for student work, the journal offers an introduction to the publishing process, including peer review and editor-guided revision of scholarly work. For the majority of students, the MMUF Journal is their first experience in publishing a scholarly article. The 2018 Journal features writing by 27 authors from 22 colleges and universities that are part of the program’s member institutions. The scholarship represented in the journal ranges from research conducted under the MMUF program, introductions to senior theses, and papers written for university courses. The work presented here includes scholarship from a wide range of disciples, from history to linguistics to political science. The papers presented here will take the reader on a journey. Readers will travel across the U.S., from Texas to South Carolina to California, and to countries ranging from Brazil and Nicaragua to Germany and South Korea, as they learn about theater, race relations, and the refugee experience.
    [Show full text]
  • The Victorian Body
    University of Nebraska - Lincoln DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln Faculty Publications -- Department of English English, Department of 3-2018 The icV torian Body Peter J. Capuano University of Nebraska-Lincoln, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/englishfacpubs Part of the Comparative Literature Commons, English Language and Literature Commons, Modern Literature Commons, Reading and Language Commons, and the Women's Studies Commons Capuano, Peter J., "The ictV orian Body" (2018). Faculty Publications -- Department of English. 201. https://digitalcommons.unl.edu/englishfacpubs/201 This Article is brought to you for free and open access by the English, Department of at DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. It has been accepted for inclusion in Faculty Publications -- Department of English by an authorized administrator of DigitalCommons@University of Nebraska - Lincoln. digitalcommons.unl.edu The Victorian Body Peter J. Capuano University of Nebraska–Lincoln Introduction The nineteenth century is extremely important for the study of embodiment be- cause it is the period in which the modern body, as we currently understand it, was most thoroughly explored. This was the era when modern medical models of the body were developed and disseminated, when modern political relations to the body were instantiated, and when modern identities in relation to class, race, and gender were inscribed. While questions about the distinctions between personhood and the body were studied
    [Show full text]
  • KILLENS, JOHN OLIVER, 1916-1987. John Oliver Killens Papers, 1937-1987
    KILLENS, JOHN OLIVER, 1916-1987. John Oliver Killens papers, 1937-1987 Emory University Stuart A. Rose Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library Atlanta, GA 30322 404-727-6887 [email protected] Descriptive Summary Creator: Killens, John Oliver, 1916-1987. Title: John Oliver Killens papers, 1937-1987 Call Number: Manuscript Collection No. 957 Extent: 61.75 linear feet (127 boxes), 5 oversized papers boxes (OP), and 3 oversized bound volumes (OBV) Abstract: Papers of John Oliver Killens, African American novelist, essayist, screenwriter, and political activist, including correspondence, writings by Killens, writings by others, and printed material. Language: Materials entirely in English. Administrative Information Restrictions on Access Special restrictions apply: Series 5: Some student records are restricted until 2053. Terms Governing Use and Reproduction All requests subject to limitations noted in departmental policies on reproduction. Source Purchase, 2003 Citation [after identification of item(s)], John Oliver Killens papers, Stuart A. Rose Manuscript, Archives, and Rare Book Library, Emory University. Processing Processed by Elizabeth Roke, Elizabeth Stice, and Margaret Greaves, June 2011 This finding aid may include language that is offensive or harmful. Please refer to the Rose Library's harmful language statement for more information about why such language may appear and ongoing efforts to remediate racist, ableist, sexist, homophobic, euphemistic and other Emory Libraries provides copies of its finding aids for use only in research and private study. Copies supplied may not be copied for others or otherwise distributed without prior consent of the holding repository. John Oliver Killens papers, 1937-1987 Manuscript Collection No. 957 oppressive language. If you are concerned about language used in this finding aid, please contact us at [email protected].
    [Show full text]
  • Completing a Circle: Alice Walker's Meridian
    Title Completing a Circle : Alice Walker's Meridian Author(s) Ota, Mizuho Citation Osaka Literary Review. 29 P.187-P.200 Issue Date 1990-12-20 Text Version publisher URL https://doi.org/10.18910/25449 DOI 10.18910/25449 rights Note Osaka University Knowledge Archive : OUKA https://ir.library.osaka-u.ac.jp/ Osaka University Completing a Circle : Alice Walker's Meridian Mizuho Ota I Meridian begins with an excerpt from Black Elk Speaks which serves as a fitting epigragh to the novel. It fuses the significant concepts of the novel, fragmentation and wholeness, since it presents the circle-like dream of wholeness destroyed: "A poeple's dream died there. It was a beautiful dream ... the nation's hoop is broken and scattered. There is no center any longer, and the sacred tree is dead." As this quotation suggests, Walker uses the motif of "a broken hoop (or circle) without its center" to illuminate the major concepts of fragmentation and wholeness, death and rebirth, all of which are related not only to the protagonist's past and present, but also to the Civil Rights Movement) Meridian the protagonist struggles to complete the "nation's hoop" or the "people's dream" which Black Elk laments to have been irreparably broken. As an approach to interpret Meridian, I will analyze how the circular image, or attempting to become whole, permeates throughout the novel thematically as well as structurally. I will also consider why the "circle" is broken and how a new "circle" is completed in Meridian the protagonist. H Walker's presentation of the plot is crucially connected to the circular idea of the novel.
    [Show full text]
  • 447-449 RRIJM18030688.Pdf
    Volume-03 ISSN: 2455-3085 (Online) Issue-06 RESEARCH REVIEW International Journal of Multidisciplinary June-2018 www.rrjournals.com [UGC Listed Journal] The Man in the Artist in the Selected Novels of John Oliver Killens *1Sk Abdul Salam & 2Dr. Om Prakash Tiwari *1Research Scholar, Dr. C.V. Raman University Bilaspur, Chhattisgarh (India) 2Associate Professor, Dr. C.V. Raman University, Bilaspur, Chhattisgarh (India) ARTICLE DETAILS ABSTRACT Article History John Oliver Killens’s politically charged novels And Then We Heard the Thunder and The Published Online: 19 June 2018 Cotillion; or One Good Bull Is Half the Herd, were nominated for the Pulitzer Prize. His works of fiction and nonfiction, the most famous of which is his novel Youngblood, have been Keywords translated into more than a dozen languages. An influential novelist, essayist, screenwriter, Thunder, Heard, Columbia, Black Arts and teacher, he was the founding chair of the Harlem Writers Guild and mentored a Movement generation of black writers at Fisk, Howard, Columbia, and elsewhere. Killens is recognized *Corresponding Author as the spiritual father of the Black Arts Movement. In this first major biography of Killens, Email: sksalam815[at]gmail.com Keith Gilyard examines the life and career of the man who was perhaps the premier African American writer-activist from the 1950s to the 1980s. Gilyard extends his focus to the broad boundaries of Killens’s times and literary achievement—from the Old Left to the Black Arts Movement and beyond. Figuring prominently in these pages are the many important African American artists and political figures connected to the author from the 1930s to the 1980s—W.
    [Show full text]
  • Otak-Who? Technoculture, Youth, Consumption, and Resistance
    Lawrence Eng Research Seminar Methods in STS Spring, 2002 Otak-who? Technoculture, youth, consumption, and resistance. American representations of a Japanese youth subculture. Abstract The otaku are a youth subculture first characterized in Japan, but beyond that basic definition of the term, there have been numerous, often contradictory and routinely contested, ways the otaku have been represented by various segments of Japanese society over the course of the last 2 decades. The otaku in Japan (and abroad) have attracted non- Japanese attention as well, and the otaku have been studied, mimicked, ridiculed, romanticized, etc. by Americans who have become interested in this apparently fascinating Japanese (sub)cultural export. Influenced by Japanese conceptions of otaku as obsessed fans, technological fetishists, avid collectors, antisocial outcasts, and/or borderline psychopaths, but informed by American attitudes toward geek culture, hackers, cyberpunks, individualism, and lay expertise, representations of otaku by American observers of the culture have been equally varied (and contested) over the last decade. This paper will examine the various and changing representations of otaku culture by Americans, and attempt to unpack the context behind and the implications of those representations. Drawing upon themes uncovered in this critical discourse analysis, I will suggest a new way of defining otaku as 'reluctant insiders' engaged in the appropriation of technology and science as a means of cultural resistance. I will argue that their activities are informed by a particular otaku ethic that distinguishes them from other subcultures with similar motivations. Introduction My paper is divided into three parts. In Part 1, I ask: Why do we care about otaku, and how will we study them? In Part 2, I will critically analyze the various ways otaku have been represented since they were first characterized as a subculture in the early 80s.
    [Show full text]
  • Robert Hayden: a Critical Look at the Criticism Peter E
    Fall 1987 /Winter 1987-88 Diversity: A Way to Unity Editorial Robert Hayden: A Critical Look at the Criticism Peter E. Murphy A Portfolio of Poems Introduced and Selected by Herbert Woodward Martin Canada's Earliest Baha'i History Will. C. van den Hoonaard VOLUME 22, NUMBERS 1 & 2 •PUBLISHED QUARTERLY Editorial Board: FIRUZ KAZEMZADEH BETTY J. FISHER HOWARD GAREY IN THIS ISSUE JAMES D. STOKES 2 Diversity: A Way to Unity Consultant in Poetry: Editorial HERBERT WOODWARD MARTIN 4 Interchange: Letters from and to the Ediror Subscriber Service: CANDACE MOORE HILL 7 Robert Hayden: A Critical Look at the Criticism by Peter E. Murphy WORLD ORDER is published quarterly by 17 A Portfolio of Poems the National Spiritual Assembly of the Baha'is of the United States, 415 Linden Avenue, Wil­ Introduced and Selected mette, IL 60091. POSTMASTER: Send ad­ by Herbert Woodward Martin dress changes to WORLD ORDER, 536 Sheridan Road, Wilmette, IL 60091. The views 39 Canada's Earliest Baha'i Hisrory expressed herein are those of the au tho rs and by Will. C. van den Hoonaard do not necessarily reflect the opinions of the publisher, the National Spiritual Assembly of 50 Authors & Artists the Baha'is of the United States, or of the Ed­ itorial Board. Manuscripts can be typewritten or computer generated. They should be double spaced throughout, with the footnotes at the end. The contributor should send three cop­ ies-an original and two legible copies-and should keep a copy. Return postage should be included. Send manuscripts and other editorial correspondence ro WORLD ORDER, 415 Linden Avenue, Wilmette, IL 60091.
    [Show full text]
  • Meridian and the Color Purple )
    Multicultural Education ISSN: 10683844 Volume 6, Issue 2, 2020 _______________________________________________________________________________________ The Notion of Resistance in ( Meridian and The Color Purple ) Hani Ali Shnawa Article Info Abstract Article History Black men suffer from racial segregation , humiliation and exploitation . On the other side the black women face double marginalization due to racial Received: segregation and sexual oppression . The black women and their own July 27, 2020 children may be considered as assets belonging to the white masters . The black women suffer from rape and abuse at the hands of men who treat them Accepted: as sexual objects necessary for sustenance of the planting system in the September 30, 2020 Southern region before the Civil War . After liberation , the Jim Crow system separated whites and blacks in the South . The black women worked Keywords either as tenants on lands owned by white masters , or as domestics in white racial segregation , houses . They gained low dividends that left them in deprivation and poverty humiliation, Civil War . DOI: 10.5281/zenodo.4060161 1. Introduction In general , The woman suffers from various kinds of oppression and injustice , especially the black female who faces another thing which is the racism . Patricia Collins corroborates that in her book " Black Feminist Thought in the Matrix of Domination " , " portraying Black women solely as passive , unfortunate recipients of racial and sexual abuse stifles notion that Black women can actively work to change . [ their ] circumstances and bring about changes in . [ their ] lives " ( 11 ) . We can find out a good example to the positive woman in meridian as a protagonist in Alice Walker`s novel Meridian and also in The Color Purple represented by the main character Celie .
    [Show full text]
  • The Analysis of Black Women's Consciousness in the Color Purple
    2019 9th International Conference on Education and Social Science (ICESS 2019) The Analysis of Black Women’s Consciousness in The Color Purple 1,a 2,b* Xinzhuo Jiang and Jiang Liu 1 School of Foreign Languages, Yulin University, China, 719000 2 School of Management, Yulin University, China, 719000 [email protected]; [email protected] *The Corresponding author Keywords: Alice walker; The color purple; Black women’s consciousness Abstract. This thesis scribes a story about the awakening process of the protagonist Celie and the women around her in The Color Purple, while they were subjected to the double oppression of black men and white race. Furthermore, it mainly explains the importance of black Women’s consciousness and restoration in this novel. Finally, the thesis aims to explain walker’s desire that all mankind can live together in a peaceful, equal and harmonious way. Introduction Alice Walker and The Color Purple. Alice Walker was one of the most important African American women writers in the Twentieth Century. Her works have attracted many Chinese and foreign readers and critics. Her work, The Color Purple, gives her an award, the first prize as a South African American woman. Walker was the eighth child of a rural family in Georgia. When she was only eight, she lost an eye in an accident. As time goes by, after she graduated from her local school the Spelman, she went to the Sarah Lawrence College with scholarships and graduated in 1965. The civil rights movement began in 1960s. Alice Walker devoted herself to the political movement about the equal rights of black people.
    [Show full text]
  • ICIR 227 Approaches to Culture and Society
    ICIR 227 Approaches to Culture and Society Course Description & Aims ‘Culture’ is foundational for the human condition – it distinguishes us from other primates, and – as ‘cultural identity’ – from fellow humans in other societies. Consequently, ‘culture’ is also a perilous idea: together with history it provides a basis for nationalist ideologies and inter-group conflict. It facilitates communication and understanding by devising symbols and value systems, and at the same time it divides in- from out-group based on the very same frameworks of meaning. It can be regarded as the expression of collective identities, a set of customs and mores, values and ideas – or as a tool of domination and exploitation. What exactly is ‘culture’? And how can cultural variation be explained and assessed? This course introduces and discusses a range of foundational anthropological approaches to the study of culture and society. Students will compare different conceptualizations of ‘culture’ and develop a critical understanding of related issues, ranging from value systems and language use to the understanding of rituals, social drama and cultural identities. The course examines early paradigms in the study of social life and outlines the development of more critical approaches to the configurations of culture. Students will learn to distinguish evolutionist and diffusionist approaches to cultural variation, and discuss the merits and challenges of cultural relativism. They will compare functionalist and cultural materialist theories and contrast them with the insights of symbolist and interpretive reasoning. The relationship of methodology and epistemology in the study of culture and society are explored and students will engage with an application of anthropological theory to selected case studies.
    [Show full text]
  • Media Ecologies: Materialist Energies in Art and Technoculture, Matthew Fuller, 2005 Media Ecologies
    M796883front.qxd 8/1/05 11:15 AM Page 1 Media Ecologies Media Ecologies Materialist Energies in Art and Technoculture Matthew Fuller In Media Ecologies, Matthew Fuller asks what happens when media systems interact. Complex objects such as media systems—understood here as processes, or ele- ments in a composition as much as “things”—have become informational as much as physical, but without losing any of their fundamental materiality. Fuller looks at this multi- plicitous materiality—how it can be sensed, made use of, and how it makes other possibilities tangible. He investi- gates the ways the different qualities in media systems can be said to mix and interrelate, and, as he writes, “to produce patterns, dangers, and potentials.” Fuller draws on texts by Félix Guattari and Gilles Deleuze, as well as writings by Friedrich Nietzsche, Marshall McLuhan, Donna Haraway, Friedrich Kittler, and others, to define and extend the idea of “media ecology.” Arguing that the only way to find out about what happens new media/technology when media systems interact is to carry out such interac- tions, Fuller traces a series of media ecologies—“taking every path in a labyrinth simultaneously,” as he describes one chapter. He looks at contemporary London-based pirate radio and its interweaving of high- and low-tech “Media Ecologies offers an exciting first map of the mutational body of media systems; the “medial will to power” illustrated by analog and digital media technologies. Fuller rethinks the generation and “the camera that ate itself”; how, as seen in a range of interaction of media by connecting the ethical and aesthetic dimensions compelling interpretations of new media works, the capac- of perception.” ities and behaviors of media objects are affected when —Luciana Parisi, Leader, MA Program in Cybernetic Culture, University of they are in “abnormal” relationships with other objects; East London and each step in a sequence of Web pages, Cctv—world wide watch, that encourages viewers to report crimes seen Media Ecologies via webcams.
    [Show full text]
  • Black Eve Or Madonna? a Study of the Antithetical Views of the Mother in Black American Literature Daryl Cumber Dance University of Richmond, [email protected]
    View metadata, citation and similar papers at core.ac.uk brought to you by CORE provided by University of Richmond University of Richmond UR Scholarship Repository English Faculty Publications English 1979 Black Eve or Madonna? A Study of the Antithetical Views of the Mother in Black American Literature Daryl Cumber Dance University of Richmond, [email protected] Follow this and additional works at: http://scholarship.richmond.edu/english-faculty-publications Part of the African American Studies Commons, American Literature Commons, Caribbean Languages and Societies Commons, Literature in English, North America, Ethnic and Cultural Minority Commons, and the Women's Studies Commons Recommended Citation Dance, Daryl Cumber. "Black Eve or Madonna? A Study of the Antithetical Views of the Mother in Black American Literature." In Sturdy Black Bridges: Visions of Black Women in Literature, edited by Roseann P. Bell, Bettye J. Parker, and Beverly Guy-Sheftall, 123-32. Garden City: Anchor Press/Doubleday, 1979. This Book Chapter is brought to you for free and open access by the English at UR Scholarship Repository. It has been accepted for inclusion in English Faculty Publications by an authorized administrator of UR Scholarship Repository. For more information, please contact [email protected]. Black Eve or Madonna? A Study of the Antithetical Views of the Mother in Black American Literature by DARYL C. DANCE In the biblical story of the creation we find a situation not unlike that in accounts of the creation of the world in other ancient myths. We find that woman is half accountable for the sins of the world-for the downfall and destruction of mankind.
    [Show full text]