Literature

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    Signs and Cities: Black Literary Postmodernism

    Signs and Cities is the first book to consider what it means to speak of a postmodern moment in African-American literature. Dubey argues that for African-American studies, postmodernity best names a period, beginning in the early 1970s, marked by acute disenchantment with the promises of urban modernity and of print literacy. Dubey shows how black novelists from the last three decades have reconsidered the modern urban legacy and thus articulated a distinctly African-American strain of postmodernism. She argues that novelists such as Octavia Butler, Samuel Delany, Toni Morrison, Gloria Naylor, Ishmael Reed, Sapphire, and John Edgar Wideman probe the disillusionment of urban modernity through repeated recourse to tropes of the book and scenes of reading and writing. Ultimately, she demonstrates that these writers view the book with profound ambivalence, construing it as an urban medium that cannot recapture the face-to-face communities assumed by oral and folk forms of expression [Madhu_Dubey]_Signs_and_Cities_Black_Literary_Pos_BookZZ.org_

    Ancient Egyptian Literature: Volume III: The Late Period

    Volume III spans the last millennium of Pharaonic civilization, from the tenth century B.C. to the beginning of the Christian era. With a new foreword by Joseph G. Manning [Miriam_Lichtheim]_Ancient_Egyptian_Literature_Vo_Bokos-Z1_

    Ancient Egyptian Literature Vol. 2 : A Book of Readings: The New Kingdom

    Volume II shows the culmination of these literary genres within the single period known as the New Kingdom (1550-1080 B.C.). With a new foreword by Hans-W. Fischer-Elfert. [Miriam_Lichtheim]_Ancient_Egyptian_Literature_Vo_Bokos-Z1__2_

    Ancient Egyptian Literature: Volume I: The Old and Middle Kingdoms

    Volume I outlines the early and gradual evolution of Egyptian literary genres, including biographical and historical inscriptions carved on stone, the various classes of literary works written with pen on papyrus, and the mortuary literature that focuses on life after death. Introduced with a new foreword by Antonio Loprieno [Miriam_Lichtheim]_Ancient_Egyptian_Literature_Vo_Bokos-Z1__1_

    Neo–Segregation Narratives: Jim Crow in Post–Civil Rights American Literature

    This study of what Brian Norman terms a neo–segregation narrative tradition examines literary depictions of life under Jim Crow that were written well after the civil rights movement. From Toni Morrison’s first novel, The Bluest Eye, to bestselling black fiction of the 1980s to a string of recent work by black and nonblack authors and artists, Jim Crow haunts the post–civil rights imagination. Norman traces a neo–segregation narrative tradition—one that developed in tandem with neo–slave narratives—by which writers return to a moment of stark de jure segregation to address contemporary concerns about national identity and the persistence of racial divides. These writers upset dominant national narratives of achieved equality, portraying what are often more elusive racial divisions in what some would call a postracial present. [Brian_Norman]_Neo-Segregation_Narratives_Jim_Cro_bookos-z1.org_

    African American Rhetoric(s): Interdisciplinary Perspectives

    African American Rhetoric(s): Interdisciplinary Perspectives is an introduction to fundamental concepts and a systematic integration of historical and contemporary lines of inquiry in the study of African American rhetorics. Edited by Elaine B. Richardson and Ronald L. Jackson II, the volume explores culturally and discursively developed forms of knowledge, communicative practices, and persuasive strategies rooted in freedom struggles by people of African ancestry in America. Outlining African American rhetorics found in literature, historical documents, and popular culture, the collection provides scholars, students, and teachers with innovative approaches for discussing the epistemologies and realities that foster the inclusion of rhetorical discourse in African American studies. In addition to analyzing African American rhetoric, the fourteen contributors project visions for pedagogy in the field and address new areas and renewed avenues of research. The result is an exploration of what parameters can be used to begin a more thorough and useful consideration of African Americans in rhetorical space. 0809327457

    African and African American Images in Newbery Award Winning Titles: Progress in Portrayals

    Since 1922, the Newbery Medal of Honor has been awarded to distinguished works of literature for children. Although African and African American characters appeared in children's books well before the establishment of the Newbery award, such depictions were limited, with characters often only appearing as slaves or servants. However, over the last several decades, there has been much progress, and Black characters have played a much more integral role in many highly regarded novels. In African and African American Images in Newbery Award Winning Titles, Binnie Tate Wilkin provides a historical and contextual examination of books with such depictions that have been acknowledged by the nation's most prestigious award for children's literature. Wilkin explores the depictions of African and African American characters in these novels and illuminates the progressive quality of such representations. Wilkin looks closely at such elements as aesthetic descriptions, subservient characterizations, the relationships between characters, and specific language usage to investigate how these images have progressed toward increasingly positive depictions. She also notes, when applicable, the significance of the lack of any African or African American images. This book is an essential resource for those interested in African American studies, children's literature, and the relationship between the two. [Binnie_Tate_Wilkin]_African_and_African_American__bookos-z1.org_

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