Black Literature and Culture – serie

In this text, the author raids the borders of contemporary criticism to show how debilitating "protectionist" stances can be and how much might be gained by crossing cultural boundaries. From Spike Lee's "She's Gotta Have It" to Michael Jackson's physical transmutations, from male scholars' investments in feminism to white scholars' in black texts - Awkward explores cultural moments that challenge the exclusive critical authority of race and gender. In each instance he asks: What do artists, scholars and others concerned with representations of Afro-American life make of the view that gender, race and sexuality circumscribe their own and others' lives and narratives? In pursuing a black male/feminist criticism, the study acknowledges the complexities of interpretation in an age when a variety of powerful discourses have proliferated on the subject of racial, gendered and sexual difference. It also identifies this proliferation as an opportunity to negotiate seemingly fixed cultural and critical positions.

In this explosive book, Houston Baker takes stock of the current state of Black Studies in the university and outlines its responsibilities to the newest form of black urban expression--rap. A frank, polemical essay, Black Studies, Rap, and the Academy is an uninhibited defense of Black Studies and an extended commentary on the importance of rap. Written in the midst of the political correctness wars and in the aftermath of the Los Angeles riots, Baker's meditation on the academy and black urban expression has generated much controversy and comment from both ends of the political spectrum.

Turning on inspired interpretations of Zora Neale Hurston, Toni Morrison, and Ntozake Shange, Workings of the Spirit weighs current critical approaches to black women's writing against Baker's own explanation of the founding, theoretical state of Afro-American intellectual history. "Brilliant, and tenderly riveted to gratitude as an indispensable facet of analysis, Houston Baker arrives, yet again, bearing the loveliest flowers of his devotion and delight: thank God he's here!"--June Jordan

Turning on inspired interpretations of Zora Neale Hurston, Toni Morrison, and Ntozake Shange, Workings of the Spirit weighs current critical approaches to black women's writing against Baker's own explanation of the founding, theoretical state of Afro-American intellectual history."Brilliant, and tenderly riveted to gratitude as an indispensable facet of analysis, Houston Baker arrives, yet again, bearing the loveliest flowers of his devotion and delight: thank God he's here!"—June Jordan

Subject classification:- Black Studies; Literature and Literary Criticism: American and Canadian