LibGuides: English 363: African American Literature: The Canon

Book

What Was African American Literature? by Kenneth W. Warren
Call Number: eBook
ISBN: 9780674066298
Publication Date: 2012-09-03
African American literature is over. With this provocative claim Kenneth Warren sets out to identify a distinctly African American literature and to change the terms with which we discuss it. Rather than contest other definitions, Warren makes a clear and compelling case for understanding African American literature as creative and critical work written by black Americans within and against the strictures of Jim Crow America. Within these parameters, his book outlines protocols of reading that best make sense of the literary works produced by African American writers and critics over the first two-thirds of the twentieth century. In Warrenâe(tm)s view, African American literature begged the question: what would happen to this literature if and when Jim Crow was finally overthrown? Thus, imagining a world without African American literature was essential to that literature. In support of this point, Warren focuses on three moments in the history of Phylon, an important journal of African American culture. In the dialogues Phylon documents, the question of whether race would disappear as an organizing literary category emerges as shared ground for critical and literary practice. Warren also points out that while scholarship by black Americans has always been the province of a petit bourgeois elite, the strictures of Jim Crow enlisted these writers in a politics that served the race as a whole. Finally, Warren's work sheds light on the current moment in which advocates of African American solidarity insist on a past that is more productively put behind us.

Articles about "What was African American Literature?

The following articles about Warren's book were published in the African American Review. Click on the fulltext link to read the article.

Bradley, Adam. "Assessing "What Was African American Literature?"; Or, The State Of The Field In The New Millennium: Our Mayan Prophecy." African American Review 44.4 (2011): 570-573. Fulltext

Castronovo, Russ. "Assessing "What Was African American Literature?"; Or, The State Of The Field In The New Millennium: Trains, Planes, And "What Was African American Literature?." African American Review 44.4 (2011): 578-582. Fulltext

Colbert, Soyica Diggs. "Assessing "What Was African American Literature?"; Or, The State Of The Field In The New Millennium: On Tradition." African American Review 44.4 (2011): 575-578. Fulltext

Daniels, Melissa Asher, and Gregory Laski. "Assessing "What Was African American Literature?"; Or, The State Of The Field In The New Millennium: Introduction." African American Review 44.4 (2011): 567-570. Fulltext

Ernest, John. "Assessing "What Was African American Literature?"; Or, The State Of The Field In The New Millennium: Canals And Rivers." African American Review 44.4 (2011): 573-575. Fulltext

Holland, Sharon P. "Assessing "What Was African American Literature?"; Or, The State Of The Field In The New Millennium: Leaving WAS Behind." African American Review 44.4 (2011): 582-584. Fulltext

Selisker, Scott. "What Was African American Literature?." African American Review 44.4 (2011): 717-719. Fulltext

Warren, Kenneth W. "Assessing "What Was African American Literature?"; Or, The State Of The Field In The New Millennium: Response." African American Review 44.4 (2011): 584-591. Fulltext Note: The article presents a response by the author to critiques of his book.

"Theories And Methodologies: What Was African American Literature? [Special Section]." PMLA: Publications Of The Modern Language Association Of America 128.2 (2013): 386-408 Fulltext

Ross, Marlon B. "Kenneth W. Warren's What Was African American Literature?: A Review Essay." Callaloo: A Journal Of African Diaspora Arts And Letters 35.3 (2012): 604-612 Fulltext

Readings about the canon of African American Literature

"Canon Formation." Columbia Guide To Contemporary African American Fiction (2005): 72-74.Fulltext

Holloway, Jonathan Scott. "The Black Intellectual And The 'Crisis Canon' In The Twentieth Century." Black Scholar 31.1 (2001): 2. Fulltext

Joyce, Joyce A. "The Black Canon: Reconstructing Black American Literary Criticism." New Literary History: A Journal Of Theory And Interpretation 18.2 (1987): 335-344.Fulltext

Tate, Claudia. "Laying The Floor; Or, The History Of The Formation Of The Afro-American Canon." Book Research Quarterly 3.2 (1987): 60-78. Download fulltext

Companion to African American Literature by Gene Andrew Jarrett (Editor)
Call Number: eBook
ISBN: 9781118438787
Publication Date: 2013-05-06
See Part III: Reforming the Canon, Tradition, and Criticism of African American Literature
Loose Canons by Henry Louis Gates
Call Number: Print Books (PS153.N5 G275 1992 )
ISBN: 9780195075199
Publication Date: 1992-04-30
Canon confidential: a Sam Slade caper -- The master's pieces: on canon formation and the African-American tradition -- Writing, "Race" and the difference it makes -- Talking black: critical signs of the times -- "Tell me, sir ... what IS "black" literature?" -- Integrating the American mind -- African-American studies in the 21st century -- "What's in a name?" Some meanings of blackness -- The big picture -- Trading on the margin: notes on the culture of criticism.

Oxford African American Studies Center
See the following entries:
Literature
Literature and Criticism
Literary History

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