Category Books

White Scholars/African American Texts »

Authors: Lisa A. Long
ISBN-13: 9780813535999, ISBN-10: 0813535999
Format: Paperback
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
Date Published: September 2005
Edition: (Non-applicable)

Author Biography: Lisa A. Long

Book Synopsis

These essays ask an important question for literary criticism: can white scholars teach African American literature? Responding to Nellie McKay's concern about the lack of black scholars in the field, the collection opens a public conversation about the real and pressing obstacles faced in this type of work. McKay, co-editor of the Norton Anthology of African American Literature, is a contributor and wrote the forward to this volume. Annotation ©2006 Book News, Inc., Portland, OR

	Foreword
	Introduction : white scholars / African American texts	1
	Naming the problem that led to the question "who shall teach African American literature?; or, are we ready to disband the Wheatley Court?	17
	Theme for African American literature B	29
	Race walks in the room : white teachers in black studies	40
	Naming the problem embedded in the problem that led to the question "who shall teach African American literature?"; or, are we ready to discard the concept of authenticity altogether?	52
	Turning impossibility into possibility : teaching Ellison, Murray, and the blues at Tuskegee	68
	Before positionality	81
	White scholars in African American literary circles : appropriation or cultural literacy?	87
	"Knowing your stuff," knowing yourself	97
	At close range : being black and mentoring whites in African American studies	108
	Faulty analogies : queer white critics teaching African American texts	123
	The color of the critic : an intervention in the critical debate in African American theory on interpretive authority	134
	Between Rome, Harlem, and Harlan	145
	The stepsister and the clan : when the native teaches African American literature	154
	Twelve years with Martin Delany : a confession	173
	Master thoughts	186
	Writing about Gwendolyn Brooks anyway	198
	Truth and talent in interpreting ethnic American autobiography : from white to black and beyond	209