Synopses & Reviews
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!"and#8212;June Jordan
About the Author
Houston A. Baker is Distinguished University Professor and a professor of English at Vanderbilt University. He has been awarded fellowships by the John Simon Guggenheim Memorial Foundation and the National Endowment for the Humanities and has been a resident fellow at the Center for Advanced Study in the Behavioral Sciences and the National Humanities Center. He has served as president of the Modern Language Association and as editor of the journal American Literature.
Table of Contents
Introduction
The Daughter's Departure: Theory, History, and Late-Nineteenth-Century Black Women's Writing
1. Theoretical Returns
2. Workings of the Spirit: Conjure and the Space of Black Women's Creativity
3. On Knowing Our Place
4. The Changing Instant
Conclusion
Toward the Iterability of ONE
Afterword
Notes
Illustration Sources
Index