Naslov
African-American Literature – Toward a Unified or Balkanized American Literature?

Autori
Butković, Matea

Izvornik
Journal of Social and Human Sciences (1857-9051) 1 (2014), 1; 29-40

Vrsta, podvrsta i kategorija rada
Radovi u časopisima, članak, ostalo

Ključne riječi
American literature ; African-American literature ; balkanization ; Jim Crow ; racism

Sažetak
Stretching over 250 years, the primary goal of African-American literary production has evolved from being a powerful abolitionist tools against slavery to a means of promotion of equality and social inclusion. The double consciousness which Du Bois proposed in The Souls of the Black Folk did not only reflect African-Americans' social status, but the role of black authors in the predominately white readership in the first half of the twentieth century as well. The aim of this paper is to shed light on the debate which was raised among literary scholars in the aftermath of World War II and which focused on whether an authentic African-American literature could exist outside the Jim Crow context. The shift form the slave narratives to novels has made some critics believe that African-American authors were abandoning the authenticity of African-American way of life, and which, in turn, has contributed to the “balkanization” of American literature, whereby the balkanization metaphor has been used to denote nationalist fragmentation and political instability as a reflection of the political events in the Balkan region as well as imposing notions of whiteness as the supreme identity for African- Americans in the U.S. context.

Izvorni jezik
Engleski

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