Narrative, Race, and Ethnicity in the United States

by James J. Donahue (Editor), Jennifer Ann Ho (Editor), Shaun Morgan (Editor)

Overview

Narrative, Race, and Ethnicity in the United States, edited by James J. Donahue, Jennifer Ho, and Shaun Morgan, is the first book-length volume of essays devoted to studying the intersection of race/ethnicity and narrative theories. Each chapter offers a sustained engagement with narrative theory and critical race theory as applied to ethnic American literature, exploring the interpretive possibilities of this critical intersection. Taken as a whole, these chapters demonstrate some of the many ways that the formal study of narrative can help us better understand the racial/ethnic tensions of narrative fictions. Similarly, the essays advance the tools of narrative theory by redeploying or redesigning those tools to better account for and articulate the ways that race and ethnicity are formal components of narrative as well as thematic issues.
 
Recognizing that racial/ethnic issues and tensions are often contextualized geographically, this volume focuses on narratives associated with various racial and ethnic communities in the United States. By engaging with new developments in narrative theory and critical race studies, this volume demonstrates the vitality of using the tools of narratology and critical race theory together to understand how race influences narrative and how narratology illuminates a reading of race in ethnic American literature.
 

Product Details

ISBN-13:	9780814254462
Publisher:	Ohio State University Press
Publication date:	09/13/2017
Series:	THEORY INTERPRETATION NARRATIV
Edition description:	1
Pages:	268
Product dimensions:	6.00(w) x 9.00(h) x 0.70(d)

About the Author

James J. Donahue is Associate Professor of English and Communication at SUNY Potsdam. Jennifer Ho is Professor of English and Comparative Literature at University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Shaun Morgan is Associate Professor of English at Tennessee Wesleyan University.

Table of Contents

Acknowledgments v

Introduction Narrative, Race, and Ethnicity in the United States James J. Donahue 1

Chapter 1 What Asian American Studies and Narrative Theory Can Do for Each Other Sue J. Kim 13

Chapter 2 Narrative Form, Ideal Readerships, and Oscar "Zeta" Acosta's The Autobiography of a Brown Buffalo Christopher González 27

Chapter 3 Narrative Disidentification: Beginnings in Toni Morrison's Song of Solomon Catherine Romagnolo 43

Chapter 4 Narrative Process and Cultural Identity in Leslie Marmon Silko's Ceremony Stephen Spencer 57

Chapter 5 Black World/White World: Narrative Worldmaking in Jim Crow America Blake Wilder 70

Chapter 6 Postblack Unnatural Narrative-Or, Is the Implied Author of Percival Everett's I Am Not Sidney Poitier Black? Christian Schmidt 82

Chapter 7 The Presumptions of Whiteness in Ann Petry's Country Place Stephanie Li 95

Chapter 8 "One Silence Had Led to Another": Strategic Paralipsis and a Non-Normative Narrator in Bitter in the Mouth Patrick E. Horn 109

Chapter 9 Rhetorical Narrative Theory and Native American Literature: The Antimimetic in Thomas King's Green Grass, Running Water Joseph Coulombe 123

Chapter 10 Narration on the Lower Frequencies in Ralph Ellison's Invisible Man Sterling Lecater Bland Jr. 137

Chapter 11 Race as Interpretive Lens: Focalization and Critique of Globalization in Jhumpa Lahiri's "Sexy" Shaun Morgan 149

Chapter 12 Race, Cosmopolitanism, and the Complexities of Belonging in the Open City: Teju Cole's Transcontinental Aesthetics Claudia Breger 162

Chapter 13 Caribbean Book Nerds: Recentering to Possible Worlds in Judith Cofer and Junot Díaz Deborah Noel 177

Chapter 14 Homo-Narrative Capture, Racial Proximity, and the Queer Latino Child Roy Pérez 193

Afterword Intersections and Future Connections Jennifer Ann Ho 208

Works Cited 219

List of Contributors 234

Index 237