Haunted Roadscapes in Jesmyn Ward’s Sing, Unburied, Sing

MELUS ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 45 (2) ◽  
pp. 134-153
Author(s):  
Nicole Dib
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Social Dynamics ◽  
Narrative Structure ◽  
The United States ◽  
Two Dimensions ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Road Trip ◽  
The Road ◽  
American Experience ◽  
Unique Experience

Abstract In this article, I argue that Jesmyn Ward deploys a road trip in her 2017 novel Sing, Unburied, Sing as a literary formula through which she demonstrates the immobilizing effects of racism and incarceration on contemporary black lives. The association of the American road-trip novel with freedom and free movement is strong in the American imaginary, and Ward manipulates this association to explore what happens when automobile travelers are precarious rather than privileged. The road trip in Ward's novel makes visible various forces of mobility and immobility that differentiate citizens by race. She conjures two dimensions of the African American experience that are immobilizing: the carceral system and the risk of “driving while black.” Sing, Unburied, Sing already critiques the traditional road trip in its plot and narrative structure; for Ward, it is the linkages of dimensions of African American immobilization around the road trip that are powerful. Ward's novel demonstrates that black automobility, or the unique experience of the road for racialized drivers, reveals the political and social dynamics that shape our conception of the road for all drivers. Furthermore, I analyze how the road trip within the novel “unburies” a story about the violence of incarceration. I explore how Ward finesses that iconic American narrative trope, the journey by car that ought to be freeing, to heighten her critique of racist, anti-black structures of oppression in the United States.

scholarly journals Georgian Military Road: Constant Communication (the Structure of “A Hero of Our Time” by M. Yu. Lermontov)

Literatūra ◽  
2020 ◽  
Vol 62 (2) ◽  
pp. 171-184
Author(s):  
Maria Dmitrovskaya
Keyword(s):  
Spatial Orientation ◽  
Narrative Structure ◽  
Conceptual System ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Human Consciousness ◽  
The Road ◽  
Good And Evil ◽  
The Universe

The article demonstrates the fact that the duality of human consciousness is connected by mutual projections with the topography of the Georgian Military Road and the model of the universe and also forms the system of narrators / characters and the structure of the novel as a whole, including the number of stories and the partition of the novel into two parts. The sources used by the writer in the formation of the narrative structure of the novel are reconstructed. The numerological code of the novel is considered, the language bases of the conceptual system are analyzed. The embeddedness in the conceptual system of the trinomial name of Mikhail Yuryevich Lermontov is demonstrated. The vertical and horizontal spatial orientation of the Georgian Military Road allows discovering the topographic connection of the road with the dual reality of Lermontov, in which the opposite poles of good and evil, divine and evil turn into one.

The American Nightmare: Reading and Teaching Pietro di Donato's Ethnographic Novel Christ in Concrete

2005 ◽  
Vol 39 (1) ◽  
pp. 137-156
Author(s):  
Rose De Angelis
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
The United States ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Focal Points ◽  
Cultural Artifact ◽  
American Experience ◽  
Italian Americans ◽  
Italian American ◽  
History Of ◽  
Interdisciplinary Course

In the interdisciplinary course entitled The Italian-American Experience, Pietro di Donato's Christ in Concrete is examined, explored, and analyzed within historical, socio-political, and literary contexts. The novel becomes a point of focus for the discussion of immigrant life and working-class people in a broader and contextualized understanding of Italian Americans. Students read Christ in Concrete in conjunction with essays documenting the history of workers' struggles in the United States. Read as cultural artifact, Christ in Concrete documents with historical clarity and brutal honesty the way in which the American Dream turned nightmare. Using language, religion, and social politics as focal points, the paper looks at Italian-Americans, their virtues and flaws, their struggles and triumphs, as it underscores the culture's unique contributions to the American mosaic not only in the lived lives of the novel's characters but also in the poetics of its discourse.

scholarly journals RACHEL MORSE’S NEGOTIATING AS THE EFFECT OF DOUBLE CONSCIOUSNESS IN DURROW’S THE GIRL WHO FELL FROM THE SKY

2016 ◽  
Vol 1 (2) ◽  
pp. 127
Author(s):  
Lia Indri Hapsari
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
The United States ◽  
Psychological Effects ◽  
Double Consciousness ◽  
The Novel ◽  
Biracial Identity ◽  
Identity Problem ◽  
White Mother ◽  
African American Father ◽  
American Society

Racism towards African-American brings many impacts to African-American people’s life, especially who have ever experienced it. One ofsome psychological effects that experienced by African-American is doubleconsciousness experience that could be explored in Durrow’s The Girl Who Fellfrom the Sky. Double consciousness phenomenon is found in the main characterof the novel named Rachel Morse, a daughter of white mother and African-American father, who has identity problem in her new society. This study aimsto attend the identity negotiation of Rachel as the result of double consciousnessshe experienced using double consciousness theory by W.E.B. Du Bois. Thisstudy reveals that Rachel Morse who experience double consciousness has tonegotiate her biracial identity in American society who still believe in ‘one-drop’rule so that she could fit in the society. The practice of racism and stereotypeforms need to be reduced to make a better living for African-American andbiracial people in the United States.

Lifting Every Voice Throughout the Nation

2018 ◽  
Vol 40 (3) ◽  
pp. 142-162 ◽  
Author(s):  
Nancy E. Weiss
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
African American ◽  
American History ◽  
African American History ◽  
The United States ◽  
Library Services ◽  
National Museum ◽  
New Professionals ◽  
Grant Programs ◽  
American Experience

The National Museum of African American History and Culture Act authorized the Institute of Museum and Library Services (IMLS) to establish grant programs for museums of African American history and culture. Through its Museum Grants for African American History and Culture program, IMLS helps these museums improve operations, enhance stewardship of collections, engage in professional development, and attract new professionals to the field. The Act has fostered a national ecosystem that leverages the collective resources of the National Museum and African American museums throughout the United States to preserve and share the strength and breadth of the African American experience.

Precious African American Memories, Post-Racial Dreams & the American Nation

Daedalus ◽  
2011 ◽  
Vol 140 (1) ◽  
pp. 67-78 ◽  
Author(s):  
Waldo E. Martin
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Racial Inequality ◽  
White Supremacy ◽  
Scientific Evidence ◽  
The United States ◽  
Two Dimensions ◽  
Democratic Movement ◽  
Freedom Struggle ◽  
Social Scientific ◽  
Intractable Problem

This interdisciplinary essay explores a fundamental paradox at the heart of American race relations since the 1960s: “the changing same.” The more things change; the more they remain the same. Combining historical and social-scientific evidence with autobiographical reflections, this discussion critically probes the paradoxical decline and persistence of two dimensions of our enduring racial quagmire: racial inequality and white supremacy. The essay argues that these powerful and interrelated elements of America's continuing racial dilemma demand a massive democratic movement to alleviate both at once. This wide-ranging struggle to realize the promise of American democracy requires more than just a revitalized African American Freedom Struggle that is both intraracial and interracial. Progress toward resolving the seemingly intractable problem of racial inequality in the United States demands far more than intensified efforts to alleviate economic inequality; it requires alleviating white supremacy as well.

Los Angeles and Cinema

2017 ◽  
Author(s):  
John Trafton
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Los Angeles ◽  
Cultural Landscape ◽  
Film History ◽  
The United States ◽  
Hollywood Cinema ◽  
American Experience ◽  
New Hollywood ◽  
Wim Wenders ◽  
Starting Point

This article discusses the history of cinema in Los Angeles and the complex relationship that American film has had with its host city throughout film history. First, General Overviews considers the essential texts on Los Angeles and Southern California history. Although many of these works are not part of the literature on cinema and media studies, they nevertheless provide a critical starting point for scholars studying the role of Los Angeles on film. Mission Legend examines the mythical allure of the region that enticed film pioneers to leave the East Coast for the land of sunshine. Edendale features texts on the early studios of the 1910s. Weimar on the Pacific is on the contributions that Austrian and German émigrés made to the cultural landscape, including crucial theorists and German-Austrian filmmakers who fled to the United States. Los Angeles Modernist Architecture discusses another group of German-Austrian immigrants—modernist architects who constructed homes that would later become iconic film locations. Film noir has had an enduring relationship with the City of Angels, and Noir focuses on Los Angeles as a noir character in its own right. Los Angeles and New Hollywood reviews depictions of Los Angeles in films from the late 1970s to the early 1980s, including those by American filmmakers and European tourist filmmakers with their own take on Los Angeles: Michelangelo Antonioni, John Boorman, Jacques Deray, and Wim Wenders, to name a few. Los Angeles Disaster Cinema has remained consistent in Hollywood cinema over the last forty years, and as such, a scholarly focus on this aspect of Los Angeles Cinema is featured. Los Angeles and African American Cinema discusses texts on the L.A. Rebellion School, which invigorated a neorealist cinema about the Los Angeles African American experience, as well as studies on the L.A. “hood films” that emerged during the early 1990s. Los Angeles and Chicano Cinema offers a series of texts for scholars looking to engage with this field. The music industry has also played a crucial role in L.A. history, but the Los Angeles Punk movement of the late 1970s and early 1980s also energized a punk aesthetic in cinema that emerged from films like Repo Man. Toward the end of the 20th century, many auteur filmmakers, heavily influenced by New Hollywood cinema, created portraits of Los Angeles, and Los Angeles Auteur Filmmakers provides some key texts on these filmmakers. Lastly, this article features a section on Documentary Films, because there are so many nonfiction films that will serve scholars of Los Angeles Cinema well in their research.

scholarly journals Islam in the African-American Experience

2005 ◽  
Vol 22 (2) ◽  
pp. 111-113
Author(s):  
Aneesah Nadir
Keyword(s):  
United States ◽  
African American ◽  
African Americans ◽  
The United States ◽  
Dominant Group ◽  
Main Concept ◽  
Hip Hop Culture ◽  
American Experience ◽  
Central Piece ◽  
History Of

Islam in the African-American Experience is a historical account of Islamin the African-American community. Written by a scholar of African-American world studies and religious studies, this book focuses on theinterconnection between African Americans’ experiences with Islam as itdeveloped in the United States. While this scholarly work is invaluable forstudents and professors in academia, it is also a very important contributionfor anyone seriously interested in Islam’s development in this country.Moreover, it serves as a central piece in the puzzle for Muslims anxious tounderstand Islam’s history in the United States and the relationship betweenAfrican-American and immigrant Muslims. The use of narrative biographiesthroughout the book adds to its personal relevance, for they relate thepersonal history of ancestors, known and unknown, to Islam’s history inthis country. Turner’s work furthers African-American Muslims’ journeytoward unlocking their history.The main concept expressed in Turner’s book is that of signification, theissue of naming and identity among African Americans. Turner argues thatsignification runs throughout the history of Islam among African Americans,dating back to the west coast of Africa, through the Nation of Islam, to manyof its members’ conversion to orthodox Sunni Islam, and through Islamicmessages disseminated via contemporary hip-hop culture. According toTurner, Charles Long refers to signification as “a process by which names,signs and stereotypes were given to non-European realities and peoples duringthe western conquest and exploration of the world” (p. 2). The renamingof Africans by their oppressors was a method of dehumanization andsubjugation.The author argues that throughout the history of African-AmericanMuslims, Islam served to “undercut signification by offering AfricanAmericans a chance to signify themselves” (p. 3). Self-signification is anantithesis to the oppressive use of signification, for it facilitates empowermentand growing independence from the dominant group. In addition,“signification involved double meanings. It was both a potent form ofoppression and a potent form of resistance to oppression” (p. 3). By choosingMuslim names, whether they were Muslim or not, Turner claims that ...

Ralph Ellison’s Three Days

2016 ◽  
Author(s):  
Timothy Parrish
Keyword(s):  
African American ◽  
Civil Rights ◽  
Civil Rights Movement ◽  
James Joyce ◽  
Political Change ◽  
The Novel ◽  
American Experience ◽  
Modern Novel ◽  
History And Myth

Timothy Parrish’s “Ralph Ellison’s Three Days: The Aesthetics of Political Change” argues that in Three Days, Ellison transcends the novel form, becoming an epic poet through prose that resembled fiction, history, and myth simultaneously, creating what he calls Ellison’s Book of America. As a true modernist novelist, kin to Louis Armstrong and James Joyce, Ellison understood that the modern novel is never truly finished; like Robert Musil’s A Man Without Qualities, whose aesthetic premise depended on its not being finished, Three Days both rejects and creates history. Parrish terms Ellison “the great modernist redactor of African American experience.” In ways that Ellison could not recognize, he did not finish the second novel because it could not be finished. Like the Civil Rights movement from which it emerged, Three Days is an incomplete project, unable to end “until the story of America and its struggle to realize its Edenic promises ends too.”

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