Black British Writing

This collection of essays provides an imaginative international perspective on ways to incorporate black British writing and culture in the study of English literature, and presents theoretically sophisticated and practical strategies for doing so. It offers a pedagogical, pragmatic and ideological introduction to the field for those without background, and an integrated body of current and stimulating essays for those who are already knowledgeable.

Praise

"Black British literary culture has given rise not only to an impressive body of belletristic publications but has also since the last decade of the twentieth-century especially generated a growing field of scholarship intent on examining and celebrating its legacy and continued output. To this canon we must now add Victoria Arana and Lauri Ramey's edited collection of essays Black British Writing, a text that achieves its importance by offering critical analysis of the most recent generation of black British writers, which in contrast to earlier generations, situates itself and envisions the future of Britain in dramatically new terms."--Winston Napier, Clark University 

 

"It's a book that opens up discussion and calls for strategic thinking and practical engagement with its ideas." --Anita Franklin, Black Arts Alliance Newsletter

About the Author(s)

By R. Victoria Arana and Lauri Ramey

Lauri Ramey is Director of the Center for Contemporary Poetry and Poetics and Professor of African American Literature and Culture and Creative Writing, at California State University, Los Angeles.

R. Victoria Arana is Professor of English at Howard University.

 

 

Table of Contents

Introduction--R. Victoria Arana and Lauri Ramey * Narrating the Africanist Presence in the Early Modern Survey of English Literature--Ann Kelly * Sea Change: Historicizing the Scholarly Study of Black British Writing--R. Victoria Arana * The Politics of Teaching Black and British--Maria Helena Lima * The Evolution of Black London--Judith Bryan * Identity and Belonging in Contemporary Black British Writing--Chris Weedon * Transformations within the Black British Novel--Kadija George Sesay * Contemporary Black British Poetry--Lauri Ramey * The Socio-Politics of Black Britain in the Work of Buchi Emecheta--Susan Yearwood * Deterritorialization, Black British Writers, and the Case of Ben Okri--Jude Chudi Okpala * The Black Man and the Dark Lady: The Imaginary African in Early Modern and Modern British Writers--Alinda J. Sumers * A Black Briton's View of Black British Literature and Scholarship--Tracey Walters