Book contents
- The Cambridge Companion to Contemporary African American Literature
- The Cambridge Companion to Contemporary African American Literature
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Acknowledgments
- Chronology
- Introduction
- Part I Histories of the Present
- 1 African American Citizenship in the Post–Civil Rights Era
- 2 The Politics of Class
- 3 Rethinking Post-Racialism
- Part II African American Genres
- Part III Mapping New Identities and Geographies
- Part IV Critical Approaches
- Further Reading
- Index
- Cambridge Companions To …
3 - Rethinking Post-Racialism
from Part I - Histories of the Present
Published online by Cambridge University Press: 14 December 2023
- The Cambridge Companion to Contemporary African American Literature
- The Cambridge Companion to Contemporary African American Literature
- Copyright page
- Contents
- Contributors
- Acknowledgments
- Chronology
- Introduction
- Part I Histories of the Present
- 1 African American Citizenship in the Post–Civil Rights Era
- 2 The Politics of Class
- 3 Rethinking Post-Racialism
- Part II African American Genres
- Part III Mapping New Identities and Geographies
- Part IV Critical Approaches
- Further Reading
- Index
- Cambridge Companions To …
Summary
Much contemporary antiracist and African Americanist scholarship – especially since the 2008 election of President Barack Obama – has assumed a decidedly cynical orientation toward ideas of “post-racialism.” Scholars, journalists, and activists have rightly detected, in numerous deployments of the term, a kind of bad faith utopianism espoused as a cover for political retreat from progressive, race-conscious policies. This chapter recognizes the merits of such anti-post-racial critiques, but also argues against the summary dismissal of the term. More pointedly, the chapter argues for a rethinking of post-racialism that acknowledges and grapples with a long, ideologically heterogeneous history of African American investments in and ambivalence toward the race concept. The upshot of this rethinking is not a defense of post-racialism as such, but a richer and more dynamic portrait of post-racialism’s historical force, social currency, and inner workings. The chapter takes inspiration from, and proceeds through close readings and intertextual analyses of, Danzy Senna’s 2017 novel, New People.
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- Information
- Publisher: Cambridge University PressPrint publication year: 2023