Studies in African American History and Culture Edited by Graham Hodges Colgate University A Routledge Series Studies in African American History and Culture Graham Hodges, General Editor The Mysterious Voodoo Queen, Black Liberation in the Midwest Marie Laveaux The Struggle in St. Louis, Missouri, A Study of Powerful Female Leadership 1964–1970 in Nineteenth-Century New Orleans Kenneth S. Jolly Ina Johanna Fandrich When to Stop the Cheering? Race and Masculinity in The Black Press, the Black Community, Contemporary American Prison and the Integration of Professional Narratives Baseball Auli Ek Brian Carroll Swinging the Vernacular The Rise and Fall of the Garvey Jazz and African American Modernist Movement in the Urban South, Literature 1918–1942 Michael Borshuk Claudrena N. Harold Boys, Boyz, Bois The Black Panthers in the Midwest An Ethics of Black Masculinity in Film The Community Programs and and Popular Media Services of the Black Panther Party in Keith M. Harris Milwaukee, 1966–1977 Andrew Witt Movement Matters American Antiapartheid Activism and Words and Songs of Bessie Smith, the Rise of Multicultural Politics Billie Holiday, and Nina Simone David L. Hostetter Sound Motion, Blues Spirit, and African Memory Slavery, Southern Culture, Melanie E. Bratcher and Education in Little Dixie, Missouri, 1820–1860 Blaxploitation Films of the 1970s Jeffrey C. Stone Blackness and Genre William Novotny Lawrence Courting Communities Black Female Nationalism and “Syncre- Womanism, Literature, and the Nationalism” in the Nineteenth- Transformation of the Black Century North Community, 1965–1980 Kathy L. Glass Kalenda C. Eaton The Selling of Civil Rights The Student Nonviolent Coordinating Committee and the Use of Public Relations Vanessa Murphree Womanism, Literature, and the Transformation of the Black Community, 1965-1980 Kalenda C. Eaton New York London First published 2008 by Routledge 270 Madison Ave, New York, NY 10016 Simultaneously published in the UK by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon OX14 4RN This edition published in the Taylor & Francis e-Library, 2007. “To purchase your own copy of this or any of Taylor & Francis or Routledge’s collection of thousands of eBooks please go to www.eBookstore.tandf.co.uk.” Routledge is an imprint of the Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business © 2008 Taylor & Francis All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereaf- ter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Trademark Notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trade- marks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. Library of Congress Cataloging in Publication Data Eaton, Kalenda C. Womanism, literature, and the transformation of the Black community, 1965–1980 / by Kalenda C. Eaton. p. cm. — (Studies in African American history and culture) Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0-415-96129-7 1. American fiction—African American authors—History and criticism. 2. American fiction—Women authors—History and criticism. 3. American fiction—20th century— History and criticism. 4. African American women authors—Political and social views. 5. Womanism in literature. 6. African Americans in literature. 7. African Americans— Race identity. 8. African Americans--Social conditions. I. Title. PS374.N4E37 2007 813.009'928708996073—dc22 2007020476 ISBN 0-203-93590-X Master e-book ISBN ISBN10: 0-415-96129-7 (hbk) ISBN10: 0-203-93590-X (ebk) ISBN13: 978-0-415-96129-5 (hbk) ISBN13: 978-0-203-93590-3 (ebk) For the next wave Yasmine Morgan Breana Caché Jada Jayme Jaysen Germayne Kelsey Angelica Angelia Leigh Chloe Kristen Contents Preface “Lifewriting” ix Acknowledgments xi Chapter One “Let Me Know When You Get Through”: The Afro-Politico Womanist Agenda 1 Chapter Two “Look Before You Leap”: Reading Black Nationalist Rhetoric and Toni Morrison’s Song of Solomon 15 Chapter Three “Tomorrow the People Would Come”: The Crisis of the Black Middle Clas in Alice Walker’s Meridian 39 Chapter Four “Ain’t No Such Animal as an Instant Guerilla”: Composing Self and Community in Toni Cade Bambara’s The Salt Eaters 59 Chapter Five “Something That’s Been Up Has to Come Down”: Global Black Consciousness in Paule Marshall’s The Chosen Place, The Timeless People 75 Conclusion 85 vii viii Contents Notes 91 Glosary 97 Bibliography 9 Index 105 Preface: “Lifewriting” For most of my life I have been convinced that my physical body was born a decade later than my soul. I have often been called an “old soul,” by my elders, and have come to appreciate the term, but with that apprecia- tion comes a feeling of displacement. My earliest memories involve a fierce understanding of my position in the world as a Black person and the power associated with that identity. Many would consider these sentiments more in line with a generation of Black youth who came of age in the 1960s rather than the early 1980s—but as I stated, I believe there was a slight mix-up in the drawing room. Or maybe not. When I was born, my mother had only recently returned home after spending four life changing years as a college student on the other side of the nation. Her decision to step out on faith and pursue her dream of attending Howard University in Washington, D.C. simply because it was a premier Historically Black University has stood as a testament to the con- viction I associate with pride in one’s heritage. What she brought home from her journey was both tangible and intangible, and has served me in intimate and complex ways. I remember conversations we had in the lower level of my grandparents’ house, a place where my mother would tell me that I was beautiful and that I came from beautiful people. I remember being instructed to ball up my little fist and pump it in the air while softly saying, then shouting “I’m Black and I’m proud, and I’ll shout it out loud.” I remember this. As I got older the conservative backlash of the 1980s claimed the views and convictions of the “quiet revolutionaries” like my mother. She sacrificed our private affirmations in order to climb the corporate ladder and take care of us, only to find out the historical truth that Black, female, and educated meant enduring harassment, occasional jokes about “water- melons” at the office party, as well as physical and emotional stress. During ix