August Wilson and Black Aesthetics

by Shannon, Sandra G.; Williams, Dana A.

• ISBN13: 9780230113015
• ISBN10: 023011301X
• Format: Paperback
• Copyright: 2011-03-15
• Publisher: Palgrave Macmillan

Summary

August Wilson and Black Aesthetics offers new essays that address issues raised in Wilson's "The Ground on Which I Stand" speech. Essays and interviews range from examinations of the presence of Wilson's politics in his plays to the limitations of these politics on contemporary interpretations of Black aesthetics. Also included is Sybil Roberts' A Liberating Prayer: A Lovesong for Mumia , that, for two seasons, has played to sold out houses, but that until now has not been published.

Author Biography

Dana A. Williams is Professor of African American Literature at Howard University. Sandra G. Shannon is Professor of African American and American Drama at Howard University.

Table of Contents

Introduction--Dana A. Williams * Black Aesthetics as Theory, Art, and Ideology * The Development of African-American Dramatic Theory: W.E.B. DuBois to August Wilson - Hand to Hand!--Mikell Pinkney * Rita Dove's Mother Love: Revising the Black Aesthetic through the Lens of Western Discourse--Tracey L. Walters * The Ifa Paradigm: Reading the Spirit in Tina McElroy Ansa's Baby of the Family--Georgene Bess Montgomery * Just 'Cause (or Just Cause): On August Wilson's Case for a Black Theater--by John V. White * Black Aesthetics and Interdisciplinary Black Arts * "Keeping It Real": August Wilson and Hip Hop--Harry J. Elam, Jr. * Giving Voice and Vent to African American Culture: August Wilson's Black Aesthetics and Katherine Dunham's Fight for Cultural Ownership in Mambo-- Dorothea Fischer-Hornung * The Mumia Project: Theatre Activism at Howard University--Sybil J. Roberts * August Wilson's Plays and Black Aesthetics * Phantom Limbs Dancing Juba Rites in August Wilson's Joe Turner's Come and Gone and The Piano Lesson--Reggie Young * Speaking of Voice and August Wilson's Women--Tara T. Green * Using Black Rage to Elucidate African and African-American Identity in August Wilson's Joe Turner's Come and Gone--C. Patrick Tyndall * Current, Unpublished Interviews That Speak to Aesthetic Issues Raised in "The Ground on Which I Stand" * The Ground on Which He Stands: Charles S. Dutton on August Wilson--Yolanda Williams Page * Interview with Wilson conducted by Sandra Shannon * A Liberating Prayer: A Lovesong for Mumia--Sybil J. Roberts * Afterword--Sandra G. Shannon