Description: Black Women's Activism is the first book-length study of African American women's historical romances. This book examines romances written from 1989 to the present, and discusses their black heroines' resistance at particular moments in history - from the colonization movement to the Texas oil boom. Socio-historical perspectives, a womanist agenda, and an African-centered outlook inform the readings of female characters in the narratives of Francine Craft, Gay G. Gunn, Shirley Hailstock, Beverly Jenkins, and Anita Richmond Bunkley. Broadening the scope of the historical romance genre, and expanding the canon of African American literature, this book provides a more comprehensive image of the black female character and addresses gender issues previously unexplored in black fiction. This text should be used by librarians, historians, literary critics, writers, college- and graduate-level students, teachers, and romance readers.
Review Quotes: «It is both useful and pleasing that Rita B. Dandridge's study of historical romances honors a long-standing tradition in American literature of respecting literature that combines 'utile' and 'dulce'. She combines factual contexts with accessible readings of text that too many intellectuals have too quickly dismissed as mere recreational reading. The result is that we joyfully learn more about some of today's best-selling and most popular African American writers while we come to appreciate more clearly their innovative and radical interventions regarding race, class, and gender stereotypes of our past and of our present.» (Frances Smith Foster, Charles Howard Candler Professor of English and Women's Studies, Emory University)
«This text is a thoughtful, scholarly, and valuable genre study that addresses the neglect of black women's historical romances and the black activist's role in this genre. Rita B. Dandridge's study offers new insights and exciting alternative perspectives to scholars and students of African-American women's literature.» (Freddy L. Thomas, Chair, Department of Languages and Literature,
Virginia State University)