African Spiritual Traditions in the Novels of ToniMorrison
African Spiritual Traditions in the Novels of ToniMorrison
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Abstract
Toni Morrison herself has long urged for organic critical readings of her works. This book delves into African spiritual traditions, explaining the meanings of African cosmology and epistemology as manifest in Morrison's novels. The result is a critical investigation of such works as The Bluest Eye, Sula, Song of Solomon, Tar Baby, Paradise, Love, Beloved, and Jazz. While others have studied the African spiritual ideas and values encoded in Morrison's work, the author of this study explores a wide range of complex concepts, including African deities, ancestral ideas, spiritual archetypes, mythic trope, and lyrical prose representing African spiritual continuities. She writes this book, not only as a literary critic but also as a practicing Obatala priest in the Yoruba spiritual tradition and a Mama Nganga in the Kongo spiritual system. She analyzes tensions between communal and individual values and moral codes as represented in Morrison's novels. She also uses interviews with and non-fiction written by Morrison to further build her critical paradigm.
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Front Matter
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Introduction: There’s a Little Wheel a Turnin’ in My Heart: Cultural Concentricities and Enduring Identities
K. Zauditu-Selassie
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I Ancestral Echoes Positing a Spiritual Frame
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II Psychic Domains and Spiritual Locations
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3
I’ve Got a Home in Dat Rock: Ritual and the Construction of Family History in Song of Solomon
K. Zauditu-Selassie
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4
Dancing with Trees and Dreamin of Yellow Dresses: The Dilemma of Jadine in Tar Baby
K. Zauditu-Selassie
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5
In(her)iting the Divine:(Consola)tions, Sacred (Convent)ions, and Mediations of the Spiritual In-between in Paradise
K. Zauditu-Selassie
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3
I’ve Got a Home in Dat Rock: Ritual and the Construction of Family History in Song of Solomon
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III Remembrance Has Not Left Us: What the Record Shows
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6
Living with the Dead: Memory and Ancestral Presence in Beloved
K. Zauditu-Selassie
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7
Tracing Wild’s Child Joe and Tracking the Hunter: An Examination of the Òrìsà Ochossi in Jazz
K. Zauditu-Selassie
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8
If I’d a Knowed More, I Would a Loved More: Toni Morrison’s Love and Spiritual Authorship
K. Zauditu-Selassie
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6
Living with the Dead: Memory and Ancestral Presence in Beloved
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End Matter
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