Critical Theory Today: A User-Friendly Guide

Content Warning: This section of the guide includes discussion of racism.

This chapter provides a background to African American history, “the fundamental concerns of African American race theorists” (313), and their applications to literary texts. A dominant theme of this chapter is Literary Analysis as a Form of Social Justice, as these modes of analysis highlight the racism of canonical literary works and valorize the contributions of Black Americans in literature.

Racial Issues and African American Literary History

Tyson notes that throughout most of American history, Black American experiences have been excluded from the dominant narrative. Tyson then defines key terms:

• Racialism is “the belief in racial superiority, inferiority, and purity based on the conviction that moral and intellectual characteristics, just like physical characteristics, are biological properties that differentiate the races” (314).

• Racism is the “systemic discriminatory” actions taken against a race perceived as inferior.

• Institutional racism (or systemic/structural racism) is the practice of racism through widespread policy or practice. One example of this is environmental racism, wherein governments, for example, locate waste dumps in predominantly Black or brown neighborhoods. Another example of institutional racism can be found in the literary canon, which consists of predominantly white authors.

• Internalized racism is the adoption of racist beliefs about one’s race perpetuated by a racist society.