Black on Black: Twentieth-Century African American Writing about Africa

Black on Black provides the first comprehensive analysis of the modern African American literary response to Africa, from W.E.B. Du Bois\u27s The Souls of Black Folk to Alice Walker\u27s The Color Purple. Combining cutting-edge theory, extensive historical and archival research, and close readings of individual texts, Gruesser reveals the diversity of the African American response to Countee Cullen\u27s question, What is Africa to Me? John Gruesser uses the concept of Ethiopianism--the biblically inspired belief that black Americans would someday lead Africans and people of the diaspora to a bright future--to provide a framework for his study. Originating in the eighteenth century and inspiring religious and political movements throughout the 1800s, Ethiopianism dominated African American depictions of Africa in the first two decades of the twentieth century, particularly in the writings of Du Bois, Sutton Griggs, and Pauline Hopkins. Beginning with the Harlem Renaissance and continuing through the Italian invasion and occupation of Ethiopia, however, its influence on the portrayal of the continent slowly diminished. Ethiopianism\u27s decline can first be seen in the work of writers closely associated with the New Negro Movement, including Alain Locke and Langston Hughes, and continued in the dramatic work of Shirley Graham, the novels of George Schuyler, and the poetry and prose of Melvin Tolson. The final rejection of Ethiopianism came after the dawning of the Cold War and roughly coincided with the advent of postcolonial Africa in works by authors such as Richard Wright, Lorraine Hansberry, and Alice Walker. This work charts well the African American literary response to Africa over time. —Booklist The view that black Americans will deliver a bright future to Africa is refuted in this survey of 20th century Afro-American writings about Africa. —Bookwatch Engaging and offers insight into the evolution of African-American thought and writing. —Charleston Post & Courier Draws important conclusions and offers a perceptive treatment. —Choice Will play an important role in discussions of the literature of the African diaspora for years to come. Original and intriguing. —Craig H. Werner Chronicles, in a detailed and convincing manner, the evolution of black America literary responses to the consequences of the African Diaspora. —Modern Fiction Studies Thoroughly and thoughtfully written. . . . Seeks to address the basic tenants of Ethiopianism and how Black Americans across centuries have chosen to write Africa. —Politics and Culture Well-written, meticulously researched (containing a wealth of fascinating historical material), and powerfully argued. —South Atlantic Reviewhttps://uknowledge.uky.edu/upk_african_american_studies/1028/thumbnail.jp

Poe's Last Jest: The Magazine Prison-House, Colonial Exploitation, and Revenge in "Hop-Frog"

As I have done in connection with another tale about vengeance Edgar Allan Poe published two and a half years earlier, “The Cask of Amontillado,” in what follows I offer a generalized biographical interpretation of the 1849 story “Hop-Frog,” linking it to Poe’s February 1845 essay “Some Secrets of the Magazine Prison-House” and his September 1845 Marginalia piece about the sorry state of the American publishing industry. Contending that the tale must be read vis-à-vis not only enslavement and slave rebellion (that is, in a domestic context), as several critics have done, but also colonization (that is, in an international context), I cast doubt on claims that Poe used the tale to settle scores with personal enemies or revenge himself on the reading public. In making this argument, I heed Edward W. Said’s call for critics to “read the great canonical texts, and perhaps the entire archive of modern and pre-modern European and American culture, with an effort to draw out, extend, give emphasis and voice to what is silent or marginally present or ideologically represented.” In a brief coda, I argue that in “Hop-Frog” Poe avenges himself on those responsible for his own exploitation as “a poor devil author” and the colonization of American literature generally while counterbalancing the gruesome, fiery climax with a celebratory (and what proved to be a valedictory) compendium of many of his greatest hits through allusions to at least eleven of his writings published between 1835 and 1846

A rapid synthesis of the evidence on interventions supporting self-management for people with long-term conditions. (PRISMS Practical systematic RevIew of Self-Management Support for long-term conditions)

Background: Despite robust evidence concerning self-management for some long-term conditions (LTCs), others lack research explicitly on self-management and, consequently, some patient groups may be overlooked. Aim: To undertake a rapid, systematic overview of the evidence on self-management support for LTCs to inform health-care commissioners and providers about what works, for whom, and in what contexts. Methods: Self-management is ‘the tasks . . . individuals must undertake to live with one or more chronic conditions . . . [including] . . . having the confidence to deal with medical management, role management and emotional management of their conditions’. We convened an expert workshop and identified characteristics of LTCs potentially of relevance to self-management and 14 diverse exemplar LTCs (stroke, asthma, type 2 diabetes mellitus, depression, chronic obstructive pulmonary disease, chronic kidney disease, dementia, epilepsy, hypertension, inflammatory arthropathies, irritable bowel syndrome, low back pain, progressive neurological disorders and type 1 diabetes mellitus). For each LTC we conducted systematic overviews of systematic reviews of randomised controlled trials (RCTs) of self-management support interventions (‘quantitative meta-reviews’); and systematic overviews of systematic reviews of qualitative studies of patients’ experiences relating to self-management (‘qualitative meta-reviews’). We also conducted an original systematic review of implementation studies of self-management support in the LTCs. We synthesised all our data considering the different characteristics of LTCs. In parallel, we developed a taxonomy of the potential components of self-management support. Results: We included 30 qualitative systematic reviews (including 515 unique studies), 102 quantitative systematic reviews (including 969 RCTs), and 61 studies in the implementation systematic review. Effective self-management support interventions are multifaceted, should be tailored to the individual, their culture and beliefs, a specific LTC and position on the disease trajectory, and underpinned by a collaborative/communicative relationship between the patient and health-care professional (HCP) within the context of a health-care organisation that actively promotes self-management. Self-management support is a complex intervention and although many components were described and trialled in the studies no single component stood out as more important than any other. Core components include (1) provision of education about the LTC, recognising the importance of understanding patients’ pre-existing knowledge and beliefs about their LTC; (2) psychological strategies to support adjustment to life with a LTC; (3) strategies specifically to support adherence to treatments; (4) practical support tailored to the specific LTC, including support around activities of daily living for disabling conditions, action plans in conditions subject to marked exacerbations, intensive disease-specific training to enable self-management of specific clinical tasks; and (5) social support as appropriate. Implementation requires a whole-systems approach which intervenes at the level of the patient, the HCP and the organisation. The health-care organisation is responsible for providing the means (both training and time/material resources) to enable HCPs to implement, and patients to benefit from, self-management support, regularly evaluating self-management processes and clinical outcomes. More widely there is a societal need to address public understanding of LTCs. The lack of public story for many conditions impacted on patient help-seeking behaviour and public perceptions of need. Conclusions: Supporting self-management is inseparable from the high-quality care for LTCs. Commissioners and health-care providers should promote a culture of actively supporting self-management as a normal, expected, monitored and rewarded aspect of care. Further research is needed to understand how health service managers and staff can achieve this culture change in their health-care organisations. Study registration: This study is registered as PROSPERO CRD42012002898. Funding: The National Institute for Health Research Health Services and Delivery Research programme

The Crawdads Sing in Poe Country: Delia Owens's Bestseller and “The Gold-Bug”

Abstract Abstract In an August 9, 1846, letter, Poe explained his method for writing detection. The trick, he tells Philip Pendleton Cooke, is to work backward, first inventing a character that commits the crime (or otherwise sets the mystery in motion) and then creating a second character (i.e., the detective figure) that solves it. “Where is the ingenuity,” Poe writes, “in unraveling a web which you yourself (the author) have woven?” When asked which part of   Where the Crawdads Sing she liked best, Delia Owens said, “The ending. The idea for the ending came to me suddenly, so I started there. Then I jumped back to the beginning and braided the two storylines together toward the end. Weaving together all the pieces—the characters, the clues, the feathers, and the shells—was so much fun.” Here she not only evokes Poe's methodology but, through the words “braided” and “weaving,” his sewing imagery.</jats:p