ABSTRACT
This project will use a historically situated approach to locate each of the three focal novels in their historical and cultural epoch. While the methodology may seem similar to new historicism, it really owes more to contemporary directions of Black literary criticism, which will be discussed in detail in chapter three. Close readings of the texts, framed by Asante’s three fundamental themes of transcendent discourse, will be used to determine their levels and modes of Afrikan expression. In this context, Afrikan explicitly references distilled examples of cultural imperatives arising on the continent of Africa, especially those behaviors or beliefs that transcend and/or cannot be identified exclusively with local cultural groupings. A comparative perspective will also be employed as the paradigmatic themes will be analyzed in relationship to each other.
