ABSTRACT
With every decade since the 1970s, the number of critical works engaging with Zora Neale Hurston's "Characteristics of Negro Expression" has grown significantly. Its progressive inclusion in anthologies of African American criticism, reflect the essay's importance. The criticism almost directly mirrors Hurston's claim that white artists such as jazz composer George Gershwin and dancer Ann Pennington "have all the elements", but that those elements are "displaced or distorted". Perhaps most problematic has been Hurston's implicit claim that authentic African American expression is found only in folk and vernacular culture. Many artists have since argued that that this creates an inescapable bind. Read Kenneth Warren's account, Hurston's work would be important only for making a political argument against the alleged inferiority of African Americans. Though more commonly read from a historical perspective, the essay might surprise new readers, given how its ideas anticipate many contemporary debates about authentic African American art.
