African American Review is soliciting essays for a special
issue on the Post-Soul aesthetic to be published in 2007.
Greg Tate calls the Post-Soul "the African American
equivalent of postmodernism," and a working definition of
the Post-Soul aesthetic could include, but not be limited
to, this quotation from Thelma Golden, curator of the Studio
Museum in Harlem (who prefers the term "post-black"):
"For me, to approach a conversation about 'black art'
ultimately meant embracing and rejecting the notion of such
a thing at the very same time. . . . [The Post-Soul] was
characterized by artists who were adamant about not being
labeled as 'black' artists, though their work was
steeped, in fact deeply interested, in redefining complex
notions of blackness."
     Recognized nearly 20 years ago primarily by Trey Ellis
("The New Black Aesthetic," 1989), Greg Tate ("Cult
Nats Meet Freaky-Deke," 1986) and Nelson George (Buppies,
B-Boys, Baps and BoHos: Notes on Post-Soul Black Culture,
1992), the Post-Soul aesthetic could be used to describe the
work of Paul Beatty, Jean-Michel Basquiat, Danzy Senna,
Mos-Def, Dave Chappelle, Me'Shell Ndege-Ocello, Colson
Whitehead, Aaron McGruder, Ellen Gallagher, The Roots, Spike
Lee, Saul Williams, Kara Walker, Living Colour, and Darius
James, to name only a few.
     In addition to these artists and provocateurs,
prospective article topics include theorizing the Post-Soul
as critical praxis; postmodernism and the Post-Soul
aesthetic; observations, commentary, and critiques of the
Post-Soul aesthetic and/or scholarship on the Post-Soul;
critical readings of Post-Soul novelists, artists,
filmmakers, musicians, et al.; critical readings of
individual Post-Soul novels, art, film, music, etc.; gender
and the post-soul aesthetic; social class and the Post-Soul
aesthetic; hip-hop and the Post-Soul aesthetic;
essentialized blackness and the Post-Soul aesthetic; naming
the Post-Soul aesthetic—identifications and identity
crises; mass marketing and/or mass communication and the
Post-Soul aesthetic; the Post-Soul aesthetic and the African
American vernacular traditions; satire and the Post-Soul
aesthetic; the Black Arts Movement and the Post-Soul
aesthetic; Ralph Ellison and/or Albert Murray and the
Post-Soul aesthetic; the "cultural mulatto" archetype in
Post-Soul texts; redefining blackness in Post-Soul texts;
signifyin(g) and the Post-Soul aesthetic; politics and the
Post-Soul aesthetic; Double consciousness and the Post-Soul
aesthetic; the Post-Soul in the college classroom; Pre-Soul
and Post-Soul; and Post-Sex(ualities) and the Post-Soul.
     Completed papers are due 31 December 2005. Send
queries, proposals, or papers to:
     Bertram D. Ashe, Associate Professor of English and
American Studies
     University of Richmond
     28 Westhampton Way
     Richmond, VA 23173
     bashe_at_richmond.edu

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Received on Mon Jun 06 2005 - 16:31:28 EDT