Ann Petry’s The Street: an exposition of discursive practices of capitalism, racism, and chauvinism

Abstract

ABSTRACT African-American women’s fiction is so tantalizing that it has haunted the memories of readers ever since its inception. The earlier writers of this variety of fiction have been often labeled as sheer protest writers by some critics, but there are efforts made by researchers consistently to resuscitate the hitherto less known authors from the appropriation of partial canon makers and critics and to show that they are matchless in terms of their literary dexterity and originality. This paper will try to succinctly scrutinize one such writer Ann Petry’s debut novel The Street (1946), which interrogates and unmasks the discursive practices of ‘capitalism’ that pervade America and breed racism, chauvinism, and false class consciousness, and hamper the growth of blacks in general and women in particular. Further, the paper will also try to explore how Petry through the metaphor of the street of Harlem exposes the ubiquitous forces of ‘capitalism’ that produce white supremacism and racialized patriarchy.