From the Shadows: Houston Baker's Move toward a Postnationalist Appraisal of the Black Aesthetic

Abstract

SHE PERIOD SPANNING 1976 to 1988 represents Houston Baker's use of cultural anthropology to examine historical and linguistic variables responsible for what he terms sui generis nature of black literature. Drafted primarily in On Criticism of Black American Literature: One View of Black Aesthetic (1976), A Note on Style and Anthropology of Art (1980), and The Journey Back (1980),9 Baker's postnationalistic thought embodies what he believes to be a less politicized approach for studying and analyzing black aesthetic. In effect, to examine his work from 1976 to 1988 is to take measure of one-labeled the doyen of Afro-American literary critics4-striving to move beyond black nationalist aesthetic standards by employing theoretical alternatives promising advanced analyses of black artistic culture. But as I will argue in this paper, Baker remains unfair in his analysis of nationalist spokespersons Amiri Baraka and Addison Gayle by presenting them in an uneven light, a light which enshadows Baker's own derivation from and postnationalistic dependence on ideas both represent. In 1976 Baker began a frontal attack against Black Arts Movement in On Criticism of Black American Literature: One View of