Pauline Hopkins and the Occult: African-American Revisions of Nineteenth-Century Sciences

Abstract

Pauline Hopkins's by-now almost canonical magazine novel of 1902-3 Of One Blood: Or, The Hidden Self combines science of occult-which opening pages describe as theories of supernatural phenomena or mysticism associated with great field of new discoveries in psychology-with another occult science, that of archaeology, and specifically Egyptology, to reveal in both fields overt and implicit racializing that shaped so many late nineteenth-century EuroAmerican discourses (442). These two sciences are both based on notions of excavation, mysticism, and occulted wisdom, and both contribute significantly to scholarly and popular discourse on mind and race. The novel thereby identifies and engages a striking range of positions and debates, interand intraracial, within nineteenth century's ubiquitous race question (584): political issues of black leadership, black nationalism, PanAfricanism, African-origins-of-western-civilization thesis and latter's implications for theories of identity and race purity. Of One Blood was serialized in Colored American Magazine during 1902-3. This monthly magazine, as an editorial statement-possibly written by Hopkins herself-announced, was devoted to development of Afro-American art and literature and to publishing writing that would develop the bonds of racial brotherhood not only through fiction and poetry but also in the arena of historical, social, and economic literature (Editorial 60). Hopkins's own writing for journal thus included, in addition to four novels and several short stories, two long-running biographical series (Famous Men of Negro Race and Famous Women of Negro Race) and numerous