Negotiating Difference ─ Race, Gender, and the Politics of Positionality

Encamped within the limits of experience and authenticity, critics today stake out their positions according to race and ethnicity, sexuality and gender, and vigilantly guard against any incursions into their privileged territory. In this book, Michael Awkward raids the borders of contemporary criticism to show how debilitating such protectionist stances can be and how much might be gained by crossing our cultural boundaries.
From Spike Lee's She's Gotta Have It to Michael Jackson's physical transmutations, from Toni Morrison's Song of Solomon to August Wilson's Fences, from male scholars' investments in feminism to white scholars' in black texts - Awkward explores cultural moments that challenge the exclusive critical authority of race and gender. In each instance he confronts the question: What do artists, scholars, and others concerned with representations of African American life make of the view that gender, race, and sexuality circumscribe their own and others' lives and narratives? Throughout he demonstrates the perils and merits of the sort of boundary crossing this book ultimately makes: a black male feminism.

Michael Awkward is associate professor of English and director of the Center for Afroamerican and African Studies at the University of Michigan.