Explorations in Sights and Sounds
Orginal Publication Date
1984
Journal Title
Explorations in Sights and Sounds
Volume
4
Issue
ess/vol4/iss1
First Page
69
Last Page
70
Abstract
Because of the present concentrated push to reshape our view of American literature, the battle to include more ethnic and female writers in the traditional stream of our literature is clearly being won, and the salad bowl is replacing the melting pot as a central metaphor in our writing. Correctly, editors DePietro and Ifkovic in this sourcebook emphasize that now various European ethnic groups have been sparked to cultural pluralism by the raising of our consciousness during the past two decades to the riches in black, brown, and red literatures. Further, they indicate that several bibliographies of ethnic writings now exist, a half-dozen decent anthologies of ethnic writing have been made available, and MELUS (Multi-ethnic Literature of the United States) is a solid, sustained entity in the Modern Language Association. The editors could also have added that the MLA has been pushing these frontiers by publishing other pragmatic works such as Studies in American Indian Literature: Critical Essays and Course Designs; Three American Literatures: Essays in Chicano, Native-American and Asian-American Literature; Minority Language and Literature: Retrospective and Perspective; and Afro· American Literature: The Reconstruction of Instruction. This accelerating concern has led many universities and colleges to include courses in these hitherto underrated ethnic literatures.
Rights
Copyright, ©EES, The National Association for Ethnic Studies, 1984