Healing narratives
Subtitle: women writers curing cultural dis-ease
By: Gay Wilentz.
Publisher: Rutgers University Press
Published: 2000
Place of publication: New Brunswick, N.J
Language: eng
Number of pages: 205
Subjects: Brodber, Erna; Sinclair, Jo., 1913-; Silko, Leslie, 1948-; Bambara, Toni Cade; Hulme, Keri; American fiction -- Women authors -- History and criticism; Literature and mental illness -- United States -- History -- 20th century; Women and literature -- United States -- History -- 20th century; American fiction -- 20th century -- History and criticism; Mentally ill in literature; Ethnicity in literature; Healing in literature; Narration (Rhetoric)
Description: "In Healing Narratives, Gay Wilentz explores the relationship between culture and health. In close reading of works by five women writers - Toni Cade Bambara, Erna Broder, Leslie Marmon Silko, Keri Hulme, and Jo Sinclair - she traces the narrative and structural similarities of a main character moving form a state of mental or physical disease toward wellness through reconnection with her cultural traditions. Whether due to the history of diaspora, colonial oppression, or the subversion of traditional culture by modernity, illness can only be overcome when the cultural construction of disease is recognized and a link to the indigenous [Aboriginal or Native peoples] is restored. Wilentz's cross-cultural approach - African American, Jamaican, Native American, Maori, and Jewish stories-offers a rich context from which the basis of cultural illness can be examined."--Publisher.
Notes: Includes bibliographical references (p. 185-196) and index.