To that end, Reading Black, Reading Feminist rep-
resents what Gates calls “an embracive politics
of inclusion” that characterizes the conversation
that black women writers have been engaged in
through their works (8). He asserts that the an-
thology is a useful tool not only for reading black
women’s writing, but for understanding any writ-
ing that requires readers to consider their own po-
sition in society.
Reading Black, Reading Feminist features such
theorists and writers as ZORA NEALE HURSTON,
Mary Helen Washington, Michele Wallace, Hazel
Carby, HOUSTON BAKER, JR., and JAMAICA KINCAID.
It is divided into three subheadings: “Construct-
ing a Tradition,” “Reading Black, Reading Femi-
nist,” and “Interviews.” “Constructing a Tradition”
presents various essays that attempt to establish
the tenets of black feminist theory. Although there
is no one set theory, each essay presupposes the
existence of a black woman’s literary tradition and
thus explicit ways to approach works from that
tradition. For example, in “Speaking in Tongues:
Dialogics, Dialectics, and the Black Woman Writ-
er’s Literary Tradition,” Mae Gwendolyn Hender-
son proposes that black feminist criticism should
be a “model that seeks to account for racial differ-
ence within gender identity and gender difference
within racial identity” (117). Theory is put into
practice in the section “Reading Black, Reading
Feminist,” where critics offer black feminist read-
ings of such works as ALICE WALKER’s The COLOR
PURPLE, HARRIET JACOBS’s INCIDENTS IN THE LIFE OF
A SL AV E GIRL, and GLORIA NAY LO R’s The WOMEN
OF BREWSTER PLACE. Most of the essays feature
an author’s take on how to read the writings of
black women; however, some essays, like Nellie Y.
McKay’s “The Souls of Black Women Folk in the
Writings of W. E. B. DuBois,” delve into the larger
implications of black feminist theory for African-
American literature in general, whether by black
women or by black men. The anthology concludes
with two interviews, one with RI TA DOVE and the
other with Jamaica Kincaid. In these conversa-
tions, the authors discuss their art as well as the
traditions that may have influenced their artistic
visions. Reading Black, Reading Feminist contin-
ued the trend toward black female literary theory
started in the late 1970s in response to the prolif-
eration of published works by African-American
women writers.BIBLIOGRAPHY
Wall, Cheryl, ed. Changing Our Words: Essays on Crit-
icism, Theory, and Writing by Black Women. New
Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1989.
Stephanie Powell HankersonRedding, Jay Saunders (1906–1988)
Literary critic, social historian, educator, and au-
thor Jay Saunders Redding was, like W. E. B. DU-
BOIS, one of the leading African-American pioneers
of the study of race relations in America. Redding
was born in 1906 in Wilmington, Delaware, to
Lewis Alfred and Mary Ann Holmes Redding, both
graduates of Howard University. He grew up in a
predominantly white middle-class neighborhood
and was home-schooled through the third grade
by his parents, who introduced him to the works
of poet PAU L LAURENCE DUNBAR. Redding spent his
formative years at Howard High School, where he
excelled in journalism, debate, basketball, drama,
and speech. Redding’s English teacher at Howard
High School was ALICE DUNBAR-NELSON, Dunbar’s
former wife and a family friend.
Redding, who began his college career at Lin-
coln University in Pennsylvania from 1923 to 1924,
received a B.A. in English from Brown University
in 1928 and an M.A. in 1932. He also attended Co-
lumbia University from 1933 to 1934. Choosing a
career in education, Redding taught at Morehouse
College (1928–31) and Louisville Municipal Col-
lege (1934–36), and served as chair of the En-
glish department at Southern University in Baton
Rouge (1936–38) and Elizabeth City State Teach-
ers College (1938–43). He was the first Johnson
Professor of English literature and creative writ-
ing at Hampton Institute, 1943 to 1966. Toward
the end of his teaching career, he taught at Cornell
University, where he was Ernest I. White Professor
of American Studies and Humane Letters, 1970 toRedding, Jay Saunders 429