SELF-REFLEXIVITY AND HISTORICAL REVISIONISM
IN ISHMAEL REED'S NEO-HOODOO AESTHETICS
Santiago Juan-Navarro
Florida International Uniuersity
Abstract
Throughout his literary career, African American novelist Ishmael
Reed has shown constant concern for historical issues and for their
expression through reflexive narratives. This blend of the historical and
the aesthetic is one of the many amalgamations that are achieved in
his texts. In terms of both form and ideology his work is characterized
by syncretism. In form, all novels he has published to date overstep
the boundaries among genres, as well as the gulf between academic
and popular culture; in ideology, Reed supports multiculturalism as
an expression of the plurality that constitutes US society. This essay
explores how Reed's novels seek to produce a narrative hybrid that
blends fiction and reality, satire and mysticism, the mass media and
the African and Western literary traditions.
Key words: self-reflexivity, metafiction, history, revisionism, NeoHooDoo, aesthetics, satire
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