Talk by Victor Goldgel (University of Wisconsin-Madison)
Talk by Victor Goldgel (University of Wisconsin-Madison)
Juan Francisco Manzano, Cuba’s most famous enslaved writer, explicitly disidentified from blackness, prompting many critics to discuss his racialization. As new generations returned to his texts, the palimpsest of conflicting ideas about his blackness or lack thereof kept growing. This talk examines some of these layers through a two-pronged approach. First, by focusing on the paradox of enslaved authorship – of a writer who built his authority on the basis of his deauthorization. Secondly, by considering Manzano's poems as literary forms of back talk and intellectual marronage
Juan Francisco Manzano, Cuba’s most famous enslaved writer, explicitly disidentified from blackness, prompting many critics to discuss his racialization. As new generations returned to his texts, the palimpsest of conflicting ideas about his blackness or lack thereof kept growing. This talk examines some of these layers through a two-pronged approach. First, by focusing on the paradox of enslaved authorship – of a writer who built his authority on the basis of his deauthorization. Secondly, by considering Manzano's poems as literary forms of back talk and intellectual marronage