Twentieth-century America has witnessed the most widespread and sustained movement of African-Americans from the South to urban centers in the North. Who Set You Flowin'? examines the impact of this dislocation and urbanization, identifying the resulting Migration Narratives as a major genre in African-American cultural production. Griffin takes an interdisciplinary approach with readings of several literary texts, migrant correspondence, painting, photography, rap music, blues, and rhythm and blues. From these various sources Griffin isolates the tropes of Ancestor, Stranger, and Safe Space, which, though common to all Migration Narratives, vary in their portrayal. She argues that the emergence of a dominant portrayal of these tropes is the product of the historical and political moment, often challenged by alternative portrayals in other texts or artistic forms, as well as intra-textually. Richard Wright's bleak, yet cosmopolitan portraits were countered by Dorothy West's
longing for Black Southern communities. Ralph Ellison, while continuing Wright's vision, reexamined the significance of Black Southern culture. Griffin concludes with Toni Morrison embracing the South "as a site of African-American history and culture," "a place to be redeemed."
Industry Reviews
"[This book]...will will attract a wide readership inside and outside the Academy."--Booklist
"Moving brilliantly across a vast range of textual spaces and political geographies...[this book] is in every way an exemplary work of U.S. cultural studies."--Eric Lott, University of Virginia
"A bold and brilliant book...that breathes new life into such old pardigms as `the Great Migration,' `the rural folk,' and `the urban masses.' Informative, fascinating, and finely crafted. A pleasure to read."--Ann duCille, Wesleyan University
"Farah Griffin is a new kind of intellectual of the younger generation. She goes beyond the fashionable mantra of Race, Gender, and Class by concretely situating black people constructing themselves as a heterogeneous community on the move geographically, culturally, politically, and existentially."--Cornel West, Harvard University
"[An] important book....An extremely impressive book by a young scholar of immense promise."--Choice
"Because Griffin utilizes diverse cultural works, from Billie Holiday, Richard Wright, Jean Toomer, Jacob Lawrence, Toni Morrison, and others, as extended examples and for illustrations, she lends to her 'migration narrative' discourse a familiarity that the general reader can identify with, and that orientation will attract a wide readership inside and outside the Academy."--Booklist
"In this new and suggestive study, Griffin places many different forms of expression into a relationship with each other: literary texts from Paul Laurence Dunbar, Jean Toomer, and Richard Wright to Dorothy West, LeRoi Jones, and Toni Morrison, visual arts from Jacob Lawrence's paintings to FSA photographs, music from Billie Holiday to Stevie Wonder, and varied documentary evidence are considered part of a larger 'migration narrative' that swept an urbanizing
black America in the twentieth century. Inspired by Georg Simmel's famous essay 'The Stranger,' this book attempts to reconstruct the inwardness of the tension between belonging and alienation, between
ancestry and migration, experienced by a people in motion."--Werner Sollors, Harvard University
"Moving brilliantly across a vast range of textual spaces and political geographies, Farah Griffin flows with the fierce independence and passionate commitment of the migrants whose paths she charts. 'Who Set You Flowin'?' is in every way an exemplary work of US cultural studies."--Eric Lott, University of Virginia
"Farah Jasmine Griffin has written a bold and brilliant book, destined to assume a prominent place in the realms of American and African-American literary, cultural, and historical studies. In its carefully contextualized, finely nuanced readings of texts as varied as the paintings of Jacob Lawrence, the poetry of Jean Toomer and Gwendolyn Brooks, the prose of Richard Wright and Toni Morrison, the blues of Billie Holiday and Bessie Smith, and the rap lyrics of
Grand Master Flash and Arrested Development, 'Who Set You Flowin'?' is a model of interdisciplinary scholarship that breathes new life into such old paradigms as `the Great Migration,' `the rural
folk,' and `the urban masses.' Informative, fascinating, and finely crafted. A pleasure to read."--Ann duCille, Wesleyan University
"Farah Jasmine Griffin looks at modern black migration from an interdisciplinary literary and cultural perspective, giving lavish critical attention to its creative artifacts, the photography, music, and literature that it inspired.... Griffin has written an ambitious study marked by a rare enough contribution of intellectual creativity and rigor. `Who Set You Flowin'? is excellent."--Journal of Blacks in Higher Education
"'Who Set You Flowin'?' ... is delicious brain food without the wordy rhetoric.... Thanks to Griffin's writing and analytical skills, 'Who Set You Flowin'?' breaks new ground."--Vibe Magazine
"A glittering photo-collage.... A fruitful inquiry."--Multicultural Review
"Along with the book's interdisciplinary focus, 'Who Set You Flowin'?' is particularly valuable for its new insights into well-known literary works.... A finely crafted volume that will undoubtedly be used as a reference work by future scholars. Griffin's generous bibliography and fresh readings of major literary works make the book a valuable addition to the library of anyone concerned with twentieth-century American literature."--American
Literature
"[The book] is carefully researched, informed by a breadth of critical and theoretical references, and measured in its conclusions.... 'Who Set You Flowin'?' is a valuable addition to the new scholarship by black women who refuse to by circumscribed by disciplinary boundaries."--Signs
"[Griffin's] is an enormous, ambitious, and necessary project."--Modern Fiction Studies
