Swaying in the Heat of Island : From Ambivalence to Dynamism in Caribbean Literature

抄録

Without adequate preparation, the Negro of the Western world lives, in one life, many lifetimes. Most whites' lives are couched in norms more or less traditional: born of stable family groups, a white boy emerges from adolescence, enters high school, finishes college, studies a profession, marries, builds a home, raises children, etc. The Negro, though born in the Western world, is not quite of it; due to policies of racial exclusion, his is the story of two cultures: the dying culture in which he happens to be born, and the culture into which he is trying to enter- a culture which has, for him not quite yet come into being; and it is up the shaky ladder of all the intervening stages between these two cultures that Negro life must climb. (Italics by author)