Abstract
The answer is yes to all, and they deliver on their promises with the impressive sweep of the book's twenty-four loosely chronological chapters, which include discussions of an array of genres and authors from canonical poets like Walt Whitman, to ephemeral African American oral performances, to twentieth-century labor songs, to theatre and film. The authors also acknowledge that many works in the tradition were produced by those who were either brought to North America against their will or compelled by violence or economic suffering to emigrate. [...]these texts often contrast with the last half century's recovery of women's writing and writing by authors of color which has tended to focus more on the affirming and celebratory facets of identity-based literature. The inter-related narratives of white and black working-class communities and cultures are explored in a later chapter, by Bill V. Mullen, on twentieth-century African American writing, and in the book's final chapter, by Sara Appel, on class and intersectional analysis.