The Criticism of African and African American Novels: Between Contextualized and Contested Readings

Abstract

This paper examines how theoretical and ideological frameworks shape the interpretation of African and African American novels within a context marked by tensions among competing critical approaches. The central problem lies in the limitations of unilateral readings, whether Eurocentric or Afrocentric, formalist or contextualized, in the production of meaning and the reception of literary works. To address this issue, the study adopts a methodology based on a critical review of major literary theories, drawing on insights from sociocriticism, semiotics, narratology, and postcolonial theory. This approach enables an analysis of both textual structures and the historical, cultural, and ideological determinants that inform interpretation. The analysis highlights the decisive role of the reader in interpretive divergences and clearly distinguishes reception from understanding as two complementary levels of literary analysis. It further demonstrates that exclusive critical approaches tend to produce partial readings, whereas an interdisciplinary perspective provides a more comprehensive account of issues related to power, identity, and representation. The study ultimately argues that an integrated and contextualized approach is essential for capturing the complexity of African and African American novels and for producing more rigorous and well-grounded interpretations.