A binding of community: Storytelling and identity construction in Black Canadian literature

In this study, I examine the extent to which the Black Canadian community and its literature has a unified identity, focussing on literature of the Harlem Renaissance (1919-29) as a historical example, and Black Canadian literature, with particular emphasis on West Indian-Canadian writing (from 1960-present). I argue that storytelling emerges as the means by which the Black Canadian literary community will be bound together. I begin by examining in Chapter 1 the various theoretical models of identity formation, critiquing their relevance to the study of Black Canadian literature. The most applicable model for the amorphous Black Canadian identity is that of process through storytelling. In Chapter 2, I contend that historically, identity was constructed racially, the Harlem Renaissance being an example. I show in this chapter also that sometimes individuals will vacillate between racial and ethnic constructions to differentiate themselves intraracially. In Chapter 3, I argue that in Canada, ethnicity has always been the strongest indicator of identity, rather than the form of racial identification displayed during the Harlem Renaissance. This also suggests that in times where there is reduced racial strife, people are free to create identities on factors other than race, and class may emerge as a subset of the ethnic-based identity. In Chapter 4, through an examination of the effects of gender on identity construction, I illustrate that identity can be fluid, varied, and at times contradictory. Chapter 5 examines how language affects identity construction and demonstrates that language is not a sufficient basis on which to base one's identity. I conclude the dissertation with the argument that storytelling is the agency by which the Black Canadian identity will coalesce. The telling of their stories provides ground for the creation of a language specific to the Canadian context (despite the various derivations of blacks in Canada), displays a sense of belonging that is not necessarily specific to the geographic boundaries of nations, and allows for a fluid, multiple notion of identity construction.