Vol. 42 No. 3 (1994)
Research Article

Reading the “Deep Talk” of Literary Names and Naming

Published 1994-09-01

Abstract

Abstract

Literary texts contain poetic names whose “deep talk,” or connotative value, is hidden beneath the primary level of the text. Within this level of discourse production, names have the ability to subvert, invert, and create meanings and actions that open a text to radical interpretive possibilities. To read through names and naming is to seek out the manipulative play of poetic names so that their function as strategies of discourse production is revealed and understood.

References

  1. Curtis, David Ames and Henry Louis Gates, Jr. “Establishing the Identity of the Author of Our Nig.” Joanne M. Braxton and Andrée McLoughlin, eds., Wild Women in the Whirlwind. Rutgers UP, 1990, 48–69.
  2. Dowling, Colette. “The Song of Toni Morrison,” The New York Times. Times Magazine, May 20, 1979. 41.
  3. Ellison, Ralph. Invisible Man. New York: Vintage-Random House, 1952.
  4. Frege, Gottlob. “On Sense and Nominatum.” Eds. Feigl and Sellars Readings in Philosophical Analysis. New York: Appleton Century Crofts, 1949. 86–102.
  5. Gaines, Ernest. A Gathering of Old Men. New York: Vintage, 1984.
  6. Gardiner, Sir Allan. The Theory of Proper Names. 2nd ed. London: Oxford UP, 1954.
  7. Goldstein, William. “A Talk With Gloria Naylor.” Publisher’s Weekly 9 Sept 1983: 35+.
  8. Habermas, Jürgen. “Technical Progress and the Social Life-World.” Toward a Rational Society: Student ProtestiScience and Politics. Trans. Jeremy J. Shapiro. Boston: Beacon Press, 1970. 50-61.
  9. Kripke, Saul A. Naming and Necessity. Cambridge: Harvard UP, 1980.
  10. Kristeva, Julia. “The True-Real.” Ed. Toril Moi. The Kristeva Reader. New York: Columbia UP, 1986. 214–37.
  11. Lacan, Jacques. Ecrits/A Selection. Trans. Alan Sheridan. New York: Norton, 1977.
  12. Morrison, Toni. Song of Solomon. New York: Knopf, 1977.
  13. Naylor, Gloria. The Women of Brewster Place. 1982. New York: Penguin Books, 1983.
  14. Russell, Bertrand. Logic and Knowledge. Great Britain: Offset,1956.
  15. Williams, Sherley Anne. Dessa Rose. New York: William Morrow, 1986.
  16. Wilson, Harriet E. Adams. Our Nig: or, Sketches From The Life of a Free Black in a Two-Story White HouseiNorth. Showing That Slavery’s Shadows Fall Even There. By “Our Nig.” 1859. Henry Louis Gates, ed. New York: Random, 1983.