Presents an examination of the work of Zora Neale Hurston, and describes how Hurston's ethnographies, plays, and fiction paint a picture of the rural African-American South.
Traces the influences of traditional oral forms such as folktales, riddles, idiom, jazz rhythms, spirituals, and blues on the development of African American literature.
Studies the nature of folktales, their place in contemporary North American culture, and the characteristics that make them appealing to adolescent readers, and profiles nine popular folktales.
