Alice Walker

Yvonne Johnson (Central Missouri State University)

Ed. by Emory Elliott, University of California, Riverside
The Literary Encyclopedia. Volume 3.2.5: African American Writing and Culture of the United States.
Vol. editors: Sofia Ahlberg (Uppsala University), Philathia Bolton (University of Akron), Patrick Chura (University of Akron), J. Michael Duvall (College of Charleston), Emory Elliott (University of California, Riverside), A Yemisi Jimoh (University of Massachusetts Amherst), Stephen E. Meats (Pittsburg State University), Tony Papanikolas (San Jose State University)

Dates

Born 9 Feb 1944
Activity 1964-ongoing

Places

Born in United States
Active in United States

Cultural Identities

Activities

Primary

Novelist
Poet
Story-writer

Other

Anthologist
Biographer
Cultural Theorist/ Critic
Editor
Political writer
Revolutionary, Activist
Teacher/ Professor

Resources

Walker's Works

Save to Bookshelf

Alice Walker, winner of both the Pulitzer Prize and the American Book Award for

The Color Purple,

has dedicated her life to establishing a literary cannon of African American writers and to encouraging the “survival whole” of all women. She has won recognition for literary “foremothers” such as Zora Neale Hurston and Frances Ellen Watkins Harper, and has placed their contributions within the fabric of her own artistry. She has drawn on a childhood trauma in order to identify with African women who have been genitally mutilated, a theme that dominates her novel

Possessing the Secret of Joy

, and her non-fiction book

Warrior Marks.

Her recent autobiographical writing includes the pervasive themes of the history and preservation of African American culture, the importance of a…

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2134 words

Citation: Johnson, Yvonne. "Alice Walker". The Literary Encyclopedia. First published 29 February 2004 [https://www.litencyc.com/php/speople.php?rec=true&UID=4945, accessed 21 November 2024.]

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