Neither black nor white : a new approach to the modern racial plight in Jean Toomer’s Cane

Abstract EN

Prior to the publication of Cane, the light-skinned African American author Jean Toomer (1894-1967) seemed to declare his black blood.

However, with his travel to Georgia to find solace with the black-skinned race and serve as a school principal he starts distancing himself and his works from the African-American label.

Thus, Toomer‟s journey to the south formed the bases of his creativity, set him in the mid of his racial confusion and motivated him to create a new race in America, demonstrated in Cane.

Toomer‟s reaction to the horrified state of the blacks in the south is revealed through his rejection of being labeled a Negro.

Though this rejection has been interpreted as a disapproval of the black race and black culture, an accurate examination of Cane would reveal that rather than denying black race Toomer was disaffirming race altogether.

More importantly, Toomer worked for swaying away the restrictions posed on the issue of racial discrimination through claiming a universal existence of man, regardless to his color or the group he belongs to.

Hence, he established the notion of a “new race in America”, formed through the combination of various races, and he regarded himself as the epitome of this new race.

This study sheds some lights on various techniques Toomer employs for rejecting racial categorization in Cane.

Cane is Toomer‟s most influential criticism of American racial stereotypes.

It rejects the peculiar stereotypical description of African Americans, through the depiction of a number of characters entrapped by racial boundaries, and struggle to overcome racial segregation.

These characters who are embodiments of the author‟s beliefs are representatives of individuals of Toomer‟s new American race.

Thereby, Toomer‟s technique of defending the blacks is unique and different from his African-American contemporaries due to his daring and unusual treatment of the issue of race.

For the sake of illustrating Toomer‟s peculiar notion of race, several prose vignettes and poems from Cane are depicted for analysis.