At the close of the twentieth century, democracy appeared to have overcome the Cold War partition of the world, as countries across the globe had deposed autocratic regimes and held free elections. Nowhere were these developments dramatized more brightly than in Eastern Europe in 1989, as newly formed civic movements replaced long-standing Leninist regimes with democratic governments. Yet it is clear that the -waves- of democracy that initially seemed similar have led to widely varying outcomes. While some countries in Eastern Europe were invited to join NATO and the European Union, others...

John Glenn's innovative criticism champions the connection between African and African American literature, unfolding a new theory that elaborates on the black experience itself. Linking resistance to the literary history and to the expressiveness of blacks, Glenn provides the basis for a study of African and African American fiction at the social level. He shows how empiricism and action are both central to African and African American methods of social adaptation or acting out. Investigating performance in black literature by exploring the social resistance and adaptation of fictional...