By using the term “folk,” Ralph Ellison is emphasizing the struggle for blacks in Harlem with their identity. On one hand, blacks wanted to cling to their old folk personality, simply because it was what they knew. The folk personality is all about how they talked, acted, ate, sang, and essentially everything that went into the way they lived their lives in the South. However, as they settled into Harlem, their lives drastically changed. They were expected to ditch their past selves and become the “New Negro,” a creative, sophisticated intellectual. This is the reason that Harlem is nowhere. The challenge to transform into a completely new person in practically the blink of an eye was too much for many of the blacks in Harlem. They were in a constant identity struggle, wanting to keep their roots in folklore, and becoming the innovative city-dwellers they were expected to be.
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Yams
African American cuisine can also be considered a form of artistic expression along with their music. This embodiment of art has a “superior democracy in which each individual cultivated his uniqueness and yet did not class with his neighbors”(Ellison 246). There are many paths that lead to art and food can be interpreted as one of them. If they do not choose a path then “the individual feels that his world and his personality are out of key”(Ellison 246). They become “a ‘displaced person’ of American Democracy” (Ellison 246). They are not “confused of mind… seek[ing] reality” because they have found their direction (Ellison 247). They have found art. Whether it is in music, murals, or food, they have found their true calling that will pull them out of the dark and into the light.
African American cuisine can also be considered a form of artistic expression along with their music. This embodiment of art has a “superior democracy in which each individual cultivated his uniqueness and yet did not class with his neighbors”(Ellison 246). There are many paths that lead to art and food can be interpreted as one of them. If they do not choose a path then “the individual feels that his world and his personality are out of key”(Ellison 246). They become “a ‘displaced person’ of American Democracy” (Ellison 246). They are not “confused of mind… seek[ing] reality” because they have found their direction (Ellison 247). They have found art. Whether it is in music, murals, or food, they have found their true calling that will pull them out of the dark and into the light.
"For if Harlem is the scene of the folk-Negro’s death agony, it is also the setting of his transcendence” (Ellison 243).