A Study Of The Selected Novels Of Ralph Ellison

African American Literature is a record of the American Negroes displacement, alienation, pain and survival. It is a historical saga of a race's struggle for freedom and equality and their undeterred quest for a real identity. It begins with their forcible transportation from their native land of Africa to America, their incarceration as slaves in the American colonies, their emancipation from slavery, their travails and tribulations due to social segregation, political and economical deprivation and their untiring fight to be accepted as an integral component of the American mainstream society. It is a literature that records the physical, intellectual, emotional, spiritual and psychological expression of a people going through the process of conception, growth and maturity from a racially confined state to a self-contained state.