Through 'the spy-glass of anthropology': Reconsidering Zora Neale Hurston's anthropology for literary criticism and pedagogy

Zora Neale Hurston's training and practice in the field of anthropology has been overlooked, undervalued and misunderstood by literary critics interested in her work. The goal of this dissertation is to remedy misunderstandings such as these by tracing the story of Hurston's work in anthropology and by offering an informed perspective on Hurston's training and practice in the discipline. In particular, I address several areas in which literary critics have undervalued the influence of Hurston's anthropology, most notably, how Hurston's anthropological critique of the concept of race informs her writing; how the significance that anthropologists assign to using the subject's original language influences Hurston's literary use of dialect; how the choices Hurston makes in her anthropological practice create the celebratory nature of her work; and the way Hurston's anthropology positions her to challenge how the mulatto character is written in Harlem Renaissance fiction. Additionally, by treating Hurston as an anthropologist, I attempt to legitimize her for that discipline, and in the process, to generate an interest in Hurston among anthropologists as a important black, female practitioner in anthropology's history. This project culminates in a chapter that considers the importance of my revisionary reading for pedagogy, namely that Hurston's writing offers a pedagogical model that meets the needs of the contemporary, diverse student body in the college classroom.