“In the Making”: Proclaiming Black Strength in the Midst of Tragedy

Houston Baker distinguishes between the “mastery of form” and the “deformation of mastery” in black matter (literature, poetry, art, etc.) by applying the biological concept of allaesthetic characteristics to modern black expression. Baker connects the mastery of form with “cryptic” allaesthetic masks, positing that mastering any tradition involves learning a series of codes to conceal…