Partial e-mail content: I’m enjoying your blog, but could you please explain the term signifyin’ again. I’m not sure I understand what you mean, and I feel as if I’m missing out on something when I read your pieces….
(My correspondent really wanted to ask me just the way I titled this blog, but she was trying to be nice.)
So what does the term signifyin’ mean? I believe it’s easier to demonstrate what it means, rather than attempt a definition. I do attempt to define it in my “about” section, but maybe Henry Louis Gates, Jr. can help further. After all, I am borrowing the term from Black America.
One example of signifyin’ I’ve provided so far is in my analysis of what Ruel Johnson does with the poeticized month of April. He indirectly calls on Eliot’s use of it in the section of the story where the characters are watching Jeopardy: “Okay here’s your clue for Literary Calendar, Jim: According to poet Thomas Stearns Eliot, this. . .is the ‘cruellest’ month...” I argue that Johnson reinterprets Eliot’s depiction of April within a specific Guyanese context. His indirect “calling” on Eliot’s definition of April that he then proceeds to reinterpret, is what signifyin’ is all about. Like a seasoned signifier, Johnson pays tribute to Eliot, and reinterprets him.
Signifyin’ is not always indirect though. Another example I have provided so far is my rant on the term “Afro-Guyanese.” In fact, my particular use of the term signifyin’ will involve A LOT of very direct opining on terms, ideas, really anything I believe to be of interest to a concerned group of Guyanese, and people interested in things Guyanese.
Does that help?
