[By Crystal Boson]

For the unfamiliar, Hoodoo functions both as a faith and a practice; it is a multilayered site of cultural context. Hoodoo, both in faith and practice, has elements of African Voudon, Haitian Voodoo, several Native American religions and American brands of Christianity, both Catholic and Protestant. It is an American creation, forged and continued to help Black practitioners navigate the extremely hostile cultural, social, religious and physical landscape. It is still practiced and giving life to communities and American literature.


Historically, there has been tension regarding the representation of this faith and its literary inclusion. DuBois, Dunbar, and Alice Ruth Moore wrote against its inclusion into literature, deeming it to be descriptive of the frenzy present within the ways of the folk, and a hindrance to literary and cultural acceptance. It has often been situated against Christianity and constructed as deviance. However, as we move into the contemporary literary era, there has been a larger push by authors, especially those who work outside of the traditional confines of set genre, to include Hoodoo as an important medium through which to represent racial authenticity and cultural liberation.