Title: Sorry, but it's just ...
Review: This reads like poorly researched graduate-school blathering (which I expect it is).Mr Lock appears to have approached his sources with his thesis already formed and to have avoided all contact with anything that might force him to reconsider. Check out his footnote admitting that his use of Ellington's song title is totally inappropriate to what he's trying to make it mean, yet he decided to use it anyway!His comparison of Sun Ra's mythological musings and autobiographical confessions with slave narratives is ridiculous in that it reveals a thorough lack of knowledge of comparative religion. The author acts as though the experience of death and rebirth or of choosing a new name to reflect a new station in life were phenomena unique to (and invented by) African-Americans. He clearly didn't research this topic thoroughly.This is a really shoddy work and not worth your time, much less your money.
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