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Taking into account reassessments of Franz Boas' concepts of race as well as the correspondence between Zora Neale Hurston and Boas, I suggest that Hurston arrived at a crucial turning point between her first and second Florida field expeditions. By following Boas' injunctive to attend to the "manner of rendition" over the content of a folk tale, Huston experienced an epiphany, documented in her correspondence, on the nature of vernacular "lies"-storytelling. Rather than seeing vernacular African American culture as a static tradition, Hurston came to see it as an ongoing, participatory dynamic, in which attention to the manner of rendition is paramount: an aesthetic she incorporated into all of her writing after that point.
It was only when I was off in college, away from my native surroundings that I could see myself like somebody else and stand off and look at my garment. Then I had to have the spy-glass of Anthropology to look through at that. (Hurston, 1990/1935, p. 1)
While conducting research for Mules and Men from December 1927 until February 1930 Zora Neale Hurston reported on her progress, goals, and methodologies via letters written to three very distinct audiences: "Papa" Franz Boas, her mentor at Columbia, who was ardently seeking to establish anthropology as a science; "Godmother" Charlotte Osgood Mason, the wealthy patron of the primitive, the source of Hurston 's financial support and the legal owner of all the material Hurston collected; and her "pal," Langston Hughes, who introduced Hurston to Mason and with whom Hurston corresponded the most frequently and familiarly. Hurston obliged each audience with what it wanted: Mason, the "little mother of the primitive world," received fawning letters "Humbly and sincerely" wishing her good health and encouraging her to feel assured that "her" material was for her eyes only (in Kaplan, 2002, p. 123). At the same time, though, Hurston surreptitiously sent copies of her material to both Boas and Hughes - as well as to others, including Alain Locke and Dorothy West - along with reminders to keep the material as well as their correspondence secret. She closes a letter to West with the admonition "PLEASE DON'T LET ANYONE KNO W TH AT YOU HAVE HEARD FROM ME OR SEE [sic] MY PAPERS" (in...