In an extensive collection of essays spanning 50 years of sustained scholarship, The Negritude Moment explores the many varied aspects of Negritude - both as a concept and as a movement. F. Abiola Irele provides an account of its historical origins and examines the sociological and ideological background of themes that have preoccupied French-speaking black writers and intellectuals. His collection also includes a rare essay on the structure of Aime Cesaire's imagery in its poetic transmutation of this experience.