Bell defines it as an "elaborate, indirect form of goading or insult generally making use of profanity". Signifyin(g) is closely related to double-talk and trickery of the type used by the Monkey of these narratives, but, as Gates himself admits, "It is difficult to arrive at a consensus of definitions of signifyin(g)." Bernard W. Gates' title alludes to the song "Signifyin' Monkey" by Oscar Brown, recorded in 1960. The book traces the folkloric origins of the African-American cultural practice of "signifying" and uses the concept of signifyin(g) to analyze the interplay between texts of prominent African-American writers, specifically Richard Wright, Ralph Ellison, Zora Neale Hurston and Ishmael Reed. The Signifying Monkey: A Theory of Afro-American Literary Criticism is a work of literary criticism and theory by the American scholar Henry Louis Gates Jr.
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