ENGL 314 - Foundations of African American Literature

A study of African American writing from the 18th and 19th centuries. Drawing on the history of slavery and its immediate aftermath, students examine how African Americans negotiated the promises and the limitations of freedom, gendered experiences of slavery, debates around Reconstruction, political representation, and discourses of revolution and abolition. Students will discuss topics including religion, labor, sentimental novels and historical romances, and the slave narrative. Students will also consider how writings by these authors circulated in the United States and abroad. Authors may include the following: Jupiter Hammon, Phillis Wheatley, David Walker, Harriet Jacobs, Solomon Northrup, Frederick Douglass, Maria Stewart, William Wells Brown, Anna Julia Cooper, and Charles Chesnutt, among others.

Credits: 1.0
Corequisite: None
Prerequisites: None
Major/Minor Restrictions: None
Class Restriction: None
Area of Inquiry: Human Thought and Expression
Core Component: None

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