ENG 450AAfrican American Novel

Catalog

ENG 450A African American Novel - This class focuses on the critical question: Why the novel? What does this form offer Black writers that other literary forms do not? Why did so many Black writers choose to take up-and re-create-"realism" as a political concern, artistic philosophy, literary style, and compositional aesthetic in their craft? What is "realism" really? How have Black novelists defined it? Played with it? Challenged it? Blended it with other styles and forms? How do Black writers imagine themselves and engage a literary conversation that stretches back into the past and reaches out toward new futures? We will begin with novels from the mid-twentieth century by Richard Wright, Ann Petry, and Gwendolyn Brooks and then close with contemporary writing that echoes and signifies on the earlier novels- paying them homage, challenging and updating their themes, ideas, and imagery, and building new forms that beckon to future Black writers. Throughout, we will discuss these books in connection to contemporary issues of which they offer historical insight- racist policing, the prison abolition movement, intersectionality (particularly as it impacts Black women), #metoo, de facto segregation, gentrification, race and the publishing industry (#blackoutbestsellerlist, #publishingpaidme and the proliferation of "anti-racist reading lists"), the flourishing of Afro-futurism, sci-fi, and the Afro-surreal as literary forms. Student writing for this class emphasizes drafting the literary argumentative essay based on your unique reading perspective.