ENG 229Tradition African Amer Lit

Catalog

"Slavery and its Afterlives." In her book Lose Your Mother: A Journey Along the Atlantic Slave Route (2007), Saidiya Hartman introduces the idea of slavery and its afterlives: If slavery persists as an issue in the political life of black America, it is not because of an antiquarian obsession with bygone days or the burden of a too-long memory, but because black lives are still imperiled and devalued by a racial calculus and a political arithmetic that were entrenched centuries ago. This is the afterlife of slavery--skewed life chances, limited access to health and education, premature death, incarceration, and impoverishment (6). It is these afterlives upon which we will focus in the course: The United States' persistent clinging to inequality and the African American literary response. In African American literature, the contexts inform the texts. Throughout the semester, we will consider these questions: What role does African American literature and cultural production play in modern American culture? How do different critical perspectives help us see the social and political issues inscribed in literature? How does literature help us understand a diversity of lived experiences as well as our own individual place in communities? Along the way, we'll analyze essays from Toni Morrison, Christina Sharpe, and more in order to gain insight regarding genre, canon and culture that will carry us through the course. In all readings we will discuss the ways in which African/Negro/Black/African American writers use the written word as activism in the fight for full enfranchisement. Prerequisite: English 120 or English 121 for majors; for non-majors, English 120 or 121 or third-year standing. LAVAN