Gwybodaeth Modiwlau

Module Identifier

WL35430

Module Title

African American Literature

Academic Year

2013/2014

Co-ordinator

Dr Helena Grice

Semester

Semester 1

Other Staff

Dr Helena Grice

Course Delivery

Delivery Type	Delivery length / details
Seminars / Tutorials	10 x 2hr seminars

Assessment

Assessment Type	Assessment length / details	Proportion
Semester Assessment	2 X 3000 WORD ESSAYS	100%
Supplementary Assessment	Resubmit or resit failed elements and/or make good any missing elements.

Learning Outcomes

On successful completion of this module students should be able to:

demonstrate knowledge of a range of African American Literature with reference to cultural and historical context;

identify genres within the scope of African American Literature with a particular emphasis on women's fiction and black drama;

describe the development of the novel from 19th century slave-narratives;

articulate the impact on African American Fiction and drama of the Civil Rights movement of the 1950s and 1960s;

read literary texts in an informed and critical manner;

engage in coherent oral discussion of the texts and their contexts;

write about the subject in a well-structured and argued manner with reference to cultural and historical context.

Brief description

_PROGRAMME

_Seminar 1: Introduction: Slave narratives; lyrics of early blues and spirituals

Required reading: Helena Grice et al, Beginning Ethnic American Literatures, chapters 1+2; Frederick Douglass, The Narrative of An American Slave (1845)
Optional further reading: Paul Oliver, The Story of the Blues; Screening the Blues; James Weldon Johnson, The Autobiography of an Ex-Coloured Man (1912); Harriet Jacobs, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl, in Heath Anthology of American Literature Vol. 1

_Seminar 2: Black Women's Fiction I

Required reading: Zora Neale Hurston Their Eyes Were Watching God (1939)
Optional further reading: Hurston, Jonah's Gourd Vine (1934), Dust Tracks on A Road (1942), Mules and Men (1935);

_Seminar 3: From Autobiography to Allegory and Satire I

Required reading: Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man (1952)
Optional further reading: Going to the Territory (1984)

_Seminar 4: From Autobiography to Allegory and Satire II

Required reading: Invisible Man, contd.;
Optional further reading: Ellison, Shadow and Act (essays) (1967); Richard Wright, Native Son (1940); Black Boy and American Hunger (1944)

_Seminar 5: Black Drama I

Required reading: James Baldwin, The Amen Corner (1955, 1965)
Optional further reading: Baldwin, Go Tell It On The Mountain (1954); Blues for Mister Charlie (1964); The Fire Next Time (1963)

_Seminar 6. Black Drama II

Required reading: Leroi Jones, Dutchman (1964); August Wilson, Ma Rainey's Black Bottom (1984)
Optional further reading: Alice Childress, Wine in the Wilderness (1968); Lorraine Hansberry, A Raisin in the Sun (1959); Eldridge Cleaver, Soul on Ice (1969); August Wilson, Fences (1985); Joe Turner's Come and Gone (1987); The Piano Lesson (1990); Two Trains Running (1992)
Suggested Viewing: Spike Lee (Dir.) Do The Right Thing; Malcolm X

_Seminar 7: Black Women's Fiction II

Required reading: Alice Walker, Meridian (1976)
Optional further reading and viewing: Walker, Living by the Word (1988); Paule Marshall, Praise-Song for the Widow (1983); Anniversary broadcasts for Martin Luther King; The Words of Martin Luther King (1983); selected chapters from The Autobiography of Malcolm X (1965)

_Seminar 8: Black Women's Fiction III

Required reading: Toni Morrison, Song of Solomon (1977)
Optional further reading: Toni Morrison, Beloved (1987); Jazz (1992) (there are also video and audio resources available)

_Seminar 9: Black Women's Fiction IV

Required reading: Gloria Naylor, The Women of Brewster Place (1982)
Optional further reading: Gloria Naylor, Linden Hills (1985); Thulani Davies (1959): A Novel (1992)

_Seminar 10: Black Women's Fiction V

Required Reading: Terry McMillan, Waiting to Exhale (1995) [+ film showing]

Content