Crossing the Color Line: Racial Passing in American Literature
AMST 322
Spring 2011 not offered
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| Crosslisting:
ENGL 319 |
Narratives of racial passing having long captivated readers and critics alike for the way in which they provocatively raise questions about the construction, reinforcement, and subversion of racial categories. This course will consider several examples of the "literature of passing" as it has been established as a category within African American literature alongside more ambiguously classified 20th-century narratives of ethnic masquerade and cultural assimilation as a way of exploring how literary and filmic texts invoke, interrogate, and otherwise explore categories of race, gender, class, and sexual identity. |
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Essential Capabilities:
Interpretation, Writing
This seminar will require students to closely analyze a range of literary and cultural texts through several short written assignments and two longer papers.
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| Credit: 1 |
Gen Ed Area Dept:
HA AMST |
| Course Format: Seminar | Grading Mode: Graded |
| Level: UGRD |
Prerequisites: None |
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Fulfills a Requirement for: (AMST) |
Major Readings:
Key texts will include James Weldon Johnson's THE AUTOBIOGRAPHY OF AN EX-COLORED MAN, Nella Larsen's PASSING, Douglas Sirk's film IMITATION OF LIFE, Richard Rodriguez's memoir HUNGER OF MEMORY, Chang-rae Lee's novel A GESTURE LIFE, and Philip Roth's novel THE HUMAN STAIN.
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Examinations and Assignments:
Response papers, online posting, one 5-7 page paper, one 8-10 page paper. |
Additional Requirements and/or Comments:
This course satisfies the Literatures of Difference requirement and helps fulfill the Race and Ethnicity concentration in the English major. |
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