Southern Literature as Migration Studies
ENGL 359
Spring 2015 not offered
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| Crosslisting:
AFAM 358, AMST 359 |
There is no shortage of critical discourse on the historical experience, and the continuing impact, of American acts of migration, and the South remains a place Americans--and American writers--want in equal measure to abandon and return to. This course will examine literary representations of southern migrants and will use historical and theoretical texts to rehistoricize and retheorize migration. We will consider the figure of the uprooted southerner, ideas of urbanization, and the phenomenon of the Great Migration (alongside the fact that, as Houston Baker has pertly commented, "No matter where you travel, you still be black"). We will also investigate the phenomenon of reverse migration, in which northerners head southward, and its attendant "immersion narratives." How does Southern literature contribute to (or help create) our understanding of migration and of migration studies? How does the experience of migration vary according to class, to race, to gender? What do migration and relocation mean for a people who have been, in Toni Morrison's words, continually "moved around like checkers"? |
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| Credit: 1 |
Gen Ed Area Dept:
HA ENGL |
| Course Format: Seminar | Grading Mode: Graded |
| Level: UGRD |
Prerequisites: None |
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Fulfills a Requirement for: (AMST) |
Major Readings:
W.E.B. Du Bois, THE SOULS OF BLACK FOLK
William Faulkner, ABSALOM, ABSALOM!
William Faulkner, THE SOUND AND THE FURY
Ernest Gaines, A LESSON BEFORE DYING
Toni Morrison, JAZZ
Toni Morrison, SONG OF SOLOMON
Walker Percy, THE LAST GENTLEMAN
Mark Twain, THE ADVENTURES OF HUCKLEBERRY FINN
Eudora Welty, THE OPTIMIST'S DAUGHTER
August Wilson, THE PIANO LESSON
Tennessee Williams, A STREETCAR NAMED DESIRE
Richard Wright, 12 MILLION BLACK VOICES
Coursepack with critical/theoretical readings
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Examinations and Assignments:
One 10-15 minute in-class presentation
One research paper at end of term |
Additional Requirements and/or Comments:
This course fulfills the Literatures of Difference major requirement and contributes to the American Literature and Race & Ethnicity requirements of the English major. It also provides a Research Option for those pursuing Honors. |
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