Undergraduate Course: Slavery and Freedom in Nineteenth-Century African American Literature (ENLI10384)
Course Outline
School | School of Literatures, Languages and Cultures |
College | College of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences |
Credit level (Normal year taken) | SCQF Level 10 (Year 3 Undergraduate) |
Availability | Available to all students |
SCQF Credits | 20 |
ECTS Credits | 10 |
Summary | This course will introduce students to the beginnings of African American literature in the writings authored by enslaved and free women and men which were published in the US from the mid-eighteenth century onwards. First generation US Black writers obtained the ability to read no less than to write against body-and-soul destroying odds: the acquisition of literacy was not only denied enslaved people on pain of torture and death, it was scarcely less off-limits to emancipated individuals suffering from inequalities in every area of their lives as lived within the US as a white supremacist nation. Working to do justice to the experiences of Black women, men, and children who were repeatedly exposed to unimaginable acts of physical, psychological, imaginative, and emotional suffering that typically defeated all forms of literary expression, early Black writers pioneered experimental techniques in order to arrive at alternative literary modes in which to begin to put flesh on the bones of otherwise erased Black stories. Working to give voice to the voiceless across their writings, they developed a self-reflexive relationship to language in order to work with symbolism, allegory, and imagery to produce diverse texts across numerous genres, including: slave narratives, spiritual confessions, prison narratives, poetry, plays, essays, letters, diaries, novels, short stories, songs, and folktales. Their social, political, historical, cultural and artistic legacies live on today in African American twentieth and twenty-first century literary and performative traditions. |
Course description |
The beginnings of the African American literary tradition coincides with the founding of the United States as an independent nation and as a result constitutes a hard-hitting testament to its status as a paradoxical site of Black slavery and white freedom. This course will consider an array of literary forms authored by enslaved and free writers including: spirituals, work songs, folk tales, novels, short stories, poems, political tracts, slave narratives, spiritual confessions, speeches, letters, prison narratives, and diaries. The key themes within the early African American literary tradition and which will be the focus of this course are the following: antislavery radicalism; identity politics: bodily trauma; racial conflict; gender inequalities; sexual depredations; psychological illness; family separation; ancestral and genealogical legacies; authorship as activism as well as a source of imaginative creativity; audience reception; publication histories and print cultures; authenticity; Black-white power dynamics within abolitionist discourse; survival by any means necessary; death.
The structure of reading and analysis on the course is broadly comparative: students will be asked to explore the similarities and differences between the set texts, and examine the various types of analysis made possible by the critical and theoretical modes of reading to which they are introduced. The guided examination of the similarities and differences between the range of texts and approaches studied will help students to develop the analytical skills and knowledge that will be assessed in their essays. Due to the vast number of still unexamined texts within the early African American literary tradition - 'new' texts are being unearthed all the time - there is plenty of scope for students to undertake original research and develop new theoretical models that will shed light on key formal and thematic dimensions of these works as written by Black authors and which still remain vastly under-researched.
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Information for Visiting Students
Pre-requisites | A MINIMUM of 4 college/university level literature courses at grade B or above (should include no more than one introductory level literature course). Related courses such as cross disciplinary, "Freshman Seminars", civilisation or creative writing classes are not considered for admission to this course.
Applicants should also note that, as with other popular courses, meeting the minimum does NOT guarantee admission. In making admissions decisions preference will be given to students who achieve above the minimum requirement with the typical visiting student admitted to this course
having four or more literature classes at grade A.
** as numbers are limited, visiting students should contact the Visiting Student Office directly for admission to this course **
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High Demand Course? |
Yes |
Course Delivery Information
Not being delivered |
Learning Outcomes
On completion of this course, the student will be able to:
- Construct original, clear and coherent arguments about African American literature's and oral culture's depictions of slavery and freedom
- Analyse literary and oral texts using recognised and newly emerging literary critical methodologies to substantiate and illustrate those arguments
- Extrapolate, evaluate and assess ideas from a range of non-literary sources in order to bring them to bear on their analyses of race and representation in US literature
- Evaluate the ways in which representations of slavery and freedom as well as the construction of race and identity have developed over the centuries and live on in the current era
- Orally present the results of research undertaken individually and as part of a small group, respond thoughtful the research undertaken by others, and critically evaluate the importance of such material for an understanding of the chief themes of the course.
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Reading List
To be submitted. [*Details of Primary texts and key secondary reading, with 2 or so exceptions, these texts are all freely available in digital editions*] |
Additional Information
Graduate Attributes and Skills |
As an outcome of having studied this course, students will benefit from having developed a range of personal and professional skills commensurate with the range of SCQF Level 10 characteristics:
Knowledge and understanding: students will have had the opportunity to demonstrate their critical understanding of a range of the principal theories and concepts of literary analysis in relation to their reading and discussion of the course material;
Applied Knowledge, Skills and Understanding: in their work for class discussion, presentations and formal assessment tasks, students will have been able to practice the application of these theories and concepts in their construction of arguments about the course material;
Generic Cognitive Skills: in completing assessed essays and class presentations, students will have practiced identifying, defining, conceptualising and analysing complex problems and issues germane to the discipline;
Communication: through participating in these tasks students will also have demonstrated the ability to communicate ideas and information about specialised topics in the discipline to an informed audience of their peers and subject specialists;
Autonomy and Working with Others: students will also have shown the capacity to work autonomously and in small groups on designated tasks, develop new thinking with their peers, and take responsibility for the reporting, analysis and defence of these ideas to a larger group. |
Keywords | slavery,freedom,American Literature,nineteenth century,African American,Black writing |
Contacts
Course organiser | Prof Celeste-Marie Bernier
Tel: (0131 6)50 4114
Email: |
Course secretary | Ms Sheila Strathdee
Tel: (0131 6)50 3619
Email: |
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