ENGL 364-01, Topics in African American Literature: "The Lover's War": The Protest Tradition in Twentieth Century African American Literature, Fall 2009

Abstract

Over the course of this semester, we will read a range of works that deal with the themes of protest, resistance, and struggle at the heart of the African American literary tradition. We will read selections from Ralph Ellison (Invisible Man, selected essays), Richard Wright (Native Son, essays from Black Power and White Man, Listen!), James Baldwin (Go Tell It On the Mountain, essays from The Fire Next Time, Nobody Knows My Name, and Notes on a Native Son), and some of their contemporaries: Lorraine Hansberry, Ann Petry, John A. Williams and Malcolm X. In order to establish a historical framework for these creative forms of intellectual and political protest, we will also read excerpts from Ida B. Wells, Frederick Douglass, and W.E.B. Du Bois among others.