Early on, prescribed formats governed the publication of slave narratives. Douglass based his narrative on the sermon. Jacobs modeled her narrative on the sentimental or domestic novel. Douglass focuses on the struggle to achieve manhood and freedom. Jacob focuses on sexual exploitation. A comparison of the narratives of Douglass and Jacobs demonstrates the full range … Continued
Given the secondary position of persons of African descent throughout their history in America, it could reasonably be argued that all efforts of creative writers from that group are forms of protest. The intention of protest literature was—and remains—to show inequalities among races and socio-economic groups in America and to encourage a transformation in the … Continued
Aylmer, the protagonist of Hawthorne’s “The Birthmark,” undertakes to remove the blemish from his wife’s cheek to satisfy his own spiritual strivings and to redeem what he sees as a failed career.
In To Kill a Mockingbird Mrs. Henry Lafayette Dubose embodies and gives public voice to the values and attitudes of the Old South. The way the novel’s protagonist Atticus Finch responds to her suggests that he lacks the critical perspective needed to acknowledge the depth and pervasiveness of his community’s racism.
By deepening her emotional sympathy and by allowing her to liberate her thinking from Puritan orthodoxy, Hester Prynne’s scarlet letter, meant to exclude her from the community, functions ironically as the agent of her inclusion.
Jack London’s story “To Build a Fire” warns not only against trekking through a wilderness at seventy-five below but also against seeing nature simply as a resource to be exploited and controlled.
Why do we struggle with admitting how pain and love are entangled in in cherished artifacts of our childhood? In this talk, I argue that confronting this fact is the best way to dismantle the White-supremacist delusion of “cancel culture,” to develop more complex relationships with favorite works of our youth, and to create a … Continued
The 1918–1919 influenza pandemic killed 50–100 million people worldwide, with the United States losing more people in the outbreak than it did in all the 20th and 21st century wars, combined. Arriving just as WWI was ending, the pandemic brought a non-human, invisible horror into every community. The viral tragedy has been largely hidden, but … Continued
Recently there have been many discussions about decolonizing the curriculum. What does this mean for the teaching of Shakespeare? As Gauri Viswanathan explored in her groundbreaking book Masks of Conquest, Shakespeare’s place in the English literary curriculum was at its heart a colonial endeavor. Does this history mean that we should eschew teaching Shakespeare’s plays? … Continued
We have long understood The Crucible, ostensibly about the Salem Witch Trials, to “actually” be about McCarthyism, but what more can this play tell us about politics and American identity in the early years of the Cold War? To what extent is the fear of communism the occasion for Miller’s portrayal of American paranoia, and … Continued