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David Weimer
dweimer@fas
413-884-2702
Representing the Race: the Autobiographical Tradition in African American Literature
In this course, we will investigate the advantages and disadvantages of “African American” as a
category for literary criticism. To focus the class, we will read primarily books in which authors
invoke the autobiographical mode in order to define themselves, their books, and their racial
identity. In particular, we will discuss how African Americans writers during Jim Crow manipulated
this form to manage the pressure of “representing the race.” In the process, we will consider the
effect that different historical periods have had on understandings of a “racial canon” or traditions
of racial literature. To this purpose, we will read across racial canons in order to see how authors
invoke these designations and take that as an invitation to reflect on our own reading methods.
Required Texts: Please get these editions, since specific page numbers will be very important!
W.E.B. Du Bois The Souls of Black Folk Library of America 1598530542
Ralph Ellison Invisible Man; Vintage 0679732764
Henry Louis Gates Jr and William Andrews, ed. Slave Narratives; Library of America 1931082111
James Weldon Johnson Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man Vintage 0679727531
Zora Neale Hurston Dust Tracks on a Road; Harper Perennial 9780062004833 [MAKE SURE THIS
IS THE LIBRARY OF AMERICA UPDATED TEXT)
Malcolm X and Alex Haley The Autobiography of Malcolm X; Ballantine 9780345350688
Barack Obama Dreams from My Father; Three Rivers 1400082773
Assignments:
There are four kinds of short writing assignments for this course to help prepare you for writing
your junior essay, as summarized below:
1) 3-sentence projection of an argument: One of the biggest skills that I want you to hone is
knowing the difference between an observation and an argument. An observation points to a
moment in the text and says “Wow! Cool, right?” (or however the young kids sat it these days). An
argument observes a piece of the text in relation to the whole and explains something interesting,
counterintuitive, or unexpected about the relationship between piece and whole.
2) 1-sentence summary of an argument: Usually, you can summarize a good piece of criticism in a
sentence or two. Think of this sentence as trying to explain to a peer who comes across this piece of
criticism what the point of it is: what interesting thing is it trying to say? Why did so-and-so write it?
What does it explain?
3) Annotated Bibliography: This is a list of sources accompanied by a few sentences like you
would write for the previous assignment. What is each source arguing? Why is it useful to you?
4) 2-page reading/use of evidence: This is a chance to try out a piece of your argument. Here,
you can take something like you would write for assignment (1) and couple it with the observations
to back it up.
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5) 2-page Prospectus: Here you should try to lay out your plans for your junior essay. This
document needs to have at least all of the following: 1) a short description of the focal texts for your
paper 2) your hypothesis about your argument, i.e. what do you think you will claim to be true about
your texts 3) a short explanation of why that hypothesis matters: how does it relate to other criticism
about the text(s), (including the criticism you list in your annotated bibliography)? what is interesting
or surprising about your hypothesis? In working on your prospectus, you should meet with the
departmental writing fellow, Alexis Becker (akbecker@fas).
Week of 1 Sept:
Introductions, Course Goals
One pre-1845 slave narrative from UNC’s Doc South database
Week of 8 Sept:
Frederick Douglass The Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass (1845)
Thoreau “Economy,” “Where I Lived, and What I lived For,” “Sounds,” “Visitors,” “The BeanField,” “The Village,” “Spring,” and “Conclusion” from Walden (1854)
Lawrence Buell “Autobiography in the American Renaissance”
Sample Versions of Junior Essays
Assignment: Fill out the Peer-Editing Sheet as if this sample essay were by a classmate
Week of 15 Sept:
Harriet Jacobs Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl (1861)
Ralph Waldo Emerson “History,” “Self-Reliance,” and “Circles” from Essays: First Series (1841)
John Ernest “Truth Stranger than Fiction: African American Identity and (Auto)Biography” Chaotic
Justice: Rethinking African American Literary History
Assignment: 3-sentence projection of an argument about either Jacobs
Week of 22 Sept:
W. E. B. Du Bois The Souls of Black Folk (1903)
Booker T. Washington “The Struggle for an Education” and “The Atlanta Exposition Address”
from Up From Slavery (1901)
Kenneth Mostern “African American Autobiography and the Field of Autobiography Studies” in
Autobiography and Black Identity Politics: Racialization in Twentieth-Century America
Assignment: 1-sentence summary of Mostern’s argument; 2 sentences about how he is similar
to/different from Ernest or Buell
Week 29 Sept:
James Weldon Johnson Autobiography of an Ex-Colored Man (1912)
Mary Antin “Initiation” in The Promised Land (1912)
James Weldon Johnson “The Dilemma of the Negro Author” (1928)
Kenneth Warren “Historicizing African American Literature” in What Was African American
Literature?
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Assignment: 3-sentence projection of an argument about Johnson
Week of 6 Oct:
Library Visit (start reading Hurston!)
Assignment: Pre-Library Scavenger Hunt.
Week of 13 Oct:
Zora Neale Hurston Dust Tracks on a Road (1942) and excised sections (to be handed out)
Zora Neale Hurston “Characteristics of Negro Expression”
Jason Frydman. “Zora Neale Hurston, Biographical Criticism, and African Diasporic Vernacular
Culture.” MELUS 34.4 (Winter 2009): 99-118.
Benigno Sánchez-Eppler. “Telling Anthropology: Zora Neale Hurston and Gilberto Freyre
Disciplined in Their Field-Home-Work.” American Literary History 4.3 (Autumn 1992): 464488.
Assignment: Two-page close reading of Hurston
Week of 20 Oct:
Ralph Ellison Invisible Man (1952)
James Baldwin “Stranger in the Village” Notes of a Native Son (1955)
Richard Wright “Blueprint for Negro Writing” New Challenge (Fall 1937)
Assignment: 3-4 Annotated Sources
Week of 27 Oct:
Ralph Ellison Invisible Man (1952)
Emily Lordi. “The Timbre of Sincerity: Mahalia Jackson’s Gospel Sound and Ralph Ellison’s Invisible
Man.” Black Resonance: Iconic Women Singers and African American Literature: 66-98.
Paul Allen Anderson. “Ralph Ellison on Lyricism and Swing.” American Literary History. 17.2
(Summer 2005): 208-306.
Assignment: A two-page prospectus and an annotated bibliography with 8-10 sources are both
due at class.
Week of 3 Nov:
Malcolm X and Alex Haley The Autobiography of Malcolm X (1965)
Gene Jarrett “The Geopolitics of African American Autobiography between the World Wars” in
Representing the Race (2011)
Assignment: 3-sentence projection of an argument about Malcolm X
Week of 10 Nov:
The Autobiography of Malcolm X
Harold Cruse, Selection from the Introduction to Rebellion or Revolution (1968): 20-24
Harold Cruse “An Afro-American’s Cultural Views” Présence Africaine (Dec 1957/Jan 1958)
J. Saunders Redding “Negro Writing in America” The New Leader (16 May 1960)
Manning Marable Chapter 12 ““Do Something About Malcolm”” Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention
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Assignment: 2-page reading/use of evidence for the junior paper
Week of 17 Nov:
No reading; Individual meetings about your writing.
Assignment: Partial Draft of Junior Essay (10-15 pages) is due 1 day before class.
Week 24 Nov:
Selections from Barack Obama Dreams from My Father (1995)
Joan Scott “The Evidence of Experience” (1991)
Assignment: 1-sentence summary of Scott’s argument; 2 sentences about her relationship to
another piece of criticism from the semester or your research.
Week of 1 Dec:
Peer Editing Workshop
Assignment: A full draft of the Junior Essay is due two days before class. We will circulate and
discuss your essays as a group.
4pm on Tuesday, 9 Dec: Final Essay due, one copy to me and one copy to the department.