ENG 293 - Special Topics in African American Literature

SPECIAL TOPIC SPRING 2018 BLEEDING TRAUMAS: THE RUPTURE OF PRIVATE/PUBLIC SPACES OF SAFETY IN AFRICAN AMERICAN LITERATURE

What boundaries are used to define public and private spaces? How are notions of safety informed and undermined by these boundaries and ruptures of space(s)? In what ways does trauma contribute to these ruptures? African American literature has explored notions of the binary positions of private and public spaces since emancipatory narratives, and writers continue to address the varied methods of these traumatic ruptures across literary genres. In this course, we will examine and discuss how African American artists understand and approach the expansion and conflation of the private/public spaces and how these moments are informed by trauma.

SPECIAL TOPIC FALL 2017 “SICK AND TIRED OF BEING SICK AND TIRED:” MEDICINE AND ETHICS IN BLACK WOMEN’S LITERATURE

Utilizing the framework of the medical humanities, this seminar explores narratives of health, wellness, and ethics in works by black women writers. The medical humanities, or “narrative ethics” as it is more specifically termed, is concerned with the historical practices of traditional scientific medicine and medical research and the various ethical abuses that have occurred throughout history in the name of scientific advancement. Because medicine and its practitioners wield considerable influence in the wellness outcomes of so many, narrative ethics as a discourse seeks to “humanize” medicine through narrative. This course explores how black women, who have so often been instrumentalized in scientific medical research while receiving the least benefit, understand and approach the question of ethics and humane treatment in medicine. It is a discussion format class with minimal lecturing, so students are expected to have read all materials and be prepared to discuss and analyze the text as the bulk of their participatory experience in class.

 

Anticipated Terms Offered: Offered annually