Overview

Description

CALENDAR DESCRIPTION:

The study of selected works of American literature written before 1900. This course may survey a particular era or topic, and may be organized by various critical issues or approaches. Students with credit for ENGL 344 or 348 may not take this course for further credit.

COURSE DETAILS:

The “idea” of America has historically been infused with the promise of new beginnings and a sense of universal significance. It’s an idea that precedes the American Revolution, going back to the settling of the Massachusetts Bay colony in the 1630s, where the rhetoric from speeches and sermons express the sense of a divinely-inspired mission: “The eies of all people are upon us,” as John Winthrop put it. Such sentiments were echoed by leading American statesmen after independence over a century later, and have, in various forms, continued into our own time. 

A sense of distinct, national pride, of course, is not peculiar to the United States, but like other nations, the United States does have its particular version. And this version was that America, in the words of American theologian Reinhold Niebuhr “turned its back upon the vices of Europe and made a new beginning.” This drama, which is still resonant today, easily obscures the historical challenge Americans faced as they rejected – or claimed to reject -- Old World tyranny. The challenge, that is, was negotiating freedom, authority and power on their own shores. The readings for this class will be engaged in light of this historical challenge, from the early colonial period through the end of the 19th century. Various historical and political texts will be examined alongside the literary works which will be our main focus. We will investigate the conflicting approaches to power and authority in the works of 18th century political thinkers like James Madison and 19th century Transcendentalists like Emerson and Thoreau, as well as the ways in which “freedom” and “authority” are problematized in the works of Melville, Hawthorne, and Henry James. Our readings will also include works by African-American and women writers, namely Frederick Douglass and Kate Chopin, both of whom also engaged the historical American preoccupation with freedom and authority.

COURSE-LEVEL EDUCATIONAL GOALS:

The aim of the class will be to consider how the literature registers, clarifies, and complicates conflicts, paradoxes and dilemmas within “American” public culture. The readings will be situated within specific historical contexts and cultural debates.

Grading

Materials

REQUIRED READING: