Universität Wien

123223 SE Literary Seminar / BA-Arbeit / MA American/North American Lit./Studies (2022S)

"Ain't I a Woman?" American Anti-racist Speeches and Other Anti-racist Writings, 1851-2022

11.00 ECTS (2.00 SWS), SPL 12 - Anglistik
Continuous assessment of course work

Registration/Deregistration

Note: The time of your registration within the registration period has no effect on the allocation of places (no first come, first served).

Details

max. 18 participants
Language: English

Lecturers

Classes (iCal) - next class is marked with N

There will be no class on Monday 27.06.2022.

Monday 07.03. 12:15 - 13:45 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Monday 14.03. 12:15 - 13:45 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Monday 21.03. 12:15 - 13:45 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Monday 28.03. 12:15 - 13:45 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Monday 04.04. 12:15 - 13:45 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Monday 25.04. 12:15 - 13:45 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Monday 02.05. 12:15 - 13:45 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Monday 09.05. 12:15 - 13:45 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Monday 16.05. 12:15 - 13:45 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Monday 23.05. 12:15 - 13:45 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Monday 30.05. 12:15 - 13:45 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Monday 13.06. 12:15 - 13:45 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Monday 20.06. 12:15 - 13:45 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09
Monday 27.06. 12:15 - 13:45 Raum 2 Anglistik UniCampus Hof 8 3E-EG-09

Information

Aims, contents and method of the course

In this course, students will get the chance to engage with some of the Black anti-racist activists, scholars and politicians, who fought for abolition as well as for class, gender and racial equality throughout history. Engaging with selected speeches and diverse forms of political writing (pamphlets, magazine articles, memoirs, books), the students will learn about the historic conditions, these men* and women* were up against. They will learn about the political demands of early trailblazers such as Sojourner Truth, or Ida B. Wells, and the politics that should lead to the emergence of Black feminism. Through the writing of individual people - from W.E.B. Du Bois to James Baldwin, from Angela Davis and bell hooks to Jasmyn Ward or Mikki Kendall - the students will be introduced to important political movements such as Black radicalism, Pan Africanism or Black nationalism and Womanism that significantly shaped anti-racist politics during the 20th century until today. Moreover, they will develop tools and methods to analyze political writing as a specific form of literature, to understand how writing and speech facilitate movements and political action.

Assessment and permitted materials

Participants will submit a written seminar paper (BA students will have the opportunity to write their BA thesis). They have to offer an oral presentation. Regular attendance and active participation will be expected. Additionally, the students will have to hand in a written paper proposal by mid-term.

Minimum requirements and assessment criteria

Participants must submit a written seminar paper or bachelor paper, and offer an oral presentation. Regular attendance and active class participation are expected. Moreover, they have to hand in a written paper proposal by mid-term.
Student presentation 25%
Written seminar paper, 50 %
Oral contributions in class and paper proposal 25%

Examination topics

Students must familiarize themselves with the assigned literature before each class and have to be able to discuss them during the seminar sessions.

Reading list

Sojourn Truth “A’n’t I a Woman?” Sojourner Truth, 1851. In Marable, Manning, and Leith Mullings, eds. 2009. Let Nobody Turn Us Around: Voices of Resistance, Reform, and Renewal. An African American Anthology. Lanham / Boulder / New York / Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield, p. 66.

Angela Davis, Introduction and “Chapter 3: Class and Race in the Early Women’s Rights Campaign“ in Women, Race, & Class, 1981: pp. 85-126

Ida B. Wells-Barnett, Crusader for Justice (Source: Excerpt from a speech delivered at the National Negro Conference, 1909 (Proceedings: National Negro Conference, 1909, pp. 174–79).) In Marable, Manning, and Leith Mullings, eds. 2009. Let Nobody Turn Us Around: Voices of Resistance, Reform, and Renewal. An African American Anthology. Lanham / Boulder / New York / Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield, p. 991-995.

“Race and the Southern Worker,” “A Negro Woman Speaks,” “The Race Question a Class Question,” and “Negro Workers!”” In Marable, Manning, and Leith Mullings, eds. 2009. Let Nobody Turn Us Around: Voices of Resistance, Reform, and Renewal. An African American Anthology. Lanham / Boulder / New York / Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield, p. 183-191.

W. E. B. Du Bois, Excerpts from “The Conservation of Races” and Excerpts from “The Souls of Black Folk” In Marable, Manning, and Leith Mullings, eds. 2009. Let Nobody Turn Us Around: Voices of Resistance, Reform, and Renewal. An African American Anthology. Lanham / Boulder / New York / Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield, p. 195-208.

Ashley J. Bohrer, “Chapter One: The Intersectional Tradition.” In Marxism and Intersectionality: Race, Gender, Class and Sexuality under Contemporary Captialism. Transcript, 2019, pp. 81-100.

Black Bolsheviks: Cyril V. Briggs and Claude McKay, “What the African Blood Brotherhood Stands For” and “Soviet Russia and the Negro” In Marable, Manning, and Leith Mullings, eds. 2009. Let Nobody Turn Us Around: Voices of Resistance, Reform, and Renewal. An African American Anthology. Lanham / Boulder / New York / Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield, p. 228-233.

Alice Moore Dunbar-Nelson, “The Negro Woman and the Ballot” 1927, In Marable, Manning, and Leith Mullings, eds. 2009. Let Nobody Turn Us Around: Voices of Resistance, Reform, and Renewal. An African American Anthology. Lanham / Boulder / New York / Oxford: Rowman & Littlefield, p. 264-267.

Cedric J. Robinson. Black Marxism: The Making of the Black Radical Tradition. The University of North Carolina Press, 2000, pp. 212-228.

Fannie Lou Hamer, “Testimony Before the Credentials Committee, Democratic National Convention” Atlantic City, New Jersey (August 22, 1964), http://americanradioworks.publicradio.org/features/sayitplain/flhamer.html

Brandon Tensley, “America’s long history of Black voter repression,” CNN (May 2021) https://edition.cnn.com/interactive/2021/05/politics/black-voting-rights-suppression-timeline/

bell hooks. Feminist Politics: Where We Stand 2003.

bell hooks. “Sisterhood: Political Solidarity between Women.” Feminist Review, no. 23, 1986, pp. 125–38.

Angela Davis, An Autobiography, London: Penguin/Hamish [1974] 2022.

Alice Walker. “In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens.” Within the Circle: An Anthology of African American Literary Criticism from the Harlem Renaissance to the Present., edited by Angelyn Mitchell, Duke University Press, 1994, pp. 401–409.

Laurie McMillan. “ Telling a Critical Story: Alice Walker’s In Search of Our Mothers’ Gardens.” Journal of Modern Literature, vol. 28, no. 1, 2004, pp. 107–23, doi:10.2979/jml.2004.28.1.107.

Baldwin, James. The Fire Next Time. London: Michael Joseph, 1963.
Jesmyn Ward (ed.), The Fire This Time, New York: Scribner 2016.

Kendall, Mikki. HOOD FEMINISM, Notes from the Women That a Movement Forgot. Viking, 2020.

Association in the course directory

Studium: BA 612, MA 844; MA 844(2)
Code/Modul: BA10.2, MA5, MA7; MA 4.1, 4.2
Lehrinhalt: 12-0375

Last modified: Sa 05.03.2022 11:08