Course Description
This class investigates one of the most influential movements in the long history of African American literature: African American modernism. The course will be historically grounded by focusing on the changing economic and social conditions that allowed this artistic movement to come into being, such as the great migration and the increased urbanization African Americans. We will analyze various writers such as Nella Larsen, Jessie Fauset, Claude McKay, Langston Hughes, Dorothy West, and more. This class is extremely dynamic. In addition to focusing on a range of literary genres, such as poetry, novels, and short stories it will also focus on various aesthetic movement occurring in music, film, fashion, photography, painting, drama.
Texts
Larsen, Nella. Quicksand
McKay, Claude. Harlem Shadows
Fauset, Jessie. There is Confusion
Hughes, Langston. Not Without Laughter
West, Dorothy. The Living is Easy
Toomer, Jean. Cane
Thurman, Wallace. Fire!:
Painters and other Visual Artist
Aaron Douglass
Romare Bearden
Archibald Motley
Augusta Savage
Hughie Lee Smith
Charles Alston