AML 5608 Spring 2020 Gaines

2019 was the 400th anniversary of the 20-something Africans brought to Point Comfort, Virginia, beginning slavery in the British colonies that would become the United States. Even with the public histories around 1619 (including the New York Times Magazine,) the average person knows little to nothing about the lives of the enslaved or their dogged resistance. This course will take on the “peculiar institution” and its afterlives. We will read multiple slave narratives, both personal and historical accounts of the Underground Railroad, African American literary theory, and literary reimaginings of slavery.

And yes, we’re reading Beloved. Rest in Peace, Toni Morrison.