| Semester | fall semester 2019 |
| Course frequency | Irregular |
| Lecturers | Philipp Schweighauser (ph.schweighauser@unibas.ch, Assessor) |
| Content | This course invites students to explore the extraordinary flowering of African-American creativity in literature, art, and music during the two World Wars. Fueled by the Great Migration of African-Americans from the rural South to the urban, industrial North in the wake of WWI, the Harlem Renaissance drew much of its energy from African-American folk culture even as it appropriated traditional poetic forms and at times probed the limits of literary language in modernist experimental fashion. It received one of its early names (the "New Negro Renaissance") from philosophy professor Alain Locke's edited volume "The New Negro" (1925). It pitted civil rights leaders like W. E. B. Du Bois, who placed their hopes for racial uplift in the 'talented tenth,' against younger radicals like Claude McKay, who explored the vitality of urban life in his sensational(ist) Home to Harlem (1928). The Harlem Renaissance was also a fundamentally cross-cultural movement that brought together white radicals, photographers, and patrons of the arts with black writers, musicians, and artists. In the third book on our list of course texts, Nella Larsen explores the gendered nature of this interracial dimension by way of the tragic protagonist of her spell-binding novel "Quicksand" (1928). |
| Learning objectives | To give students a solid overview of a defining moment in the history of African-American literature. |
| Bibliography | The following three texts should be purchased and read before the beginning of the term: Alain Locke, ed. "The New Negro: Voices of the Harlem Renaissance" (1925; get the 1990s Simon & Schuster edition with an introduction by Arnold Rampersand); Nella Larsen, "Quicksand" (1928); Claude McKay, "Home to Harlem" (1928). Copies are available at Labyrinth bookstore. Consider supporting your local bookstore. |
| Admission requirements | This MA course is a research seminar for MA students, PhD candidates, and post-docs. |
| Language of instruction | English |
| Use of digital media | Online, mandatory |
| Interval | Weekday | Time | Room |
|---|
No dates available. Please contact the lecturer.
| Modules |
Modul: Anglophone Literary and Cultural Studies (Master's degree subject: English) Modul: Fields: Knowledge Production and Transfer (Master's degree program: African Studies) Modul: Fields: Media and Imagination (Master's degree program: African Studies) Modul: Koordinaten der Kreativität (Master's degree program: Cultural Techniques) Modul: Kulturtechnische Dimensionen (Master's degree program: Cultural Techniques) Modul: Literatur- und kulturwissenschaftliche Forschung (Master's degree program: Literary Studies) Modul: Literaturgeschichte (Master's degree program: Literary Studies) Modul: Research in Anglophone Literary and Cultural Studies (Master's degree subject: English) |
| Assessment format | continuous assessment |
| Assessment details | no more than two absences, weekly readings, active participation |
| Assessment registration/deregistration | Reg.: course registration; dereg.: not required |
| Repeat examination | no repeat examination |
| Scale | Pass / Fail |
| Repeated registration | as often as necessary |
| Responsible faculty | Faculty of Humanities and Social Sciences, studadmin-philhist@unibas.ch |
| Offered by | Fachbereich Englische Sprach- und Literaturwissenschaft |