Specjalization classes: literature-culture studies 2 340-AS2-2LCS2

Selected aspects of Native American history, culture, and literature (including key critics and representatives). The aim of the course is to broaden students' knowledge and abilities in the areas of cultural and literary studies. During the course, students will explore new areas of research in these fields, improve interpretative abilities of literary and cultural works as well as discover connections between various cultural phenomenon.

The aim of this course is to provide an introduction to the works of William Shakespeare in the context of Elizabethan worldview assumptions and the conventions of Elizabethan theatre. Students will focus on selected works and will be introduced to contemporary interpretive proposals (e.g. H. Bloom, S. Greenblatt, R. Girard). In addition to analysing and interpreting the plays, students will be introduced to selected 20th and 21st century theatrical and film adaptations.

The aim of the course is to familiarise students with key aspects of African American history, culture and literature, and to develop their skills in critically analysing literary texts and historical sources. The course covers the period from the 18th century to the second half of the 20th century, showing the evolution of the African American experience and its literary representation.

The first part of the course focuses on the literature of the slavery period, including authentic source texts, slave narratives and the poetry of enslaved people. Excerpts from Frederick Douglass's Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave and Phillis Wheatley's poetry will be analysed as examples of early African American literary expression and testimony to the experience of slavery.

Subsequent thematic blocks are devoted to racial segregation in the Jim Crow era and literary and cultural responses to racism and racial violence. The poetry of Langston Hughes and the essay ‘When the Negro Was in Vogue’ will be discussed in the context of the Harlem Renaissance, as well as Marilyn Nelson's poem ‘A Wreath for Emmett Till.’

The course includes an analysis of the civil rights movement, with particular emphasis on the figure and work of Martin Luther King Jr.

The course also includes an analysis of Octavia Butler's novel "Kindred" as a contemporary reinterpretation of the experience of slavery and Maya Angelou's poetry as an important voice of the African American experience in the 20th century.
The course is conversational and analytical in nature. It includes reading and interpreting literary texts, discussions and student presentations, which enable in-depth discussion of selected issues and the development of critical thinking and text analysis skills.

1.Sacvan Bercovitch (ed.), The Cambridge History of American Literature, CUP 2005.
2.Joy Porter, The Cambridge Companion to Native American Literature, CUP 2005.
3.Arnold Krupat, The Voice in the Margin, Univ. of California Press 1989.
4.Harlod Bloom (ed.), Native American Writers, Bloom’s Literary Criticism 2010.

Primary sources:

- Wiliama Shakespeare's plays selected by the teacher and students w(1 history play, 2 tragedies , 1 comedy, 1 'problem' play)

Secondary sources:

McEachern, Claire, ed. The Cambridge Companion to Shakesepearean Tragedy, CUP, 2002.

Leggatt, Alexander. The Cambridge Companion to Shakespearean Comedy, CUP, 2004.

Watson, Donald. G. Shakespeare's Early History Plays: Politics at Play on the Elizabethan Stage, Macmillan, 1990.

Greenblatt, Stephen. Will in the World: How Shakespeare Became Shakespeare, W. W. Norton & Company, 2004.

---. Shakespeare's Freedom, The University of Chicago press, 2010.

Bloom, Harold.Shakespeare. The Invention of the Human (1998);

Literature covered in class:
Frederick Douglass "Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, an American Slave" (excerpts)
Phillis Wheatley - poetry
Martin Luther King Jr. "ATime to Break Silence: The Essential Works of Martin Luther King Jr., for Students" (selected texts)
Octavia Butler "Kindred"
Langston Hughes poetry and "When the Negro was in Vogue"
Maya Angelou poetry
Marilyn Nelson "A Wreath for Emmet Till"
"The Cambridge Companion to American Civil Rights Literature" Armstrong, Julie, editor. 2015.
Anderson, David, and Marilyn Nelson. “An Interview with Marilyn Nelson.” African American Review, vol. 43, no. 2/3, 2009, pp. 383–95. JSTOR,
http://www.jstor.org/stable/41328615.
Müller, Timo. "The African American Sonnet: A Literary History" 2018.
Additional texts (optional):
"Four Hunderd Souls" Ibram X. Kendi, Keisha N. Blain 2021
"Remembering Jim Crow" Ed. William H. Chafe, Raymond Gavins, Robert Korstad 2001
"African American Voices" Ed. Leslie Brown 2014
"At the Dark End of the Street" Danielle L. McGuire 2010
"The Autobiography of Martin Luther King, Jr." ed. Clayborne Carson 1998
"The Blood of Emmett Till" Timothy B. Tyson 2017
"The Color of Law" Richard Rothstein 2017