19th-C AWW
1
Nineteenth-Century American Women Writers
Spring 2011
Instructor: Dr. Kai-ling Liu
Level of students: MA and Ph. D students
Office hours: T 12:00-13:00; W 08:00-09:00.
Phone: (O) 52242
e-mail: kailing@mail.ncku.edu.tw
Course Description
The nineteenth-century American literature used to witness the “American
Renaissance” of male authors such as Washington Irving, Ralph Waldo Emerson,
Nathaniel Hawthorne, and Walt Whitman. Studies in the past three decades have,
nevertheless, re-discovered women authors whose novels in particular were much
more popular than those by their male counterparts. What were the material
conditions and the ideology under which these women produced their work?
What are the paradigms for the criticism of these women writers? Given that most
of these women writers were white middle-classed and that the novel was the
prevalent genre used by women at that time, we’ll focus on three popular novels to
1) understand the ideology and the material conditions where they wrote their
works, 2) explore how these writers speak to these ideology and conditions, and 3)
engage the students in a dialogue with critics of 19th-century American literature.
Requirements
Attendance
5% One absence will result in a loss of 1 point of the term grades.
Class participation 10%
Facilitation
15% See Appendix I for instructions.
Class notes
10% A 2-paragraph note which you upload to moodle after each
class. One paragraph is a summary of the class discussion. The
other is your reflection on one issue that interests you.
Paper proposal
20% See Appendix III for instructions.
Term paper
40% 8-10 pages for MA students. 15-20 pages for Ph.D. students.
Primary Sources
Parton, Sara Willis. (Fanny Fern; 1811-1872). Ruth Hall and Other Writings. New
Brunswick: Rutgers UP, 1986. (1854)
Sedgwick, Catharine Maria (1789-1867). Hope Leslie, or, Early times in the
Massachusetts. Danvers, MA: General Books, 2009. (1827)
Stowe, Harriet Beecher (1811-1896). Uncle Tom's Cabin: Authoritative Text,
Backgrounds and Contexts, Criticism. New York: W. W. Norton, 1994. (1852)
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Class Schedule
W01 2/23 Course introduction
W02 3/2 Features and themes of the 19th-century American women writers
◎Baym, Nina. Woman’s Fiction: A Guide to Novels by and about Women
in America, 1820-70. Illinois: U of Illinois P, 1993. (Course Packet;
1 )
CP○
◎ Tompkins, Jane. “The Other American Renaissance.” Sensational
Designs: The Cultural Work of American Fiction, 1790-1860,
Oxford: Oxford UP, 1985.147-85; 220-25 (notes). (Handouts)
Fetterley, Judith. Introduction. Provisions: A Reader from 19th-Century
American Women. Ed. Fetterley. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1985.
3 )
1-40. (CP○
Fetterley, Judith. “Commentary: Nineteenth-Century American Women
Writers and the Politics of Recovery.” American Literary History
4 )
6.3 (1994): 600-611. (CP○
Freibert, Lucy M., and Barbara A. White, eds. Introduction. Hidden
Hands: An Anthology of American Women Writers, 1790-1870. New
5 )
Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers UP, 1985. 1-9. (CP○
W03 3/9
Methods
◎ Davidson, Cathy N. “Introduction: Toward a History of Texts.”
Revolution and the Word: The Rise of the Novel in America. 1st ed.
2 )
1987. New York: Oxford UP, 2004. 3-54; ???? (Notes). (CP○
◎ Merish, Lori. “Introduction: the Forms of Cultured Feeling.”
Sentimental Materialism: Gender, Commodity Culture, and
Nineteenth-Century American Literature. By Merish. Durham and
London:
Duke
UP,
2000.
1-27.
(Online:
http://books.google.com.tw/books ; On Reserve)
Earl. Introduction. Popular 19th-century American Women Writers and the
Literary Market. Ed. Earl Yarington and Mary De Jong. New Castle,
6 )
UK: Cambridge Scholars Publishing, 2007. 1-9. (CP○
W04 3/16 Stowe, Uncle Tom's Cabin
W05 3/23 Stowe, Uncle Tom's Cabin
W06 3/30 ◎Brown, Gillian. “Getting in the Kitchen with Dinah: Domestic Politics
in Uncle Tom’s Cabin.” American Quarterly 39.4 (1984): 503-523.
(Handouts)
◎ Merish, Lori. “Sentimental Consumption: Harriot Beecher Stowe,
Nathaniel Hawthorne, and the Aesthetics of Middle-Class
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Ownership.” Sentimental Materialism: Gender, Commodity Culture,
and Nineteenth-Century American Literature. By Merish. Durham
and
London:
Duke
UP,
2000.
135-90.
(Online:
http://books.google.com.tw/books ; On Reserve)
Pelletier, Kevin. "Uncle Tom's Cabin and Apocalyptic Sentimentalism."
11 )
LIT 20.4 (2009): 266-87. (CP○
Coleman, Dawn. "The Unsentimental Woman Preacher of Uncle Tom's
12 )
Cabin." American Literature 80.2 (2008): 265-92. (CP○
Wearn, Mary McCartin. Negotiating Motherhood in Nineteenth-Century
American Literature. London; New York: Routledge, 2008.
(Online: http://books.google.com.tw/books )
W07 4/6
Spring Break. No class.
W08 4/13 Parton, Ruth Hall
W09 4/20 Parton, Ruth Hall
W10 4/27
Homestead, Melissa J. “’Every Body Sees the Theft’: Fanny Fern and
Periodical Reprinting in the 1850s.” American Women Authors and
Literary Property, 1822-1869. By Homestead. New York:
Cambridge UP, 2005. 150-191. (CP)
◎Dowling, David. "Capital Sentiment: Fanny Fern's Transformation of
the Gentleman Publisher's Code." ATQ 22.1 (2008): 347-64.
(Online: http://www.bnet.com/?tag=header;header-pri)
◎Harris, Jennifer. "Marketplace Transactions and Sentimental Currencies
in Fanny Fern's Ruth Hall." ATQ 20.1 (2006): 343-59.
(Online: http://www.bnet.com/?tag=header;header-pri)
Askeland, Lori. "Has a Mother a Right to Her Children?: Fanny Fern's
Urban Domesticity and the 'Birth' of Foster Care and Adoption in
Mid-nineteenth-century America." A/B 18.2 (2003): 171-95. (Not
included in CP)
Willey, Nicole L. Creating a New Ideal of Masculinity for American Men:
the Achievement of Sentimental Women Writers in the
Mid-Nineteenth Century. Lewiston, NY; Lampeter: Mellen Press,
2007. (Not included in CP)
Weyler, Karen A. "Literary Labors and Intellectual Prostitution: Fanny
Fern's Defense of Working Women." South Atlantic Review 70.2
(2005): 96-131. (Not included in CP)
W11 5/4
Sedgwick, Hope Leslie
W12 5/11 Sedgwick, Hope Leslie
W13 5/18 ◎Homestead, Melissa J. "Suited to the Market: Catharine Sedgwick,
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Female Authorship, and the Literary Property Debates, 1822-1842."
American Women Authors and Literary Property, 1822-1869. By
7 )
Homestead. New York: Cambridge UP, 2005. 21-62. (CP○
◎Ousley, Laurie. "The Business of Housekeeping: the Mistress, the
Domestic Worker, and the Construction of Class." Legacy 23.2
8 )
(2006):132-47. (CP○
Sweet, Nancy F.: "Dissent and the Daughter in a New England Tale and
9 )
Hobomok." Legacy 22.2 (2005):107-25. (CP○
W14 5/25
W15 6/1
W16 6/8
Proposal discussion
Paper writing.
Individual conference: first draft
W17 6/15 Paper presentation
W18 6/22 Revised paper due
References
Links
 The Norton Anthology of American Literature Student Website
http://www.wwnorton.com/college/english/naal7/welcome.asp
The Norton Anthology of American Literature Student Website provides on-line
resources of American Literature. The website includes period introductions,
questions for discussions, writing and research of selected authors based on the
six periods in the timeline of American literature: To 1820, 1820~1865,

1865~1914, 1914~1945, and Since 1945.
The Norton Anthology of Literature by Women Website
http://www.wwnorton.com/college/english/nalw/
The Norton Anthology of Literature by Women Website features six topics that
are organized to provide an overview of a cultural, historical, or literary context
of selected works in the anthology. The six topics include: (1) Killing the Angel:
Anxieties about Motherhood for Women Writers (2) Wrestling with Eve (3)
Women’s Education: A History of the Feminist Polemic (4) The Ecstasy of
Influence: Inspiration and Mentorship among Women Writers (5) Toward a


Feminist Utopia: Women’s Same-Sex Communities, Real and Imagined (6)
Re-appropriating Mythology.
Literature Online
http://www.onread.com/ (You can read online or register to download all texts
except Ruth Hall and Other Writings.
Books (* on reserve)
*Baym, Nina. Woman’s Fiction: A Guide to Novels by and about Women in America,
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1820-70. Illinois: U of Illinois P, 1993.
*Davidson, Cathy N. Revolution and the Word: The Rise of the Novel in America. 1st
ed. 1987. New York: Oxford UP, 2004.
*Deetz, James. In Small Things Forgotten. New York: Doubleday, 1977.
*Fetterley, Judith, ed. Provisions: A Reader from 19th-Century American Women.
Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1985.
*Freibert, Lucy M., and Barbara A. White, eds. Hidden Hands: An Anthology of
American Women Writers, 1790-1870. New Brunswick, New Jersey: Rutgers
UP, 1985.
Godey’s Lady’s Book. http://www.history.rochester.edu/godeys/
*Heneghan, Bridget T. Whitewashing America: Material Culture and Race in the
Antebellum Imagination. Bloomington: Indiana UP, 1992.
*Homestead, Melissa J. American Women Authors and Literary Property, 1822-1869.
New York: Cambridge UP, 2005.
*Kelley, Mary. Private Woman, Public Stage: Literary Domesticity in
Nineteenth-Century America. Oxford: Oxford UP, 1984.
*Kilcup, Karen L., ed. Soft Canons: American Women Writers and Masculine
Tradition. Iowa City: U of Iowa P, 1999.
Kowaleski-Wallace, Elizabeth. Consuming Subjects: Women, Shopping, and Business
in the 18th Century. New York: Columbia UP, 1997.
*Merish, Lori. Sentimental Materialism: Gender, Commodity Culture, and
Nineteenth-Century American Literature. Durham and London: Duke UP, 2000.
*Motz, Marilyn Ferris, and Pat Browne, eds. Making the American Home:
Middle-Class Women and Domestic Material Culture 1840-1940.Bowling
Green, Ohio: Bowling Green State University Popular Press, 1988.
*Tompkins, Jane. Sensational Designs: The Cultural Work of American Fiction,
1790-1860, Oxford: Oxford UP, 1985.
Williams, Susan S. Reclaiming Authority: Literary Women in America. Philadelphia:
U of Pennsylvania P, 2006.
Woloch, Nancy. Women and the American Experience. By Woloch. New York:
Alfred Knopf, 1984.
*Yarington, Earl, and Mary De Jong, eds. Popular 19th-century American Women
Writers and the Literary Market. New Castle, UK: Cambridge Scholars
Publishing, 2007.
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Appendix I: Instructions for facilitation of discussions
A. Facilitation of novel discussions
Part I. Summary of the assigned part as pertinent to the theme of the novel as it
concerns you. Identify the major characters, the setting, and the plot. List
themes and summarize the development of these themes.
Part II. List 2-3 questions for discussion. For each of your question, relate the
question to the context of the novel.
B. Facilitation of article discussions
Include the answers to the following.
1. What is the issue?
2. How does this issue engage the writer with previous studies?
3. What is the writer’s position (argument)? Does s/he supplement or argue
against other critics’ research? How?
4. What does the writer develop her/his thesis? Or, how does s/he reach the
conclusion?
5. What is your response to the writer’s argument? Do you agree? Do you
disagree? On what basis?
6. Who are the most cited critics of this issue? What journals publish the relevant
researches? Are these journals available?
Appendix II: Proposal format
Explain your proposed paper project according to the following format.
1. What? -- Identify the question or problem you will investigate, making sure that the
scope of your inquiry is clear (e.g., not "Is there any evidence that Chaucer used
Dante's Inferno in the Canterbury Tales ?")
2. Why? -- Explain what the importance of this question or problem is.
3. Summarize the current state of scholarship relating to the subject: identify the
major treatments of it, indicating what each major study has contributed.
4. How? -- Explain in what way your study will correct or complete those already
available; what new contribution will you be making?
5. Include a brief outline to show the way in which you intend to organize the thesis.
Suggest the approximate length of each section.
6. Append a preliminary bibliography of the subject, including the relevant (or
apparently relevant) items listed in standard sources. Annotate the bibliography
briefly for those items you have read.