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THE AFRICAN AMERICAN NOVEL: SYLLABUS
Course: AMN–340. xxx Elective Seminar Course [G]: 2 credits
Place: ELTE American Studies Department, ADS Room 238
Time: Friday 10.00–11.30
Instructor: Éva Gyetvai, PhD Student of American Studies at ELTE Doctoral School of Literary Studies
e-mail: eva.gyetvai@t-online.hu
COURSE DESCRIPTION
Through the reading of 13 novels by African American (AFAM) writers, students will be able to (1) better comprehend
the literary works of AFAM authors; (2) analyze the themes, styles, and methods of AFAM novelists; (3) recognize
cultural themes inherent in AFAM writing; (4) and trace the development of AFAM novels from their beginnings to the
present. This seminar also desires to enable the students to recognize as well as to be able to share the beauties and the
truths embedded in/performed by African American writing. On a more practical level, the course will help the students
prepare for their Final Comprehensive Exam (Államvizsga) in American Literature.
SET TEXTS
Nella Larsen (1893–1963), Passing, 1929
Zora Neale Hurston (1891–1960), Their Eyes Were Watching God, 1937
Richard Wright (1908–1960), Native Son, 1940
Ralph Ellison (1914–1994), Invisible Man, 1948–1952
James Baldwin (1924–1987), Go Tell It on the Mountain, 1952–1953
John A. Williams, (b. 1925), The Man Who Cried I Am, 1967
Alice Walker (b. 1944), The Color Purple, 1982
Toni Morrison (b. 1931), Beloved, 1987
Ernest J. Gaines, (b. 1933), Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman, 1973
Gloria Naylor (b. 1950), The Women of Brewster Place, 1982
Edward P. Jones (b. 1950), The Known World, 2003
Colson Whitehead (b. 1970), The Intuitionist, 1999
Octavia E. Butler (1948– 2006), Parable of the Sower, 1993
SEAS LIB
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REQUIREMENTS
 Regular ATTENDANCE (ELTE).
 Reading the set texts.
 Please come to class prepared with at least ONE FOCUS QUESTION specifically referring to the text of the
novel we are reading that day. We are going to discuss as many of your focus questions as time allows us in class.
 At the beginning of the semester, you must sign up for one ORAL PRESENTATION, which means you will be
responsible for leading class discussion and analysis of a novel, too. In preparing your presentations, you must attend
to five key concerns:

Content: what is said?

Point of view: who is speaking?

Style: how is it said?

Context: when and where is the text articulated?

Discussion: (what lessons do you feel you have taken away from this novel? ect. 50% of grade).
 One END-OF-TERM CREATIVE ESSAY responding to (one or some of) these questions: what do you think
you have learnt in this seminar? Can you see any thematic, stylistic, or contextual recurring elements or practices that
may arguably characterize the African American novel? If you had to give a 45-minute lecture on the AFAM novel to
undergraduate students, for example, what major line of thought would your rationale be revolving around? Papers
should be of 5 to 6 typed pages and edited in accordance with the latest MLA style handbook available at SEAS LIB.
The essays should be dealing with or responding to the texts in the Syllabus (50% of grade).
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COURSE SCHEDULE
SEPTEMBER 8
ORIENTATION (15 MIN)
SEPTEMBER 15
THE ROOTS OF CONTEMPORARY AFRICAN AMERICAN NOVEL: A BRIEF INTRODUCTION (30 MIN)
 Du Bois, “Criteria of Negro Art”
PRESENTER: Éva Gyetvai
MODERNISM, THE HARLEM RENAISSANCE, AND THE SEARCH FOR NEW MODES OF NARRATIVE
 Nella Larsen, Passing, 1929
 Gates, “The Trope of a New Negro and the Reconstruction of the Image of the Black”
PRESENTERS:
SEPTEMBER 22
MODERNISM, THE HARLEM RENAISSANCE, AND THE SEARCH FOR NEW MODES OF NARRATIVE
 Zora Neale Hurston, Their Eyes Were Watching God, 1934
 Hurston, “How It Feels to be a Colored Me” 1936
PRESENTERS:
SEPTEMBER 29
RICHARD WRIGHT AND THE TRIUMPH OF NATURALISM
 Richard Wright, Native Son, 1940

Wright, “Blueprint for Negro Writing,” 1937
PRESENTERS:
OCTOBER 6
MYTH, LEGEND, AND RITUAL IN THE NOVELS OF THE FIFTIES
 Ralph Ellison, Invisible Man, 1948–1952
PRESENTERS:
OCTOBER 13
MYTH, LEGEND, AND RITUAL IN THE NOVELS OF THE FIFTIES
 James Baldwin, Go Tell It on the Mountain, 1952–1953
 Baldwin, “Everybody’s Protest Novel,” 1949
PRESENTERS:
OCTOBER 20
FORMS OF NEO-REALISM: CRITICAL REALISM
 John A. Williams, The Man Who Cried I Am, 1967
 Fanon, The Wretched of the Earth
PRESENTERS:
OCTOBER 27
FORMS OF NEO-REALISM: CRITICAL REALISM AND FOLK ROMANCE
 Alice Walker, The Color Purple, 1982
 Walker “Everyday Use”
 Walker, “Womanist Definition”
PRESENTERS:
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NOVEMBER 3: FALL BREAK FALL BREAK FALL BREAK FALL BREAK
NOVEMBER 10
FORMS OF NEO-REALISM: POETIC REALISM AND THE GOTHIC FABLE
 Toni Morrison, Beloved, 1987
 Harer, “Colored Women of America.”
PRESENTERS:
NOVEMBER 17
MODERNISM AND POSTMODERNISM
 Ernest J. Gaines, The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman, 1971

PRESENTERS:
NOVEMBER 24
CONTINUITY AND CHANGE IN ETHNIC TROPES OF IDENTITY FORMATION
 Gloria Naylor, The Women of Brewster Place, 1982
 Naylor—Morrison, “A Conversation: Gloria Naylor and Toni Morrison”
PRESENTERS:
DECEMBER 1
CONTINUITY AND CHANGE IN ETHNIC TROPES OF IDENTITY FORMATION
 Edward P. Jones, The Known World, 2003
 McCoy, “Race and the (Para)Textual Condition”
PRESENTERS:
DECEMBER 8
THE NEW BLACK AESTHETIC
 Colson Whitehead, The Intuitionist, 1999
 Neal, “The Black Arts Movement”
 Ellis, “The New Black Aesthetic”
 Farrakhan, “The Million Man March Pledge”
PRESENTERS:
DECEMBER 15
CONTEMPORARY AFRICAN AMERICAN PARA-LITERATURE
 Octavia E. Butler, Parable of the Sower, 1993
 Jablon, “Metafiction as Genre”
PRESENTERS:
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BIBLIOGRAPHY
BOOKS, COLLECTIONS, AND ANTHOLOGIES TO CONSULT:
Andrews, William L., Frances Smiths Foster, and Trudier Harris, eds. The Oxford Companion to African
American Literature. New York: Oxford University Press, 1997.
Baker, Houston A. Jr. Blues, Ideology, and Afro-American Literature: A Vernacular Theory. Chicago and
London: University of Chicago Press, 1984. CEU LIB
Carby, Hazel. Reconstructing Womanhood: The Emergence of the Afro-American Woman Novelist. New
York: Oxford University Press, 1987.
Fanon, Frantz. The Wretched of the Earth. Translated by Constance Farrington. New York: Grove Press,
1963. CEU LIB
Gates, Henry Louis, Jr. The Signifying Monkey: A Theory of African-American Literary Criticism. New
York: Oxford University Press, 1989.
Gates, Henry Louis, Jr., and Nellie Y. McKay, eds. The Norton Anthology of African American Literature.
New York and London: W. W. Norton & Company, 1998.
Hutcheon, Linda. A Poetics of Postmodernism: History, Theory, Fiction. New York: Routledge, 1988. CEU
LIB
Napier, Winston, ed. African American Literary Theory: A Reader. New York: New York University Press,
2000.
ESSAYS TO READ IN NAAAL:
Baldwin, James. “Everybody’s Protest Novel.” 1949. NAAAL. 1654–1659.
Du Bois, W. E. B. “Criteria of Negro Art.” NAAAL. 752–759.
Hurston, Zora Neale. “How It Feels to be a Colored Me.” 1936. NAAAL. 1019–1032.
Neal, Larry. “The Black Arts Movement.” 1968. NAAAL. 1966–1972.
Walker, Alice. “Everyday Use.” NAAAL. 2384–2394.
Wright, Richard. “Blueprint for Negro Writing.” 1937. NAAAL. 1380–1388.
AND OUR COURSE PACKET:
Ellis, Trey. “The New Black Aesthetic.” New Bones: Contemporary Black Writers in America. Eds. Kevin
Everod Quashie, Joyce Lausch, and Keith D. Miller. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2001.
261–272.
Farrakhan, Louis. “The Million Man March Pledge.” Washington D.C. October 16, 1995. Rpt. in African
American Mosaic: A Documentary History from the Slave Trade to the Twenty-First Century.
Volume Two. From 1865 to the Present. Eds. John H. Bracey, Jr. and Manisha Sinha. Upper Saddle
River, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2004. 493–494.
Gates, Henry Louis Jr. “The Trope of a New Negro and the Reconstruction of the Image of the Black.”
Representations 24 (Fall 1988): 129-55.
Harper, Francis Ellen Watkins. “Colored Women of America.” Englishwoman’s Review. January 15, 1878.
Rpt. in Bracey, Jr. and Sinha. 384–386.
Jablon, Madelyn. “Metafiction as Genre.” Black Metafiction: Self-Consciousness in African American
Literature. Iowa City: University of Iowa Press, 1997. 139–166.
McCoy, Beth A. “Race and the (Para)Textual Condition.” PMLA. 121.1 (2006): 156–169.
Naylor, Gloria. “A Conversation: Gloria Naylor and Toni Morrison.” Southern Review. 21 (1985): 567–593.
Rpt. in Conversations with Toni Morrison. Ed. Danielle Taylor-Guthrie, Jackson: University Press
of Mississippi, 1994. 188–218.
Truman, Harry S. “Executive Order 9808, December 5, 1946.” Rpt. in Bracey, Jr. and Sinha. 301–306.
Walker, Alice. “Womanist Definition.” Quashie, Lausch, and Miller. 942–943.