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DEGREE REGULATIONS & PROGRAMMES OF STUDY 2019/2020

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DRPS : Course Catalogue : School of Literatures, Languages and Cultures : English Literature

Undergraduate Course: The Black Atlantic (ENLI10183)

Course Outline
SchoolSchool of Literatures, Languages and Cultures CollegeCollege of Arts, Humanities and Social Sciences
Credit level (Normal year taken)SCQF Level 10 (Year 4 Undergraduate) AvailabilityNot available to visiting students
SCQF Credits20 ECTS Credits10
SummaryA study of racial discourse in American and British literature of the 19th and 20th centuries. In particular, the role of 'race' in constructions of modernity and identity will be evaluated.
Course description Seminar Schedule
(Please kindly note the readings are either short full-length texts or selected excerpts from longer works)

Week
1. The Real Thing: Mapping the Black Atlantic in Early Literature and Visual Culture: Race, Representation and Resistance: African Atlantic Narratives of Slavery and Freedom in UK and US Broadsides:
Josiah Wedgwood, Am I Not a Man and a Brother (Stafford, 1787); Slave Ship Brooks (Liverpool, 1788); John Comber, A Poor African (London,1861). [all hand-outs supplied]
2. Loophole of Retreat: Tracing Transatlantic Black Womanist Literary Paradigms Part I:
Mary Prince, The History of Mary Prince (1831); Wonderful Adventures of Mrs Seacole in Many Lands (1857). [selected excerpts]
3. Women and Sisters: Tracing Transatlantic Black Womanist Literary Paradigms Part II:
T. C. Upham, Narrative of Phebe Ann Jacobs, 1850; John Hawkins Simpson, The True Story of Dinah, An Escaped Plantation Slave (1863).
[available online at Documenting the American South]
4. Men and Brothers: African Atlantic Slave Narratives Published in the UK:
Benjamin Compton Chisley, A Short Narrative (1851); John Brown, Untitled Manuscript Narrative (1854); William and Ellen Craft, Running A Thousand Miles (1860); James Johnson, The Life of the Late James Johnson (1877). [selected excerpts; handouts supplied]
5. No Right to be a Hero: African Atlantic Acts and Arts of Revolution and Resistance: Toussaint Louverture, Sengbe Pieh and Harriet Tubman:
John Barber, A History of the Amistad (1840); William Wells Brown, St. Domingo (1855); Sarah Bradford, Harriet, the Moses of Her People (1869). ).
[available online at Documenting the American South] [selected excerpts]
6. No Classes - Flexible Learning Week
7. Authorship, Artistry and Black Masculinity:
William Wells Brown, Travels in Europe (1852) and Frederick Douglass, My Bondage and My Freedom (1855). [selected excerpts]
8. Transatlantic Anti-Lynching Activism:
Ida B. Wells: The Light of Truth: Writings of an Anti-Lynching Campaigner. (new ed. 2014). [selections]
To consult website: Without Sanctuary: Lynching Photography in America.
9. Essay completion; no class.
10. Race Relations and the Search for a Diasporic Utopia:
Sutton E. Griggs, Imperium in Imperio (1899) and Booker T. Washington, Up From Slavery (1901). [selected excerpts]
11. Africa in an Atlantic Imaginary:
Pauline Hopkins, Of One Blood (1902-3).
12. Black Intellectual Traditions, Education and Uplift:
Anna Julia Cooper, A Voice from the South (1892) and W. E. B. Du Bois, The Souls of Black Folk (1903). [selected excepts]
Entry Requirements (not applicable to Visiting Students)
Pre-requisites Students MUST have passed: ( English Literature 1 (ENLI08001) OR Scottish Literature 1 (ENLI08016)) AND ( English Literature 2 (ENLI08003) OR Scottish Literature 2 (ENLI08004) OR American Literature 2 (ENLI08006))
Co-requisites
Prohibited Combinations Other requirements None
Additional Costs Essential course texts.
Course Delivery Information
Academic year 2019/20, Not available to visiting students (SS1) Quota:  12
Course Start Semester 2
Timetable Timetable
Learning and Teaching activities (Further Info) Total Hours: 200 ( Seminar/Tutorial Hours 22, Other Study Hours 12, Programme Level Learning and Teaching Hours 4, Directed Learning and Independent Learning Hours 162 )
Additional Information (Learning and Teaching) 1 hour per week for 11 weeks autonomous learning
Assessment (Further Info) Written Exam 60 %, Coursework 40 %, Practical Exam 0 %
Additional Information (Assessment) One Coursework Essay of 2,500 words: 30%
One time-limited Final Essay of 3000 words: 60%
Class Participation Assessment: 10%
Feedback Not entered
No Exam Information
Learning Outcomes
Ability to apply a theoretical literary model across disparate texts. Increased knowledge and understanding of transatlantic cultural formations. Enhanced understanding of 'race' as a constructed social/literary category
Reading List
None
Additional Information
Course URL https://www.ed.ac.uk/literatures-languages-cultures/english-literature/undergraduate/current/honours
Graduate Attributes and Skills Not entered
Special Arrangements Numbers are limited and students taking degrees not involving English or Scottish literature need the written approval of the head of English Literature
Additional Class Delivery Information Seminar: 2 hours a week for 10 weeks

plus 1 hour per week for 10 weeks: autonomous learning group at times to be arranged.
KeywordsENLI10183 Black Atlantic
Contacts
Course organiserDr Patricia Malone
Tel: (0 131 6)50 8618
Email: Patricia.Malone@ed.ac.uk
Course secretaryMiss Helene Thomsen
Tel: (0131 6)50 3618
Email: Helene.Thomsen@ed.ac.uk
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