AML 3271.1188 African American Literature
Survey 2 (1940 - present)
-- Paper Assignment --

Rationale:
As stated on the paper copy of the syllabus, the 8-10 page paper for this course is designed to reflect your comprehension of and responsible engagement with course topics and literature through textual evidence and extra-textual critique.

Given the easy availability of collegiate papers for sale either on the Internet or through any of hundreds of other sources, as well as the pressures on college students to "perform" (i.e. grades vs. an "education"), I've sadly found it necessary to assign paper topics. I still believe, however, that course papers rather than informational exams are students' best opportunites to display what they can creatively do with the given information and approaches of a course; therefore, I've allowed for (and encourage) as much lattitude as possible within the available topics. Remeber, however, that you're producing a scholarly paper, not a piece of "creative writing." Scholarly work has its own sense of creativity, yes, but the two rhetorics are not necessarily the same. Be serious about both the work you do and the fun you have with it.

Assignment:
Choose one of the following options to create an 8-10 page paper (30% of your course grade):

• Option 1: Discuss the changing concept of the African American artist/writer proposed in our course readings (i.e. Schuyler, Hughes, Wright, Fuller, Neal, Karenga, Baraka, etc. -- don't forget Morrison and Hall's pieces in the course packet!), and as illustrated by any three pieces of literature assigned for the course (i.e. autobiography, poems, short stories, novels, plays) by different authors. That is, show how three pieces of literature illustrate or serve as examples of conceptualizations of the African American artist/writer contemporary to them.
  You have available to you any of the essays, treatises, or manifestos we'll have read up to the paper due date. To broaden your scope, you may want to read ahead to the three treatises we'll be discussing after the paper due date --
  June Jordan's "A New Politics of Sexuality" N pp.2238-2241
  Ishmael Reed's "Neo-HooDoo Manifesto" N pp.2297-2301
  Alice Walker's (exquisitely fabulous) "In Search of Our Mothers' Gardens" N pp.2380-2387
  (also Cornel West's "The Dilemma of the Black Intellectual" in course packet pp.53-60) -- to use as well.

• Option 2: Discuss "blackness" as a product of hegemonic white gaze, as illustrated by any three pieces of literature assigned for the course (i.e. autobiography, poems, short stories, novels, plays) by different authors, and those authors' reactions to that constructing white gaze. How have we seen the "white gaze" proposed in our readings, and how has its effects been negotiated in the literature assigned for the course?
  You'll find it helpful to peruse PostColonial theorist Homi Bhabha's essay "Of Mimicry and Man" included in the course packet pp.47-52; while Bhabha appropriates French psychoanalytic theorist Jacques Lacan's conceptualizations of "the gaze" that produces "its own object of desire" to examine British-colonized India, his discussion has been invoked by various African American scholars (Bhabha was himself influenced by many African American writers).

• Option 3: Or, conversely, discuss "blackness" as a specifically African American-constructed identity as illustrated by any three pieces of literature assigned for the course (i.e. autobiography, poems, short stories, novels, plays) by different authors. (See suggested sources from Options 1 & 2 above.)

• Option 4: Discuss further diversity/variety within African American culture's conceptualizations of either
  the African American artist/writer
  or
  of "blackness"
  in terms of women, gays and/or lesbians, or foreign blacks living within a U.S.-defined sense of "blackness" as illustrated by any three pieces of literature assigned for the course (i.e. autobiography, poems, short stories, novels, plays) by different authors. (In addition to June Jordan's "A New Politics of Sexuality" N pp.2238-2241, see also Elizabeth Spelman's "The Erasure of Black Women" in course packet pp.61-73, as well as suggested sources from Options 1 &2. You may also need to consult with me individually for further source references. )

  (BTW, "assigned for the course" = regardless whether we explicitly discussed that piece in class or not; gives you manoevring room.)
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  »»What I'll look for in your paper

  Content-wise:

  • a clear, solid, well-defined argument presented early in the paper (somewhere in first few ¶s)
  • actual use of analytical concepts/terms and critical vocabulary (when/where pertinent) from the course
  • use of those concepts & terms that evinces familiarity with them
  • copious references to and quotations from primary sources (i.e. essays, poems, short stories, novels, plays)
  • quotations from or sufficient glosses of secondary sources (critical articles about literature; literary theory) that apply
  mechanics:
  • whether you actually follow format guidelines (see Course Policies Page, as well as example cover sheet on packet p.7)
  • use of writers' full names, qualifications, and source titles the first time you mention them in the body of your paper; use of last names and signal phrases when/where appropriate for each use thereafter
  • citations for each direct in-line or block quotation, paraphrase, or factoid according to MLA convention for scholarly papers
  • illustration of each point of your discussion with specific examples and quotations derived from the texts we've read
  • attention to spelling, punctuation, grammar, word usage, basic proofreading and editing (see packet pp.9-17; see also warnings on syllabus about careless writing)
  • a properly formatted Works Cited page in MLA style corresponding to the sources you cite in the body ¶s
  • whether you bothered to staple the bloody thing
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  »»Allowances & Restrictions (these items are not further negotiable)
  • You may bring in outside secondary sources (i.e. critical essays or theoretical pieces about literature you've encountered elsewhere) if and only if you've cleared them with me beforehand (not the night before due date, either).
  • You're restricted to literature (i.e. poems, short stories, novels, plays) assigned for the course -- you may not bring in literature read for other courses, or that you've found on your own. Sorry.
  
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  »»Course/Paper-Related Sites Links
  • Course Policies Page -- see the "Paper Formatting" section, and heed its guidelines
  • Additional course terms & concepts
  • 3000-level paper writing tips -- heartily suggested!
  • Outside texts informing/inspiring this course
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