This book is devoted exclusively to critical discussions of Afro-American literature and focuses specifically on critical issues that are especially pertinent to designing courses in Afro-American literature.

Table of Contents

AFRO-AMERICAN LITERARY HISTORY

Teaching Afro-American Literature: Survey or Tradition: The Reconstruction of Instruction

Robert B. Stepto, Yale University

Rivers Remembering Their Source: Comparative Studies in Black Literary History--Langston Hughes, Jacques Roumain, and Négritude

Melvin Dixon, Williams College

Preface to Blackness: Text and Pretext

Henry-Louis Gates, Jr., Yale University

BLACK FIGURATIVE LANGUAGE

The Blues Roots of Contemporary Afro-American Poetry

Sherley Anne Williams, University of California at San Diego

Dis and Dat: Dialect and the Descent

Henry-Louis Gates, Jr., Yale University

AFRO-AMERICAN LITERATURE AND FOLKLORE

Are You a Flying Lark or a Setting Dove?

Robert Hemenway, University of Kentucky

Riffs and Rituals: Folklore in the Work of Ralph Ellison

Robert G. O'Meally, Wesleyan University

THEORY IN PRACTICE

Introduction

Narration, Authentication, and Authorial Control in Frederick Douglass' Narrative of 1845

Robert B. Stepto, Yale University

Frederick Douglass' 1845 Narrative: The Text Was Meant to Be Preached

Robert G. O'Meally, Wesleyan University

Binary Oppositions in Chapter One of Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass an American Slave Written by Himself

Henry-Louis Gates, Jr., Yale University

AFRO-AMERICAN LITERATURE COURSE DESIGNS

Rethinking the Afro-American Literature Survey Course

Rethinking the Afro-American Genre Course

Rethinking the Interdisciplinary Course: Embracing Afro-American Literature