Nov 10, 2024
OHIO University Undergraduate Catalog 2021-22

AAS 2100 - Slave Narrative and Freeman/Freewomen Fiction of the 18th and 19th Centuries


Will cover the African American slave narrative, from the eighteenth to the nineteenth centuries, along with free-woman and free-man writings of the later nineteenth century and possibly the early twentieth century. Readings typically include works by such authors as Frederick Douglass, Harriet Jacobs, William Wells Brown, and Solomon Northup. The course will consider contemporary debates surrounding the question of authenticity as well as current views of how slave narratives merit aesthetically. The course also interrogates questions pertaining to how the slave narrative challenges conventional notions of autobiography and how the early black novel confronts received and developing notions of the U.S. novel.

Credit Hours: 3
OHIO BRICKS Pillar: Humanities: Text and Contexts
General Education Code (students who entered prior to Fall 2021-22): 2HL
Repeat/Retake Information: May be retaken two times excluding withdrawals, but only last course taken counts.
Lecture/Lab Hours: 3.0 lecture
Grades: Eligible Grades: A-F,WP,WF,WN,FN,AU,I
Course Transferability: OTM course: TMAH Arts & Humanities
College Credit Plus: Level 1
Learning Outcomes:
  • Augmenting the student’s abilities as a critical writer.
  • Helping the student mature as a critical reader of literary texts.
  • Increasing the student’s capabilities with respect to research and study methods in literary criticism and African American studies.
  • Providing student with strong academic knowledge of early African American literary writings such as slave narratives.
  • Recognizing importance of alternative black nationalism and black transnationalism in literary texts.
  • Recognizing importance of political and cultural historical in literary texts.


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