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Full-Text Articles in African American Studies

Exploring Prejudice, Miscegenation, And Slavery's Consequences In Mark Twain's Pudd'nhead Wilson, Steven Watson Aug 2011

Exploring Prejudice, Miscegenation, And Slavery's Consequences In Mark Twain's Pudd'nhead Wilson, Steven Watson

The Kennesaw Journal of Undergraduate Research

This research paper analyzes Mark Twain's use of racist speech and racial stereotypes in his novel Pudd'nhead Wilson. Twain has often been criticized for his seemingly inflammatory language. However, a close reading of the text, supplemented by research in several anthologies of critical essays, reveals that Twain was actually interested in social justice. This is evident in his portrayal of Roxana as a sympathetic character who is victimized by white racist society in Dawson's Landing, Mississippi during the time of slavery. In the final analysis, Twain's writing was a product of the time period during which he wrote. This …


“'You Done Cheat Mose Out O' De Job, Anyways; We All Knows Dat'”: Faith Healing In The Fiction Of Kate Chopin, Karen Kel Roop May 2011

“'You Done Cheat Mose Out O' De Job, Anyways; We All Knows Dat'”: Faith Healing In The Fiction Of Kate Chopin, Karen Kel Roop

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Born in St. Louis, Missouri, in 1850, the half-way mark of the century in which the country itself would be broken in two, Kate Chopin was destined to bear witness to the many divisions that have distinguished the United States. Especially noticeable in the post-Reconstruction period in which she wrote was the expanding chasm between the races. This dissertation argues that even Chopin's most seemingly orthodox Southern stories betray a quest for a theology capable of healing the physical, emotional, and spiritual ills omnipresent in the country and especially apparent in the post-Civil War South. The alternative to mainstream Protestantism …


The Failure Of The Free World: Anarchy In Uncle Tom’S Cabin, Andy Cerrone Apr 2011

The Failure Of The Free World: Anarchy In Uncle Tom’S Cabin, Andy Cerrone

Interdisciplinary Perspectives: a Graduate Student Research Showcase

Harriett Beecher Stowe is often identified as an advocate for Christianity, woman's suffrage, autonomy, and the abolishment of slavery. However, inviting the reader to view her work through an anarchist lens, her magnum opus—Uncle Tom’s Cabin— offers the reader the opportunity to reconstruct her politics with immense implication. Critics regard Stowe's "Uncle Tom's Cabin" as a sermon devised with the intention to inflate the nation with the righteous spirit of God, offering to the reader the opportunity to partake in the message of her religious vision. While Stowe's absolute faith in her Christian profile of God is present, she invariably …


Compulsory Homosexuality And Black Masculine Performance, Vershawn A. Young Jan 2011

Compulsory Homosexuality And Black Masculine Performance, Vershawn A. Young

English Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.


Whence Comes Black Art?: The Construction And Application Of “Black Motivation”, Derrell Acon Jan 2011

Whence Comes Black Art?: The Construction And Application Of “Black Motivation”, Derrell Acon

Lawrence University Honors Projects

George Schuyler, in his tragically misguided 1926 essay for The Nation magazine, “The Negro-Art Hokum,” suggests that the only difference between Blacks and Whites is the color of skin, and that both races experience the same social, psychological and educational forces in America. He blatantly disregards American racism and inequality, and in his attempt to put forth his advocacy of color-blindness he merely projects and perpetuates the most racist of ideals within our country. Schuyler views the concept of Black Art very narrowly and insists on the impossibility of such an idea because of the supposed Americanness of the art. …


Narrativizing Success : Attitudes Toward African American Vernacular English In The Composition Classroom, Christopher W. Diorio Jan 2011

Narrativizing Success : Attitudes Toward African American Vernacular English In The Composition Classroom, Christopher W. Diorio

Theses, Dissertations and Capstones

My thesis analyzes academia’s response to African American Vernacular English (AAVE) features in academic writing and how teachers’ responses to AAVE writing create socially constructed personas for students based on their vernacular dialect features. The results show spoken language strongly influences written language, although the range of dialect use varies from single feature usage to use of multiple features, and occurrences of use are highly localized. While instances of AAVE in academic writing are irregular, instructor response to features shows a pattern of strikethroughs and imperative statements used to correct language. As studies demonstrate such approaches to writing have negligible …