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The term 'resilience' generally describes a person's ability to recover from or adjust easily to horrific experiences, disastrous challenges and misfortune, including such utterly unimaginable and institutionalized conditions as Atlantic slavery, in which one human being was owned by another and deprived of most of the rights in the Americas and the British Empire. Resilience, however, does not eliminate stress or erase life's horrors and difficulties. Instead, it gives people the strength to tackle problems head on, overcome adversity and move on with their lives. In this seminar, we will first discuss some influential interdisciplinary approaches to and definitions of resilience and then apply the concept to literary and cultural studies. After a brief look at the cultural and sociocultural history of Atlantic slavery and the Atlantic slave trade, we will focus on significant engagements by contemporary African-American, Black British and Black-Canadian/Caribbean writers with the legacy of slavery and the concept of resilience. The main part of the seminar will be dedicated to the close readings of the four set literary texts to explore how resilience and resilient characters receive coverage in these post-slavery novels. Why do some characters become resilient and are hence able to marshal the strength to not just survive, but to prosper while others fail and perish? What strategies do they apply?
All participants are requested to obtain and read the following primary texts (please make sure to use the editions specified here), which will be discussed in the subsequent order:
- James Baldwin, Another Country ([1962] Penguin Classics, 2001/ ISBN 13-9780141186375); Toni Morrison, Beloved ([1987] Everyman's Library, 2006/ISBN 13-9781857152685);
- Caryl Philips, Cambridge ([1993] Vintage, 2008/ISBN 13-9780099520566), and
- Olive Senior, Dancing Lessons ([2011] Ov Books, 2013/ISBN 13-9781938604492).
Further texts required for the seminar will be provided online (cf. DuE Publico). |
