20th-21st Century American Literature

20th and 21st Century American Literature

• Emergence of multi-ethnic American literature and immigrant fiction
• Hyphenated identities: Italian-American, African-American, European-American, etc.

Italian-American Literature

• John Fante's The Bandini Quartet: Ask the Dust (1939), Wait Until Spring, Bandini, The Road to Los Angeles (1935), Dreams of Binker Hill
• Arturo Bandini: Fante's alter ego

Native American Literature

• N. Scott Momaday's House Made of Dawn (1968)

African-American Literature

• Toni Morrison's Beloved (1987), Jazz (1992)
• Concept of Rememory
• Neo-Slave Narrative
• Alice Walker's The Color Purple (1982) - Epistolary Novel
• Definition of Womanist

Caribbean-American Literature

• Paule Marshall's Brown Girl, Brownstone (1959), From the Poets in the Kitchen (1983)
• Edwidge Danticat's krik ? krak! (1995) - Haitian-American, Barbadian-American writer

Latino-Chicano-American Literature

• Sandra Cisneros' The House on Mango Street (1984) - Coming-of-Age Novel
• Gloria Anzaldúa's Borderlands, La Frontera: The New Mestiza (1987) - Postcolonial Mestizaje
• Latin-American Literature: Julia Alvarez's How the Garcia Girls Lost Their Accent (1991) - Dominican Republic, Trujillo's regime

Asian-American Literature

• Amy Tan's The Joy Luck Club (1989)
• Jhumpa Lahiri's Interpreters of Maladies (1999), The Namesake (2003)

African-Immigrant Literature

• Dinaw Mengestu's The Beautiful Things That Heaven Bears (2007)
• Chimamanda Ngozi Adichie's Americanah (2013)

The Revolutionary Period and the New Republic

• The Revolutionary War took place from 1775 to 1783.
• The Declaration of Independence was signed on July 4, 1776.
• The Constitution was drafted in 1787 by the Founding Fathers.
• George Washington became the first President of the USA on April 30, 1789.

The American Enlightenment: The Age of Reason

• European influences on American Enlightenment: John Locke, Voltaire, Montesquieu, and Rousseau.
• The Enlightenment promoted scientific reasoning, religious tolerance, and ideals of justice.
• The Founding Fathers involved in the Enlightenment were Roger Sherman, Benjamin Franklin, Thomas Jefferson, John Adams, and Robert Livingstone, known as the Committee of Five.
• The Enlightenment ideals opposed monarchy and instead promoted republicanism and deism.

The Revolutionary Period and Literature (1800-1865)

• The American Frontier and Manifest Destiny marked this period.
• American Romanticism emerged, rejecting classicism and the Age of Reason.
• Characteristics of American Romanticism: importance of feelings, power of imagination, individualism, interest in natural scenery, optimism, and social reforms.
• An attempt was made to establish an independent American literature.

The Knickerbockers

• Washington Irving (1783-1859) was the first great American Romantic fiction writer.
• He wrote prose fiction, picturesque, and American humor.
• Published "A History of New York" in 1809 under the pseudonym Diedrich Knickerbocker.
• Published "The Sketchbook of Geoffrey Crayon" in 1819-1820, which included "Rip Van Winkle" (1819) and "The Legend of Sleepy Hollow" (1820).

Explore the emergence of multi-ethnic American literature, Italian-American literature, and Native American literature, including works by John Fante and N. Scott Momaday.