1000-Level Course Descriptions
ENGL 1800-880: Ethnic Outsiders
Instructor: Professor Bradley
TR 12:30-1:45 — LIBR M498
Prereq: Honors Standing
This course explores multi-ethnic American literature with a focus on contemporary writers. Rather than assuming that ethnic groups are discrete and isolated entities, this course posits the United States as a contact zone in which cultures blend, clash, and inevitably reshape one another. Ethnic American writers often figure their characters as outsiders from the prevailing social order, fashioning their identities both from ancestral inheritances and from cross-cultural encounters. Their 'outsider' perspective often takes us to the inside of what it means to be an American. The authors we study write works of fiction that interrogate the meaning of American identity—its racial, cultural, religious, geographic, and linguistic implications. We shall touch on a variety of themes, including double consciousness, assimilation, multiculturalism, racial passing, inheritance and generational tension.
Please contact the instructor for further information: Adam.Bradley@colorado.edu.