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Programs and Areas

African-American Literature Area

Print by Phillis WHeatley of an African American women. Poems on Various Subjects, Religious and Moral by Phillis Wheatley, from the American Memory Collection (Library of Congress).
English Department at Ohio State University has a number of faculty with strong interests in African American culture from various perspectives including literature, rhetoric and composition, folklore, and socio-linguistics. The historical range of African American literature from slave narratives to contemporary fiction, poetry, and drama is represented in such courses as 281: Introduction to African American Literature and 582: Special Topics in African American Literature, and 851: Seminar in Critical Approaches to Black Literature, as well as in other more general courses that include black writers. The composition and rhetoric faculty has several scholars who specialize in issues related to black writing and oratory, and the Department's socio-linguist has conducted research on black speech and dialect. Several folklorists in the Department have written about African American oral traditions and how they relate to written literature. These cross-disciplinary approaches to the study of African American literature are one of the strengths of the program at Ohio State.

English courses

281: Introduction to African American Literature
281: Introduction to African American Literature
757.01: Introduction to Graduate Study in African American Literature, 1746–1900
757.02: Introduction to Graduate Study in African American Literature, 1900–Present
851: Seminar in Critical Approaches to Black Literature

English Faculty

Adeleke Adeeko, Professor
Stephanie Brown, Assistant Professor, Newark campus
Cynthia Callahan, Assistant Professor, Mansfield campus
Ryan Friedman, Assistant Professor
Valerie Lee, Chair and Professor
Koritha Mitchell, Assistant Professor
Beverly Moss, Associate Professor, Director of the Center for the Study and Teaching of Writing
Martin Joseph Ponce, Assistant Professor
John Roberts, Dean of Humanities and Professor
Andrea Williams, Assistant Professor

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