Teaching code

4S002912

Credits

9

Coordinator

Roberto Cagliero

Language

English

Also offered in courses:

• Anglo-american literature and cultures of the course Bachelor's degree in Foreign Languages and Literatures

Moodle Seminars 0

The teaching is organized as follows:

Learning outcomes

This course aims at providing students with a basic knowledge of the literature of United States in its complexity and plurality. Focus will be on specific texts, movements and literary tendencies.

By the end of this course, students will be able to recognize specific and often conflictual forms of writing. These are in fact generated within the context of different ethnic realities and traditions, and even though they are labeled as American Literature because of geographic reasons, they have totally different goals and forms of expression. Furthermore students will be able to approach texts with adequate critical tools, and will be familiar with specific features of American English.

Program

This course analyses different aspects of the relationship between jail and literture in the United States. We will recognize and define concepts such as rauma, resilience, and restorative justice in nineteenth and twentieth American literature. Several videos and films are included in the program. Book list This is NOT the final version. Please start reading those texts preceded by the "§" sign. The final program will be available soon. AAVV, “Sulla pena di morte”. Acoma http://www.acoma.it/content/sulla-pena-di-morte Abu-Jamal, M. (1995). Live from death row. Reading, MA: Addison-Wesley. Agamben, G. Homo Sacer (la parte su coma e braccio della morte) Algren, N. short story "El Presidente de Mejico" explored his experience in a Texas jail. Sta nel libro The Neon Wilderness § Baliga, S. An Example of Restorative Justice with Sujatha Baliga https://www.google.it/search?q=An+Example+of+Restorative+Justice+with+Sujatha+Baliga&oq=An+Example+of+Restorative+Justice+with+Sujatha+Baliga&aqs=chrome..69i57.604j0j7&sourceid=chrome&ie=UTF-8 § Baliga, S. Transformative Justice in Education Speaker Series (video - speech starts at minute 8:10) https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=khB0U0wMT4o § Blumenthal, R. “Confined In Prisons, Literature Breaks Out” (Aug. 26, 2000) https://www.nytimes.com/2000/08/26/books/confined-in-prisons-literature-breaks-out.html Chevigny, B. G. (Ed.) (1999). Doing time: 25 years of prison writing. New York: Arcade Confined In Prisons, Literature Breaks Out. New York Times, August 26, 2000: B9. ProQuest Historical Newspapers, The New York Times (1851-2003). § Davis, A. Are Prisons Obsolete? 2003 OK Davis, A. The Prison Industrial Complex 1999 § Fleetwood, N.R. “Posing in Prison: Family Photographs, Emotional Labor, and Carceral Intimacy”. Public Culture 27:3, 2015 § Foucault, M. (1977). Discipline and Punish. (A. Sheridan, Trans.). New York: Pantheon. (Sorvegliare e punire) Franklin, H. B. The Victim as Criminal and Artist: Literature from the American Prison (New York: Oxford Univ. Press, 1978 FRINZI § Gordon, A. F. “Angela Davis. Globalism and the prison industrial complex: an interview with Angela Davis”, Race Class 1999; 40; 145 PDF Green, T. From the Plantation to the Prison. African American Confinement Lietrature. Mercer UP 2008 Herivel, T. and Paul Wright edd. Prison nation: the warehousing of America’s poor. Routledge 2003 Jackson, B. “Attica. Un anniversario di morte”. Acoma § Jackson, G. George Jackson/San Quentin https://vimeo.com/100361380 video § Jackson, G. Soledad Brother. The Prison Letters of George Jackson https://libcom.org/files/soledad-brother-the-prison-letters-of-george-jackson.pdf § Kalica, E. e Santorso S. (a cura di), Farsi la galera. Spazi e culture del penitenziario. Ombre Corte 2018 King, M. L. (1963). “Letters from Birmingham jail”. https://web.cn.edu/kwheeler/documents/Letter_Birmingham_Jail.pdf § Kolk, B. van Der. The Body Keeps the Score. Penguin (Il corpo accusa il colpo, Raffaele Cortina 2015 Larson, D. (Ed.) (2014). Fourth City: Essays from the Prison in America. East Lansing, Michigan: Michigan State University Press. FRINZI London, J. "Pinched": A Prison Experience RENDERO’ DISPONIBILE § Lowrie, D. My Life in Prison (1912) PDF Copisteria 30eoltre Malcolm X, Autobiography (la parte dedicata al carcere) FRINZI Mayr, Andrea. Prison discourse: language as a means of control and resistance. Palgrave, 2004 FRINZI § Melville, H. Bartleby, the Scrivener. http://www.gutenberg.org/cache/epub/11231/pg11231.html Miller, D.Q. (ed.), Prose and Cons: Essays on Prison Literature in the United States (Jefferson, North Carolina: McFarland & Company, Inc., 2005) § Nat Turner, Confession https://docsouth.unc.edu/neh/turner/turner.html § Pelàez, Vicky. “The Prison Industry in the United States: Big Business or a New Form of Slavery?” El Diario-La Prensa, New York and Global Research 10 March 2008 http://www.globalresearch.ca/the-prison-industry-in-the-united-states-big-business-or-a-new-form-of-slavery/8289 Platt, A. M. (1999). 'Prison Writing in 20th-Century America', Social Justice 26. § Poe, E.A., “The Pit and the Pendulum” https://www.eapoe.org/works/tales/pitpdma.htm § Robert E. Burns, I Am a Fugitive from a Georgia Chain Gang (1932) e il film omonimo di Mervin LeRoy (1932) Senghor, S. Writing my wrongs : life, death, and redemption in an American prison. NY Convergent Books 2016 Sudbury, G. Ed. Race, Gender, and the Prison-Industrial Complex. Routledge 2014 § Thoreau, Civil Disobedience http://xroads.virginia.edu/~hyper2/thoreau/civil.html § Tullis, P. “Can Forgiveness Play a Role in Criminal Justice?” https://www.nytimes.com/2013/01/06/magazine/can-forgiveness-play-a-role-in-criminal-justice.html

Bibliography

Examination Methods

Classes will be in English. The exam will be an oral discussion in English and in Italian on the subject of the course and on the texts included in the program (texts in Italian can be found in English. If not, please contact instructor at roberto.cagliero@univr.it)
Students are asked to develop the following:
- the ability to discuss the subject of the course
- the ability to present a critical argumentation on topics related to the texts of the syllabus (giving examples from scenes and passages)
- the ability to make connections betweendifferent topics on the basis of the critical literature as in the bibliography.