| FW-50359-11 | Research Programs: Teaching Development Fellowships | Jeffrey Einboden | Arabic Slave Writings and the American Canon | 7/1/2011 - 11/30/2011 | $21,000.00 | Jeffrey | | Einboden | | | | Northern Illinois University | DeKalb | IL | 60115-2828 | USA | 2011 | American Literature | Teaching Development Fellowships | Research Programs | 21000 | 0 | 21000 | 0 |
Exploring the literary foundations of early America, NIU's ENGL 331 "American Literature 1830-1860" has traditionally surveyed the nation's most iconic texts, from Ralph Waldo Emerson's Nature to Herman Melville's Moby Dick, to Walt Whitman's Leaves of Grass. Consistent with NEH's Bridging Cultures initiative, I propose to revise and expand the curriculum for this core course, introducing NIU undergraduates to the cross-cultural and multi-lingual texture of America's first decades. Specifically, I aim to integrate into ENGL 331 my own research concerning a pivotal, yet largely unrecognized, element of U.S. literary history: personal writings by African slaves of Muslim descent, composed during their captivity in America, authored in Arabic. |