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OSUN Theme: Arts and Society
Borderless and Brazen: a Comparative US-German Literary Perspective of the Black Radical Tradition
Term:
January 1, 2023 – May 31, 2023
Level
: 300-Level
Day/Time:
Fridays, 09:00-12:15 Berlin Time, 03:00-06:15 New York Time, 09:00-12:15 Vienna Time
Instructor:
Kathy-Ann Tan
, Bard College Berlin
Register here
Credits
: 4 US / 8 ECTS
This is the English translation of the title of Afro-German poet May Ayim’s poem, “grenzenlos und unverschämt – ein gedicht gegen die deutsche scheinheit“ (1995). In this course, we will trace the trajectory of the Black radical tradition through a comparative US-German literary perspective. Our point of departure will be its early beginnings as charted out in W.E.B. Du Bois’ 1903 essay, “The Souls of Black Folk”, and we will continue with the New Negro/Harlem Renaissance and Black Arts movements of the 1920s and 1960s respectively. We will acknowledge the transatlantic dimension of the Black radical tradition by exploring the poetic and essayistic writings of Black German scholars such as Maisha Eggers, Ika Hügel-Marshall and May Ayim, as well as Audre Lorde, a central figure whose work was highly influential on both sides of the Atlantic. We will examine how the Black radical tradition is significant not only as a body of critical thought that seeks to bring about a restructuring of political, economic, and social relations, but also as a literary movement that carves out a space of memory, acknowledgement, empowerment and freedom by way of the poetic imagination. Texts will include: Ika Hügel-Marshall. Invisible Woman: Growing Up Black in Germany (1993 in English): Maisha Eggers. “Knowledges of (Un-) Belonging - Epistemic Change as a defining mode for Black Women’s Activism in Germany. Remapping Black Germany” (2016): May Ayim. Blues in Black and White (2003 in English): Audre Lorde. Sister Outsider (1984): W.E.B. Du Bois. “The Souls of Black Folk” (1903): Alain Locke. The New Negro (1925): Frantz Fanon. Black Skin, White Masks (1952): Fred Moten. In the Break: The Aesthetics of the Black Radical Tradition (2003)