MARGIN & CENTER

COMPARATIVE WOMEN'S LITERATURES & FEMINIST LITERARY CRITICISM Dr. Joanna Davis-McElligatt ENGL 484:001 //11:00-12:15 TR This website will contain links to supplementary readings for the course.

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"You mean a WOMAN can open it?!"

Here's a link to 25 unbelievably crass advertisements of the sort Betty Friedan reacts to in The Feminine Mystique.  These are just a few, but with a small amount of effort, you can turn up hundreds online.

http://www.icanhasinternets.com/2010/05/25-horribly-sexist-vintage-ads/vintageads17/

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Welcome to your class blog: Margin & Center

Greetings! 

I've made this blog for our class with supplemental readings and resources to aid in our class discussions, your presentations, and for our collective edification.  The posts are in reverse order, so please scroll to the bottom of the page to begin.  

Please bookmark this page, and remember to check it each time we begin to read a new text. 

If I add any new content to this page, you can bet I'll let you know in class. 

To get started, here's a link to a pretty rad and very useful feminist theory website, which we'll be referring to periodically in class (and that I'm sure you'll find helpful to work through at home): 

http://www.cddc.vt.edu/feminism/index.html

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Kimani Press Website

Take a look at the Kimani Press imprint, intended for African-American readers.  Take note of any significant differences between Harlequin's main press and this smaller imprint.  Try to determine how these romance novels are marketed racially, by taking into consideration the way they are packaged (blurb, cover, title) to the way they are narrated (plot, language, character).

http://www.eharlequin.com/store.html?cid=482

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Harlequin Press Website

Here you'll find a link to the Harlequin website.  I encourage you to spend some time poring over the offerings.  Get to know the character of the Harlequin romance, and try to get a sense for what types of texts they offer, and what kind of experience they hope their reader will enjoy.

http://www.eharlequin.com/

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Janet and Randy Jackson as Shirley Temple and Bill "Bojangles" Robinson (early 1970s).

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Shirley Temple singing "Animal Crackers in My Soup" from Curly Top (1935).

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Bill "Bojangles" Robinson and Shirley Temple in The Littlest Colonel (1935).

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Bill "Bojangles" Robinson and Shirley Temple in The Littlest Rebel (1935).

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Bill "Bojangles" Robinson and Shirley Temple in The Little Colonel (1935).

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Resources for The Bluest Eye

Here's a link to a scholarly page on The Bluest Eye, hosted by Brooklyn College that some of you might find helpful:

http://academic.brooklyn.cuny.edu/english/melani/cs6/morrison.html

Here's a link to a rather ancient page on The Bluest Eye, though many of the links are still in working order (and a couple of the critical readings for class can be found here, too):

http://www.luminarium.org/contemporary/tonimorrison/bluest.htm

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Midnight Sun, by Stephenie Meyer

Here's a link to Stephenie Meyer's novella (or chapter? or short story? whatever you want to call it), which I'm including here because of its unusual textuality - it only appears online, and is free to the public.  Reading this text might also provide additional texture to our understanding of the gender and racial dynamics of the text, in particular because there is no third component for Jacob - if you can suffer more terrible prose, that is.

http://www.stepheniemeyer.com/pdf/midnightsun_chapter1.pdf

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Native Imagery in Twilight: Eclipse

As you can well imagine, it's quite difficult to locate anything even remotely scholarly regarding Stephenie Meyer's insanely popular Twilight series, largely because it's too new (and still, at least in film form, ongoing).  This is good news for those of you who might want to publish on the series, because it's wide-open terrain.  Here's a website that unpacks (as much as is possible) the entire saga, including its insane fandom.  Please check out this link before coming to our first class discussion, especially for those of you who have never read one of the novels or watched one of the films. 

http://www.cleveland.com/movies/index.ssf/2010/06/team_edward_team_jacob_neither.html

Here's some strangers blog post (completely un-vetted) about racism in Twilight: Eclipse:

http://www.randombabble.com/2009/05/16/racism-in-twilight/

And here's another post from the same blogger about being native in Twilight: Eclipse:

http://www.randombabble.com/2010/07/06/being-native-in-the-twilight-saga-and-the-importance-of-being-sam-and-emily/

Here is a post from Native American Legal Update regarding the trope of the "noble savage" in Twilight: Eclipse:

http://www.nativelegalupdate.com/2010/07/articles/eclipse-fails-to-block-out-native-stereotypes/

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A Visual Guide to Rowlandson's Captivity

The trail to King Philip's fort at Squakeag.

Here's an interesting visual guide to Mary Rowlandson's captivity.  Some earnest soul trucked around outside and snapped photographs of the places Mary went.  This should provide you with some sense of space and place beyond that which Rowlandson offers us in her narrative.

http://www.bio.umass.edu/biology/conn.river/mary.html

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The Sovereignty and Goodness of God

Here's an great resource for those of you unfamiliar with captivity narratives.  This site covers themes, rhetorical purpose, and offers a brief summary of Rowlandson's life and narrative.  Please familiarize yourself with this material prior to coming to our first class discussion.

http://public.wsu.edu/~campbelld/amlit/captive.htm

For those of you interested in following up, here's an extensive bibliography on Rowlandson and her narrative:

http://public.wsu.edu/~campbelld/amlit/capbib.htm

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Trailer for the 2008 BBC production of Wide Sargasso Sea.

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Trailer for 1993 film adaptation of Wide Sargasso Sea.

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The Christophine Site

A still from the BBC Production of Wide Sargasso Sea 

Below you will find a link to a wonderful website with tons of information about Wide Sargasso Sea.  Please follow click through and read this information before coming to our first class discussion on the novel.

http://www.qub.ac.uk/schools/SchoolofEnglish/imperial/carib/carib.htm