This course examines what it means to be Caribbean, or of Caribbean descent, in the diaspora – either the United States, England, and France due to their stake in colonizing the Caribbean in the quest for imperial power and modernity. Within this historical and contemporary context, Caribbean literature offers a lens to learn about how this has affected and defined Caribbean culture. In this course, students will learn how legacies of colonialism and modernity affect Caribbean populations through the inevitable formations of diasporas and migrations. Students will also learn how to differentiate between migration and diaspora while recognizing how Caribbean literature is a meditation of home, culture, belonging, community, identity, and displacement. In this special-topics literary course, students will study and compare varied texts in mixed genres, including poetry, memoir, essay, and academic texts, in addition to the course novels, A Small Place, The Brief and Wondrous Life of Oscar Wao, and Black Skin, White Masks. Students will examine how various writers from the Caribbean negotiate empire, identity, language, culture, and notions of home as they make critical observations in their works. “Topics in Caribbean Literature” offers an interdisciplinary understanding of Caribbean culture, society, and identity in a trans-hemispheric and transnational context that explores (pop) culture, memory, literature, revisionism, and media to understand Caribbean diasporic cultural formations.
- Teacher: Keishla Rivera-López