Prof. Weinbaum
English 327
Narratives of Bondage and Freedom
Spring 2025
Seminar meets in LOW Room 106
Seminar meeting time 1:30-3:20 Tu/Thurs
Office meetings in 408B Padelford
Office hours Tu/Thurs 3:30-4:30
and by appointment
Email contact: alysw@uw.edu
Course description
This course examines narratives about the experience of Black enslavement, survival, and resistance during the four hundred years of Atlantic Slavery in the Americas and the Caribbean. It homes in the gendered experience of enslavement and thus on issues of sex, reproduction, family, kinship, childhood and motherhood in slavery. The course begins with an intensive look at the most famous 19th century slave narrative penned by a formerly enslaved woman, Harriet Jacobs, and moves from there to a series of twentieth century writings that have been generically categorized as “neo-slave slave narratives,” or that take up the complex task meditating on the history of enslavement while taking into consideration the present moment of writing. In many of these texts the question of how to fill in the gaps in the often sparse or compromised historical archive is central. In additional, alongside our primary texts, we will consider a range or literary critical and short theoretical writings by feminist Black studies scholars who have explored the challenges of creating knowledge about Atlantic slavery and its afterlives.
Course learning goals
Deep learning about the history of Atlantic slavery and a range of writings about it
Understanding of the racialized and gendered experience of enslavement
Ability to close read texts written in a range of idioms
Ability to raise thoughtful and nuanced observations and questions about readings in discussion posts and in-class discussion
Ability to respond meaningfully and respectfully to ideas generated by others in writing and in-class discussion
Ability to think across readings and demonstrate cumulative understanding
Ability to write about texts in response to prompts in sensitive manner that is attuned to form, content, context, and meaning
Course requirements
Careful preparation of the assigned reading for each class meeting
Maintenance of dedicated notebook for your reading and in-class notes
Active and engaged participation in large and small group discussions
Weekly discussion posts of 250-300 words each (8 in total)
2 short papers of 5-6 pages each
Posting of your class at least once during the quarter (you may upload photos)
Course expectations
Punctuality and regular participation in all class activities including discussion
Stowing of all electronic devices upon arrival to class unless otherwise instructed
Careful preparation of all readings
Use of a dedicated course notebook in-class and out
Use of hard copies of ALL readings in-class (you will need to print out 6 PDFs)
Respectful and thoughtful engagement with other people’s ideas
Self-awareness about making space for everyone to speak
On time submission of all written work
Preparation of readings and discussion posts
Electronic devices are not allowed in this class. So, you will need to procure hard copies of all materials and print out pdfs for use in class. Ideally you will annotate all readings as you work through them by penciling in the margins. You should then take notes on the readings, following your own marginalia. These notes will by the fount of your discussion posts.
Discussion posts should represent your thoughtful engagements with passages or specific elements of the text in question. Posts may be in the form of observations, connective comparison, or questions. They may be personal but may not be exclusively focused on your feelings about a text. In general, if you found something about a text surprising, distressing, moving, or especially compelling, that’s the place to begin a discussion post.
Discussion posts must not be stream of consciousness. They must be easy to read and thus must be carefully edited for clarity. Note that all posts will be read by everyone—indeed, if you post something that resonates with or is akin to the post of another student, you MUST be sure to post it as a “reply” to the original posting. In so doing you MUST signal your agreement and/or your departure/addition to what has already been said.
Posts that roughly repeat already existing posts without building on them and thus departing from them in an original way will not be counted towards your total.
You must submit at least one post on each of the primary texts.
All posts are due by midnight the day before the class in which the reading in question will be discussed. If you miss the midnight deadline, you will be unable to submit your post. You should simply move on to the next one. Discussion posts may not be made up.
Short papers
There will be two short analytical papers. The first must be submitted on April 25th, the second on June 9th. There will be two sets of essay prompts distributed and discussed during the class meeting prior to the paper date. In both cases you will have the weekend to work on your paper. Plan ahead.
In this course, use of ChatGPT or any other AI is not allowed in any form.
This includes discussion posts and short papers.
Course grade (partial contract)
If you complete all the written work for this course—8 discussion posts and 2 short papers—turn these in on time, and actively participate in all class activities including discussions, you will automatically receive a grade of 3.4 (B+) in this class.
Each missing discussion post will detract .2 grade points. 4 or more missing responses will automatically lead to a failing grade, will 1 missing paper. The minimum passing grade in this course is thus 2.6 (B-).
Grades higher than 3.4 (A range = 3.5-4.0) will be based on my assessment of the combined quality of your papers, discussion posts, and contributions to class discussions over the course of the quarter.
Course Materials
All books are available through the University Bookstore, UW libraries, and on-line new and used.
All articles and chapters are available on Canvas as PDFS.
Schedule of readings and assignments
NB: The schedule is subject to change. All changes will be announced in class and on canvas. It is your responsibility to stay abreast of all changes and to come to class having done the correct reading for the class in question.
Week 1
April 1: Introduction to the course
April 3: Harriet Jacobs, Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl to chapter XII
Supplementary link to 1619 Project: https://www.nytimes.com/interactive/2019/08/14/magazine/1619-america-slavery.html
Week 2
April 8: Jacobs XIII-XXII
Jean Fagan Yellin, “Written by Herself: Harriet Jacobs’ Slave Narrative.” PDF
April 10: Jacobs completed
Valerie Smith, “Form and Ideology in Three Slave Narratives.” PDF
Supplementary link to Library of Congress WPA collection: https://www.loc.gov/collections/slave-narratives-from-the-federal-writers-project-1936-to-1938/about-this-collection
Week 3
April 15: No class meeting—Read Butler, Kindred
April 17: Butler to page 108 “The Fight”
Week 4
April 22: Butler completed
April 24: Christina Sharpe, “The Wake” from In the Wake: On Blackness and Being. PDF
Essay prompt distributed and discussed in class
Essay #1 is due on Monday April 28th, at 5 pm
Week 5
April 29: Saidiya Hartman, “Venus in Two Acts.” PDF
May 1: Jennifer Morgan, “Partus Sequitur Ventrem.” PDF
Week 6
May 6: Toni Morrison, Beloved
May 8: Morrison continued
Week 7
May 13: Morrison completed
May 15: Morrison, last discussion of novel
Supplementary reading: Weinbaum, “Violent Insurgency, or “Power to the Ice Pick” from The Afterlife of Reproductive Slavery: Biocapitalism and Black Feminism’s Philosophy of History. PDF
Week 8
May 20: Jesmyn Ward, Let Us Descend
May 22: Ward continued
Week 9
May 27: Ward completed
May 29: Percival Everett, James
Week 10
June 3: Everett continued
June 5: Everett completed
Prompt for final paper will be distributed and discussed in class
Essay # 2 due is due on Monday June 9, at 9 am.
Additional useful information
Religious accommodation
All requests for religious accommodation will be honored. No formal paperwork is required; however, I ask that you notify me of the dates you will be unable to join us in class before the start of Week 2, and that we together work out a plan that allows you to make up any missed work.
Disability accommodation
Should you require accommodation, please come to me after class during the first week of quarter to discuss any adjustments you may require. Also, please have the disability services office send me the official request immediately so that I have this hand when we meet.
Plagiarism
One of the most common forms of cheating is plagiarism—submitting work that includes words or ideas not your own without proper citation. The UW guidelines that define plagiarism apply to information gleaned from websites and to words and ideas generated by AI such as ChatGPT. In this course, use of ChatGPT or any other AI is not allowed in any form. Any assignment that appears to indicate use of AI or any other form of plagiarism will automatically receive no grade.
The key to avoiding plagiarism is to show clearly where your own thinking ends and that belonging to someone/thing else begins. Should you have consulted outside sources (written or recorded), should you have used either digital or print sources to spark ideas or formulations, or should you have used search engines or AI (such as ChatGPT, but not restricted to it) to generate ideas or writing (including any of your discussion posts), you must specify precisely where ideas, information and/or the words you have submitted were obtained. This must be in the form of footnotes and/or a bibliography.
More information on plagiarism
https://www.washington.edu/cssc/for-students/academic-misconduct
https://students.nursing.uw.edu/policies/student-policies/plagiarism
https://tedfrick.sitehost.iu.edu/plagiarism