African American Literature

1. Excel English: 3rd Quarter African American Literature

2. Genre: Prose: Speech • Prose: written or SPOKEN language in its ordinary form • SPEECH: formal address delivered to an audience • RHETORIC: the art of effective or persuasive speaking or writing, especially the use of figures of speech and other compositional techniques

3. Speech Terms • Articulation: CLEAR and distinct speech • Cadence: rhythm or flow of speech • Connotation: what a word suggests or implies beyond its literal meaning

4. Speech Terms • Inflection: rising and falling in the pitch of a voice. • Pause: momentary stop to give additional emphasis • Projection: Directing the voice so it can be heard at a distance (speaking loudly)

5. Speech Terms • Parallelism: Repetition of a grammatical structure, sound and meaning • Repetition: Repeating a word/phrase to add a sense of balance and rhythm (anaphora)

6. Civil Rights Movement (1955-1968) • Reform movements in the United States aimed at abolishing racial discrimination • freedom, respect, dignity, and economic and social equality

7. Martin Luther King, Jr. 1929-1968 • American Baptist clergyman, activist and prominent leader in the African-American civil rights movement • Youngest person to receive the Nobel Peace Prize (1964) for his work to end segregation and discrimination through civil disobedience and other non-violent means • assassinated on April 4, 1968

8. I Have a Dream • Delivery of the speech on August 28, 1963, from the steps of the Lincoln Memorial during the March on Washington for Jobs and Freedom, was a defining moment of the American Civil Rights Movement.

9. Lincoln Memorial (D.C.)

10. Lincoln Memorial

11. Watch and Listen • http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=PbUtL_0vAJk

12. Analysis • Allusion: reference to a well-known • Metaphor: direct comparison • Repetition: to say again for emphasis • Parallelism: repetition of phrase • Dichotomy: contrast between two things that are opposed or entirely different • Alliteration: firstconsonant repeated • Juxtaposition: place or deal with close together for contrasting effect

13. Common • Lonnie Rashid Lynne Jr. • Hip hop artist and actor • Considered the “thinking man’s” rapper • criticized the path hip-hop music was taking

14. Freedom Writer’s Soundtrack • “I Have a Dream” • Personification • Allusion • Alliteration • Dichotomy • Refrain

15. Barack Obama • 44th president of the United States; the first African American • previously served as the junior Senator from Illinois • Nobel Prize recipient 2009

16. Inaugural Address • Addresses audience: “My fellow citizens” “humbled” and “grateful” • Invokes the past: “We the People” • Addresses crisis then motivates for solutions—NOW: “Today I say to you” • Directly addresses the country: “But know this, America” • Overarching phrase: “And yet at this moment—a moment that will define a generation…”

17. Inaugural Address • “This is the..” corresponds to MLK’s “Now is the time…” • Invokes scripture and God • References the progress made in civil rights: (paragraph 34) “…why a man whose father less than 60 years ago might not have been served at a local restaurant can now stand before you to take a most sacred oath.”

18. Harlem Renaissance Two Histories

19. Two Histories • Poetry in America • African American People • Cultural background + infusion of the history of a people • determination to express something about that history

20. Harlem Renaissance • African American cultural movement of the 1920s-30s • Literary recognition • Artistic expression of the African American experience

21. Langston Hughes • wrote novels, short stories, plays, and poetry • insightful, colorful portrayals of black life in America from the 20s through the 60s • wanted to tell the stories of his people in ways that reflected their actual culture, including both their suffering and their love of music, laughter, and language itself

22. “Dream Variations” (Hughes) • Speaks to black experience; suggests that black AND white experiences are part of the HUMAN experience • Variation: difference of condition • “Place in the sun”: freedom • Symbolism: • Sun/day: white • Night: cool, tender, black

23. Countee Cullen • Color was a landmark of the Harlem Renaissance • careful, traditional style that celebrated black beauty and deplored the effects of racism

24. “Any Human to Another” • Subjective w/traditional rhyme scheme • Paradox: “Diverse yet single” • Metaphor: “A little tent…All his little own.” • Personification: “Joy may be shy”; “Sorrow never scorned to speak” • Universal suffering: “Not me alone” • Allusion: Christ/”My sorry must be laid/On your head like a crown.”