Literature

 

            African American literature has shaped the way we understand the African American experience. African American authors have been recording their history and stories since the 18th century. Literature served as an essential tool in the African American struggle for freedom and equality. During slavery literature was used to protest and document the inhumane American Institution. Many people were shocked and disbelieving of the literary abilities of African Americans. Out of this

Timeline of Important African American Landmarks

 

1767          Phyllis Wheatly publishes first poem. First published African American

1827          Freedom’s Journal -First African –American Newspaper http://www.shsw.wisc.edu/library/aanp/freedom/

1845          Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglass, An American Slave,      

1860’s       Anglo-African Magazine

1900’s       “The New Negro”

§       Up from Slavery, Booker T Washington

§       The Souls of Black Folk, W.E.B du Bois concept of “double conciousness” emerges

§       Souther Horrors Lynch Laws in All Its Phases, Ida B Wells Barnett http://www.duke.edu/~ldbaker/classes/AAIH/caaih/ibwells/ibwbkgrd.html

1920-30’s The Harlem Renaissance

§       The New Negro, Alain Locke 1925 http://www.nl.edu/ace/Resources/Locke.html

§       Not Without Laughter, Langston Hughes 1930

§       Their Eyes Were Watching God, Zora Neale Hurston 1937

1940          Native Son, Richard Wright

1950          Gwendolyn Brooks, first African American Pulitzer Prize winner. Pulitzer Prize Poetry for Annie Allen

1952          Invisible Man, Ralph Ellison

1965          The Autobiography of Malcolm X, Alex Haley

1970          I Know Why the Caged Bird Sings, Maya Angelou

1971          The Black Aesthetic, Addison Gayle, Jr. editor

1977          Roots, Alex Haley http://Africana.com/roots25/

1993          Toni Morrison first African American to win Noble Prize in Literature http://www.nobel.se/literature/laureates/1993/index.html

 

 

Links

·        African American Literature and Culture Society http://www.atomicage.com/aalcs/

·        African American Women Writers of the 19th Century http://digital.nypl.org/schomburg/writers_aa19/

·        Zora Neale Hurston/Richard Wright Foundation http://www.hurston-wright.org/

·        Kunte Kinte The Alex Haley Foundation http://www.kintehaley.org/

·        Africana.com: African American Literature http://www.africana.com/Utilities/Content.html?&../cgi-bin/banner.pl?banner=Arts&../Articles/tt_438.htm

 

 

 

·        Maya Angelou

·        Gwendolyn Brooks

·        Richard Wright

·        Toni Morrison

·        Langston Hughes