AMERICAN LITERATURE 1 MOD. 1

The course is part of the MA in American, European and Postcolonial Languages and Cultures and the MA in Linguistics. It aims to provide students with advanced knowledge and skills in the literary and cultural fields, particularly in the history of American literature and culture from the nineteenth century to the present day. Students will have the opportunity to improve their skills in textual analysis as applied to works of prose and poetry, and to place these works in their respective historical and cultural contexts. The analytical tools acquired over the three years of the undergraduate course will be tested and developed, starting with the knowledge of literary history and critical theory and methodology; the ability to work independently and to discuss the results of their work orally will be encouraged.

The specific pedagogical objectives of the course are:
1) to develop an in-depth knowledge and understanding of key works of Californian American literature between the 1800s and the 2000s;
2) the ability to apply this knowledge and understanding to other texts;
3) the development of advanced skills in communicating the content studied in English;
4) the ability to discuss and evaluate primary and secondary materials with relative autonomy;
5) the ability to work synergistically with other students.

Advanced knowledge of written and spoken English (≥ C1). Good knowledge of the history of American literature and the basic theoretical concepts of literary theory, acquired during the undergraduate course in Languages, Civilizations and Linguistics and/or the reading of the reference works as in the bibliography.

The course offers an overview of the literary history of Anglo-American California from the Treaty of Guadalupe-Hidalgo (1848) to the 21st century, privileging both an eco-critical angle related to the extraction of natural resources (gold, minerals, oil) – particularly water–, and the perspective of racial divisions and racial struggles. It includes literary representations which romanticize and/or deconstruct the Mexican past of California (Jackson; Fante), and those which make the deserts, mountains, and waterscape the subject of literary realism (Austin), thus offering a contrasting reading of the different connotations of water (Didion, Diaz). The early 20th century oil boom and water infrastructures materially contributed to the growth of Los Angeles and Hollywood and fostered their imagination (Sinclair; Chinatown). Racial tensions in California date back to late 19th century and, exacerbated by World War II, one of their outcomes was the internment of Japanese American citizens (Oyama; Yamamoto). Another outcome was the formation of the Black Panthers in the 1960s, a decade where California was the epicenter of political and artistic countercultures (Ferlinghetti). Economic and racial inequalities, already suffered by 1930s-40s farm workers, lasted until after the Cold War and today, where in the Bay Area the big tech companies are not far from working class towns such as Milpitas (Castillo).

Primary soruces (all to be found in Moodle, except for the movie and the full novels):

1. Helen Hunt Jackson, Ramona (1884), ch 1, 2, 3, 6
2. Mary H. Austin, The Land of Little Rain (1901), ch 1, 12; "The Indivisible Utility" (1925)
3. Upton Sinclair, Oil! (1927), ch 1, 4
4. Chinatown (R. Polanski, 1974) movie
5. John Fante, Ask the Dust (1939), full novel
6. Mary Oyama, “After Pearl Harbor: Los Angeles” (Common Ground, 1942)
7. Hisaye Yamamoto, “Wilshire Bus,” 1950 (Seventeen Syllables and Other Stories, 1988)
8. Lawrence Ferlinghetti, “Salton Sea Notes,” 1961 (Writing Across the Landscape: Travel Journals 1960-2013)
9. Black Panthers, 10 Point Program, 1966
10. Elaine Castillo, America is Not the Heart (2018), full novel
11. Joan Didion, “Holy Water” (Esquire, 1977)
12. Natalie Diaz, “The First Water is the Body” (Postcolonial Love Poem, 2020)

Secondary sources (all in Moodle, except for Anderson):

Sigrid Anderson, “Introduction”, in Land of Sunshine: Race, Gender, and Regional Development in a California Periodical (U. of Nebraska P., 2024), pp. 1-28. --> Unive Library (BALI)
Mike Davis, “Sunshine or Noir”, in City of Quartz: Excavating the Future in Los Angeles (Verso, 1999), pp. 17-70.
Nicholas Witschi, “’I Know What is Best for You’: Post-Howellsian Realism in Mary Austin’s Desert Narratives”, in Traces of Gold: California’s Natural Resources and the Claim to Realism in Western American Literature (U. of Alabama Press, 2001), pp. 111-138.
Pierre Lagayette, “California in Late Settlement”, in The Cambridge Companion of the Literature of the West (ed. S. Frye, Cambridge UP, 2016) pp. 73-88.
David Fine, “The Twenties and Beyond: Oil, Movies and Salvation,” in Imagining Los Angeles: A City in Fiction (U. of Nevada Press), pp. 53-62.
Daniel Gardner “A Ramona in Reverse: Writing the Madness of the Spanish Past in Ask the Dust”, in John Fante’s Ask the Dust: A Joining of Voices and Views (eds. S. Cooper, C. Donato, Fordham UP, 2020), pp. 83-115.
Nicolangelo Becce, “Introduction” (1.2; 1.3) , in The Internment Ordeal in a Post-Truth World: Contemporary Narratives of the Japanese American Incarceration (De Gruyter, 2026), pp. 15-27.
James Sobredo, “From Manila Bay to Daly City: Filipinos in San Francisco”, in Reclaiming San Francisco: History, Politics, Culture (eds. J. Brook, C. Carlsson, N. Peters, City Lights Books, 1998), pp. 273-286.

Non-mandatory secondary sources (Moodle):
Matthew S. Henry, “Introduction”, in Hydronarratives: Water, Environamental Justice, and a Just Transition (U. of Nebraska P., 2022), pp. 1-23
Mike Davis, “The Dialectic of Ordinary Disaster”, in Ecology of Fear: Los Angeles and the Imagination of Disaster (Metropolitan Books 1998), pp. 5-55.

Oral Exam

Primary and secondary sources are mandatory.
PAY ATTENTION: YOU MUST HAVE THE TEXTS, EITHER PRINTED OR IN A DIGITAL FORMAT, DURING THE ORAL INTERVIEW

written and oral

The instructor is responsible for ensuring the authenticity and originality of all examinations and coursework. In cases of suspected academic misconduct, an additional on-site assessment may be required during the exams, which may differ from the standard format.

The minimum grade is 18, the maximum grade is 30 cum laude. Grades correspond to:
A. range 18-22: sufficient content knowledge; limited ability to discuss independently, limited knowledge of theoretical tools, limited knowledge of cultural-historical context and debates.
B. range 23-26: fair content knowledge; fair independent discussion skills, fair knowledge of theoretical tools, fair knowledge of cultural-historical context and debates.
C. range 27-29: good content knowledge; good independent discussion skills, good knowledge of theoretical tools, good knowledge of historical-cultural context and debates.
D. 30: very good content knowledge, independent discussion skills and very good knowledge of the theoretical tools; very good knowledge of the historical-cultural context and debates.
D. Honors/cum laude: awarded in case the knowledge of contents, the independent discussion skills, the knowledge of theoretical tools, of the cultural-historical context and of the debates are excellent and the student expands what is required by the course syllabus

Lectures and seminars, class discussion, participation in literary events with authors and/or conferences

This subject deals with topics related to the macro-area "Climate change and energy" and contributes to the achievement of one or more goals of U. N. Agenda for Sustainable Development