Collaborative Bibliographies

Constructions of Race

Discussion Thread (from T-AMLIT)

Original Query:

From: JASTEELE@macc.wisc.edu "Jeffery A.Steele"
Subject: Constructions of race

I am finishing up the design of my course on race in 19th and early 20th-century literature. In a syllabus intended to contain white, American Indian, and black authors, I find that I have few white authors (Poe, Melville, Twain). I am wondering which texts, written between 1870 and 1920 by white authors, members of this list would use as good indicators of racial attitudes in white America. I am especially looking for short stories that could be included in a course reader.

Jeffrey Steele
Dept. of English, UW-Madison
jasteele@macc.wisc.edu

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Here are several responses to the recent query by Jeff Steele for *white authors* who are interested in race. A lot of responses came in about this, so I'm sending them out in groups of 5 or so.
RBass
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A number of southern authors come to mind. Among them:

George Washington Cable: perhaps "Belles Demoiselles Plantation" [NEXT Cable] Joel Chandler Harris: His Uncle Remus stories work well with Charles Waddell Chesnutt's Conjure Woman tales. You might also look at "Free Joe and the Rest of the World." Kate Chopin: Many of her stories deal with race. See especially "Desiree's Baby" and "A Matter of Prejudice."[NEXT Chopin]

You may also want to consult Thomas F. Gossett's _Race: The History of an Idea in America_, especially chapter IX, "Literary Naturalism and Race."

Emily Seelbinder
Queens College, Charlotte
(Not to be confused with a big school by the same name in New York City)
seelbinder@queens.edu

I don't know if there is an affordable edition in print, but William Dean Howells' 1891 novella "An Imperative Duty" is an exceptionally rich text, particularly as regards the construction of racial (and other forms of) identity. Also worth a look is Howells' short story "The Pearl," published in the August 1916 "Harper's Monthly" (uncollected as far as I know). A very strange story is "Aunt Sanna Terry" by Landon Dashiell, originally published in "The Southern Workman" and included by Howells in the collection "The Great Modern American Stories" (1920) - I have absolutely no information about the author, however.

Mark Forrester -- University of Maryland -- maforr@wam.umd.edu

Try Puddnhead Wilson by Mark Twain...

Melville's "Benito Cereno" would certainly be appropriate here. Also interesting to do w/ teaching this story is to askstudents ead (for a paper topic?) Lowell's play based on the story (the title escapes me at the moment, sorry) and see the differences--or lack therein.
. . . oops--except for the fact that it was written in 1856--!
--ShaunAnne

In response to Jeffrey Steele's query about white authors who deal with race, I'd recommend assigning Gertrude Stein's _Three Lives_, preferably in its entirety. While the middle section called "Melanctha" is the one that centers on a black character, and stands on its own as an interesting treatment of African-American life by a white author, its juxtaposition with "The Good Anna" and "The Gentle Lena" creates a great opportunity for discussing the construction of racial categories, especially the category of "white." For example, the German immigrants in "The Gentle Lena" make themselves into white Americans by differentiating themselves from those they call "niggers"--not all of whom are African-American. It's a great literary test-case for David Roediger's thesis in _Toward the Abolition of Whiteness_ and elsewhere about the construction of whiteness out of more plural ethnic identities--and of course Stein would herself have known something about that process. Anyway, I heartily recommend teaching the Stein text either as a whole or teaching one of its parts in a course on "Constructions of Race."

Glenn Hendler
University of Notre Dame

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The query about white authors who deal with issues of race for a course on constructions of race has spawned quite a response. Without deluging people, I'll try to keep up. Here--and to follow-- are FIVE more responses.
RBass
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Off hand I can't think of any either; however, (and this may seems like a left-field suggestion) have you read Morrison's _Playing in the Dark_? She discusses how the Other is not so obviously implicated in narratives by white authors. What I'm getting at is: Both presence and absence can play roles in analysis; keeping this in mind, then, you may be able to open out less overt narratives. For instance, the Other is both present and absent in _The Scarlet Letter_; so, too, in Rolvaag's _Giants in the Earth_.

Patrick Bjork
Dept. of English
Bismarck State College
bjork@badlands.nodak.edu

You might consider one or more of the stories from George Washington Cable's _Old Creole Days_ (1879) [NEXT Cable], which were fairly progressive for their time, and, on the other end of the political spectrum, "plantation school" stories from Thomas Nelson Page's _In Ole Virginia_ (1887). Also see Joel Chandler Harris, such as his "Free Joe and the Rest of the World." You might also see other "local color" writers of the period, including Hamlin Garland. I have read that among Jack London's voluminous fiction are short stories that deal with race, and Stephen Crane touches on the subject of racial violence (indirectly) in "the Monster" (1899), as does Dreiser (directly) in "Nigger Jeff" (1901). (Thomas Dixon's _The Clansman_ waspublished in 1905).

John B. Jones | "Making jazz swing in Emory U. Dept. of English | seventeen syllables AIN'T jjones@dooley.cc.emory.edu | no square's job." - Etheridge Knight

Good course idea. Why not use Thomas Dixon's The Clansman? From your note it sounded like you were restricting your white authors to the canonical ones, while undoubtedly your writers of color were less canonical. This lack of symmetry may explain part of your problem. Using Dixon's book would allow you you to address head on how popular culture used the reconstruction period to reconstitute a nationalism based on whiteness, and the role the Klan played in that. It would also be the basis for screening Birth of a Nation. I don't see how you could teach the class without the film, which arguably had more impact on US attitudes about race than any other cultural product of the period.

The text that works extremely well on attitudes to race and their representation in official history is Catharine Maria Sedgwick's "Hope Leslie,"[NEXT Sedgwick] which I read as an antidote to Cooper's "Last of the Mohicans." An excellent choice for a short story is Kate Chopin's "Desiree's Baby."[NEXT Chopin]

Ivy Schweitzer
Dept. of English, Dartmouth College

For white authors on race attitudes you should definitely look at some of the short stories of Kate Chopin, especially "Desiree's Baby."[NEXT Chopin]

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And here are yet SIX more contributions to the discussion of works by white authors interested in issues of race for a course on the construction of race in the 19th and early 20th centuries.

I concur with Mary Titus' request (third posting down) of Jeff Steele if he'd be willing to post his syllabus on the course for "Constructions of Race." There seems to be a lot of interest in this: Other syllabi on said topic out there?
RBass
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I'd suggest Melville's Benito Cereno.

Also, Hawthorne's portrayal of the Native American (actually, virtual erasure except as the dark enemy) in stories like Roger Malvin's Burial might be interesting.

If you don't mind using an excerpt, you could check out Sedgwick's novel Hope Lesile, which focuses on captivity and eventual marriage. See also Lydia Maria Child's short stories on the Indians.[NEXT Child]

RE: Jeffrey Steele's request for other possible texts for his course on Race and American Lit. Some white writers I have taught in a similar course:

O'Neill. *Emperor Jones*
Joel Chandler Harris, eg. "Free Joe and the Rest of the World", also some of Uncle Remus, balanced against Chesnutt.
Thomas Nelson Page, "Marse Chan: A Tale of Old Virginia"
Kate Chopin--short fiction, eg. "Desires Baby"[NEXT Chopin]
Sarah Elliott, "The Heart of It" (in Signet Classic Book of Southern Short Stories)
watch "Birth of a Nation"
excerpts from Mary Chesnut's diary
excerpts from Susan Smedes, *Memorials of a Southern Planter*

I would love to see a copy of Jeffrey Steele's syllabus if he could send it to the list or to me.

Mary Titus titus@stolaf.edu

Regarding Jeffrey Steele's course on race, I would suggest using some of the short stories of Ruth McEnery Stuart and/or Grace King to gain some insight into white attitudes toward "The Negro Question" and how they used literature to enter into the ongoing dialogue attempting to redefine black identity in the post War years and into the 20th century. Stuart's work is definitely more in the "local color" tradition than King's but is extremely useful in showing how (supposedly harmless) humor was actually a powerful tool in reinstating white supremacist attitudes. She created many, many stories featuring black characters but usually along very stereotypical lines (negative stereotypes, that is). I find King's work intriguing for its focus on the relationships between black and white women and how emancipation affected that relationship.

Your course sounds most interesting, and I'd like to hear more about it....

Judy Sneller
jsneller@silver.sdsmt.edu

In response to Jeffrey Steele's inquiry re constructing race in American literature, I've taught a similar course at both undergraduate and graduate levels. Some 1870-1920 white authors other than Poe, Melville, and Twain (especially PUDDN'HEAD WILSON) are George Washington Cable (esp. THE GRANDISSIMES, MADAME DELPNINE, and "'Tite Poulette"), Joel Chandler Harris (both the Uncle Remus books and FREE JOE AND OTHER STORIES), Thomas Dixon (esp. THE CLANSMAN, from which BIRTH OF A NATION was made, THE LEOPARD'S SPOTS, and THE SINS OF THE FATHERS), William Dean Howells' AN IMPERATIVE DUTY, Albion Tourgee, and Kate Chopin's "Desiree's Baby."[NEXT Chopin]

Jim Kinney
Virginia Commonwealth University

Kate Chopin, "Desiree's Baby" (1894?)[NEXT Chopin]

One of the most useful texts for raising questions about what constitutes "race," and especially how it is constructed by gender and class power, is Kate Chopin's "Desiree's Baby." Some of the recent work on Gilman's "Yellow Wallpaper" deals with race in quite interesting ways (see the Rutgers U.P. edition. Joel Chandler Harris as well as some of the plantation, racist novelists work usefully over against Chesnutt and Dunbar. Harriet Spofford's "Circumstance" can interestingly be approached in this framework as well--and also a couple of Rebecca Harding Davis' stories. Paul Lauter

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Here are yet FOUR more responses to the request for white authors interested in issues of race.
RBass
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If it isn't mentioned elsewhere, Albion Tourgee, Plessey's attorney, was also a novelist who wrote on race in many, but not all of his stories.

Kevin R. McNamara
English and American Studies
Palacky University
Olomouc, Czech Republic

Don't forget Styron's _Confessions of Nat Turner_ or that Harlem Rennaissence novel/social anthropology work _Nigger Heaven_.

White novelists dealing with "race:"

The breakthrough novel in 1948 was Kingsblood Royal by . I haven't read it since I was in junior high school, but perhaps some shcolar should revisit it. Basically, it is the Babbitt story except that the white middle-class man discovers not "Bohemia" but the "Negro" section of his town. he falls in love with a "Negress." He owns a black cocker spaniel called "Nigger" and a white mob kills the dog and throws it on his front porch at the conclusion of the novel.

Others? Faulkner, of course. Light in August, Intruder in the Dust, etc. (Someone should view the MGM movie made of this novel. It starred Claude Jarman, Jr., who had played Jodie in The Yearling. The year of the movie was 1949.)

On the obverse side, a "Black" man who called himself Frank Yerby had written a series of panting, bosom-heaving Southern romances in the Gone With the Wind vein. When he revealed that he was in fact Black and not White, his career took a nosedive. That also happened in the late 1940's.

John Gilgun

There is of course the obvious (and pardon me if it's scrolled past and I've missed it) choice of Stowe's _Uncle Tom's Cabin_. Sections of _Gone With the Wind_ might be useful in examining how much of white middlebrow America was brought up to think about race. Someone mentioned Lydia Maria Child's stories; _Hobomok_ is an interesting choice. My books are still in boxes from my move, so I'm a little fuzzy on specifics, but what about "as-told-to" Native American autobiographies and/or anthropological studies? or the representation of Chinese Americans in Charlie Chan and Fu Manchu stories? or Wallace Irwin's turn-of-the-century "humor" pieces featuring a Japanese American servant named Togo? For less "fictional" discussions of Asian Americans, you might check out the legal and popular press documents addressing their citizenship status; a book called _Racism, Dissent, and Asian Americans from 1850 to the Present_ (Foner & Rosenberg, Greenwood Press 1993) has a nice collection of such documents. And finally, what about the problem (?) of a book like Danny Santioago's _Famous All Over Town_, written by a white man about hispanics under a hispanic pen name? (er, should be _Santiago_)

Shelley Reid
University at Buffalo (SUNY)
V524YAXB@ubvms.cc.buffalo.edu

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And, FOUR more responses to the query about white authors interested in questions of race and racial issues.
Rbass
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Also consider Willa Cather, especially *Death Comes For the Archbishop* for the treatment of American Indians and Mexicans.

For relationships to the Jews, consider Edith Wharton, especially her *House of Mirth.*

Paul P. Reuben

A few more suggestions for white authors' constructions of race:

I taught Helen Hunt Jackson's *Ramona* (1884) last semester--it's awfully long, but very interesting in its representation of Native Americans and Mexican Americans in the 19th century. Since it has been frequently compared to and was evidently influenced by *Uncle Tom's Cabin*, it makes for an interesting comparison with the latter.

Fannie Hurst's *Imitation of Life* (1933) raises fascinating issues regarding to the economic and emotional relationships between black and white women. It's out of print, but used copies of the most recent reprint do seem to be in circulation.

Lillian Smith's *Strange Fruit* (1944) is an interesting novel by a white Southern female civil rights advocate about a relationship between a white man and a black woman.

Flannery O'Connor's "Everything that Rises Must Converge" and "The Artificial Nigger" raise troubling questions about the dependence of white identity on constructions of black identity.

An excellent resource is the critical study: Reading Race, by Aldon Nielsen, U Georgia Press, 199?; it won a SMALA prize and is must reading for this issue.

Fred l. Gardaphe, Columbia College, Chicago fgar@aol.com

In response to your request for white authors dealing with the construction of race, you might want to check out an article written in the 1930's by Sterling Brown called "Negro Character as Seen by White Authors." He mentions a wide variety of white authors and their constructions of different racial stereotypes. It can be found in the anthology _Dark Symphony__, eds Theodore Gross and James Emanuel. I am presently working on two novels by white authors about African-American characters -- Julia Peterkin's _Scarlet Sister Mary_ and DuBose Heyward's _Porgy_. They are interesting for issues of race, but they were written in the 1920's, which is later than your time period. If you extend your period into the 1920's, there are quite a few novels of this sort. Hope this helps.--Debra Beilke, University of Wisconsin-Madison.

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