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The Bestselling Novel: Currents in American History and CultureMain MenuIntroductionIntersectionality and Power Relations in BestsellerismAn intersectional analysis of the concepts of gender, race and power relationships, highlighting how the overlap between these concepts fueled the novels’ rise as bestsellers.Slavery Beyond ChainsThe Variation of the Forms of Slavery Inflicted on Charlotte in Susanna Rowson's _Charlotte Temple_ and Dana in Octavia Butler's _Kindred_.Perception of Women in SocietyInspecting the ways in which the woman’s default “doomed” status can be blamed on the society's narrow perception of women in Susanna Rowson's Charlotte Temple and Edith Wharton's House of Mirth.Gendered Violence and Racism: The Short End of the StickThe Struggle of the Black Woman Across the CenturiesBrief summaries of course textsStudents in ENG 410: American Novel, an upper-level undergraduate seminar8105943177cf94521fefbbebb901e86333202954
Introduction: What is Slavery?
1media/barbed wire.jpgmedia/slavery2.jpg2018-04-11T09:16:45-07:00Students in ENG 410: American Novel, an upper-level undergraduate seminar8105943177cf94521fefbbebb901e863332029542976120image_header2018-05-21T16:53:44-07:00Students in ENG 410: American Novel, an upper-level undergraduate seminar8105943177cf94521fefbbebb901e86333202954Within the context of American novels, slavery is depicted in multiple forms—particularly in Susanna Rowson’s Charlotte Temple and Octavia Butler’s Kindred. Although slavery has several definitions, the chosen definition for the purpose of argument is as follows: Despite the difference in geography and time in Charlotte Temple and Kindred, we are arguing the ways in which the protagonists of each novel—namely Charlotte Temple and Dana—endure unconventional slavery.
We decided to examine the three forms of slavery:
Emotional
Physical
Social
On page 4, titled "Man is the Centre of the Universe" you will find how Charlotte and Dana's enslavement is centered around certain men in their lives they are emotionally attached to; however, Charlotte remains passive while Dana manages to actively fight this enslavement at the end. There is a Gif on the page that depicts how these men are centered in their lives.
On page 7, titled "A Woman's Ruins," you may observe the results of Charlotte and Dana's physical enslavement, where Charlotte loses her life, but is recognised as a milestone in history, while Dana loses a part of her identity as she loses her arm to the past.
On page 10, titled "Denounced," you can see how even though Dana and Charlotte are very different in terms of who they are and where they come from, they both face societal expectations and end up being enslaved to that society. Because of her society, Dana ends up being the slave she fought so hard against being and Charlotte becomes known as a ruined woman because she defied what was expected of her.
As the pages progress, you will begin to see how physical and social enslavement branch out of emotional enslavement. The idea to keep in mind is that the specific men in Charlotte and Dana’s lives initiated the first confinement, which resulted in their inability to physically escape the constraint and the decline of their social status.
This page has paths:
1media/enslavement.png2018-04-18T09:40:38-07:00Students in ENG 410: American Novel, an upper-level undergraduate seminar8105943177cf94521fefbbebb901e86333202954Slavery Beyond ChainsStudents in ENG 410: American Novel, an upper-level undergraduate seminar13The Variation of the Forms of Slavery Inflicted on Charlotte in Susanna Rowson's _Charlotte Temple_ and Dana in Octavia Butler's _Kindred_.splash7181092018-10-31T17:30:57-07:00Students in ENG 410: American Novel, an upper-level undergraduate seminar8105943177cf94521fefbbebb901e86333202954
