Coming of Age in Black Literature

Undergraduate

Phillip Atiba Goff’s 2014 study “The Essence of Innocence” confirmed that Black children are widely perceived as older than they actually are, and are presumed to be less innocent than their white classmates–often with devastating consequences. This course aims to challenge the “systematic adultification” so prevalent in American (mis)understandings of Black youth by centering narratives of Black childhood across literary genres. How do these texts disrupt conventional approaches to the bildungsroman , and what can these writers teach us about coming of age in America? Previously ENGL 360. HU W 9:25am-11:20am