Bøger i The American Literatures Initiative serien

Examines the issue of national affiliation in cases where two nations have become one or one nation has become two. It uses the US Civil War as a case study to demonstrate loyalty and allegiance can be used. It analyses literary works written during and after the conflict to reveal that post-war literature was profoundly shaped by loyalty.

Argues that the small town, as evoked by the image of ""Main Street"", is not a relic of the past but rather a metaphorical screen upon which the US's ""everyday"" stories and subjects are projected on both a national and global level. It brings together a wide range of literary, cultural, and political texts to examine how the small town is used to imagine and reproduce the nation.

Makes the compelling case that the New Negro first emerged long before the Great Migration to the North. The New Negro in the Old South reconstructs the vibrant black community that developed in Nashville after the Civil War, demonstrating how it played a pivotal role in shaping the economic, intellectual, social, and political lives of African Americans in subsequent decades.

Provides a more complete history of the zombie than has ever been told, explaining how the myth's migration to the New World was facilitated by the transatlantic slave trade, and reveals the real-world import of storytelling, reminding us of the power of myths and mythmaking, and the high stakes of appropriation and homage.

Drawing from major figures in American literature, including Mark Twain, Flannery O'Connor, Carson McCullers, and David Foster Wallace, as well as introducing texts from the emerging canon of disability studies, this demonstrates the place of disability at the core of American ideals.

Explores how a major change in the nature and forms of working-class power affected novels about U.S. industrial workers in the first half of the twentieth century.

Explores the hidden or unspoken class inequalities faced by Asian Americans, while insightfully analysing the effect such notions have had on their literary voices. Chang discusses texts from the late nineteenth century to the present that cover a range of contexts.

Transatlantic Spectacles of Race , Kimberly Manganelli argues that the tragic mulatta and tragic muse, who have heretofore been read separately, must be understood as two sides of the same phenomenon. Bringing together an impressive array of cultural texts that includes novels, melodramas, travel narratives, diaries, and illustrations, the book reveals the value of transcending literary, national, and racial boundaries.