Department of English

This weekly seminar will investigate the role of memory and its intimate relationship to female existence in novels, memoirs, and essays by Irish, Indian, African American, Caribbean, and Jewish American writers. In our readings and discussions, we will turn our attention to questions of individual and collective memory; the relationship between memory, written history, and identity; the inscription of memory on the woman's body; and the relationship between memory and secrets. Additional issues to be explored are pregnancy and childbirth, rape, incest, domestic abuse, and bodily desire. We will read theoretical material on memory to supplement our literary studies