UVM Libraries Research Guides: English & American Literature : African American Literature: Starting Points: Literature

Literary

Oxford Bibliographies. American Literature This link opens in a new window
This resource is an authoritative guide to the current scholarship (in all formats) on American literature from the last 500 years, with original introductory and commentary text followed by an annotated list of cited works. To see the list of entries by broad topic (e.g., time period; Themes, Groups, and Historical Events), in the left sidebar, click "Learn more about this subject."

Oxford Encyclopedia of American Literature
Print: REF PS 21 .E537 2004 (4 vols)
Covers American literature, from the European discovery of America to the present, with essays on the most-studied American authors, literary masterworks, and genres or movements.
Concise Oxford companion to African American literature

Literary Encyclopedia This link opens in a new window
This peer-reviewed online encyclopedia provides authoritative background and short criticism on world literature and cultural history. The work includes authored essays, chronologies, critical bibliographies, and more. It is continuously updated.
This encyclopedia is consciously adding essays on writers of more marginalized cultural identities, e.g., Caribbean Black British, British Asian, African American, Asian American, First Nations /Indigenous US-American (and Canadian), etc.
Masterplots This link opens in a new window
This resource contains full-text summaries and critical evaluations of selected books, plays, stories, and poems in literature worldwide from all eras.
Columbia Granger's World of Poetry This link opens in a new window
This resource is a searchable database of full-text poems and citations to poems in anthologies by major poets worldwide from all eras. It also contains biographical profiles of poets, poem commentaries, a glossary of poetry terms, and spoken word audio recordings of poems.
Oxford African American Studies Center This link opens in a new window
Portal to full-text information (biographies, encyclopedias, companions, primary sources), images and maps about African Americans, African American life and culture, and Africa and the diaspora. This resource has over 600 subject entries on literature- and language-related topics.

Oxford Handbooks Online
The titles in this multidisciplinary series offer authoritative surveys of original research in a particular subject area. Specially commissioned essays from recognized scholars in the discipline give critical examinations of the progress and direction of debates, as well as a foundation for future research.
Oxford Handbook of American Literary Naturalism

Encyclopedia of Religion in America. "Literature: African American"
Early African American Print Culture
by Eric Gardner
From: Oxford Research Encyclopedia - Literature (free content)

The following five books are in the Reference Collection, 1st floor. They are non-circulating.

Handbook of African American Literature by Hazel Arnett Ervin
Call Number: REF PS 153 .N5 E78 2004
Schomburg Center Guide to Black Literature Find information on the authors, writings, characters, themes, topics, literary theories and events associated with US and international black literature. Includes biographies on novelists, poets, critics, playwrights, essayists and historians, as well as synopses of works. Entries are both brief and substantive.
Call Number: REF PN 841 .V35 1996
Oxford Handbook of African American Language
Call Number: REF PE 3102 .N42 O94 2015
Encyclopedia of the Harlem Literary Renaissance
Call Number: REF PS 153 .N5 B675 2006
The Pen Is Ours: a listing of writings by and about African- American women before 1910 with secondary bibliography to the present
Call Number: REF Z 1229 .N39 Y44 1991
Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Folklore This encyclopedia is a comprehensive overview of African American folklore. Included are @700 entries on such topics as folktales, music, art, foodways, spiritual beliefs, proverbs, and other subjects. It encompasses traditional culture central to African American daily life.
Call Number: REF GR 111 .A47 G74 2006 (3 vols)

The following five books are not in the Reference Collection but are useful for providing overviews of topics in African American literature. They may be checked out of the library.

A Companion to African American Literature
Call Number: PS 153 .N5 C57 2010 (3rd floor)
This book is part of Blackwell companions to literature and culture, and presents a chronological overview of African American literature from the 18th century to the modern day.
The Routledge Introduction to African American Literature
Call Number: PS 153 .N5 M5 2016 (3rd floor)
This book considers the key literary, political, historical and intellectual contexts of African American literature from its origins to the present, and also provides an analysis of the current literary trends and debates in African American literature.
Cambridge Companion to the African American Novel
Call Number: PS 374 .N4 C36 2004 (3rd floor)
Presents essays covering the one hundred and fifty year history of the African American novel. Scholars from the US and Europe address some of the major issues in the genre: passing, the Protest novel, the Blues novel, and womanism among others. Chapters examine works by Ralph Ellison, Leon Forrest, Toni Morrison, Ishmael Reed, Alice Walker, John Edgar Wideman, and many others.
Cambridge Companion to African American Women's Literature
Call Number: PS 153 .N5 C343 2009 (3rd floor)
Covers a period dating back to the eighteenth century. A wide range of topics are addressed, from the Harlem Renaissance to the Black Arts Movement, and from the performing arts to popular fiction.
The Oxford Handbook of the African American Slave Narrative This handbook offers an assessment of this American literary genre. Includes essays that consider: the fundamental concerns of gender, sexuality, community, and the Christian ethos of suffering and redemption; under-studied narratives of individuals such as Josiah Henson, Sojourner Truth, and other often-overlooked accounts; the emergence and development of neoslave narratives, (e.g., Beloved); the WPA recordings of interviews with former slaves during the late 1930s.
Call Number: PS 366 .A35 O94 2014 (3rd floor)

Autobiography: Slave Narratives
by Lynn Orilla Scott
From: The Oxford Research Encyclopedia - Literature (free content)