With Great Pleasure: Sentimentality and Form in Early African-American Literature NEMLA Conference April 7-10, 2010

full name / name of organization: 
T. Bynum, Towson University
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This panel (for NEMLA Conference 2010--April 7-11, 2010) invites proposals that reexamine early African-American literature from a perspective that emphasizes the means by which these early authors (such as John Marrant, Phillis Wheatley, James Albert Ukawsaw Gronniosaw, and Olaudah Equiano) strategically deploy modes of sentimentality in their writings. Papers should address the means by which these authors explore alternative notions of subjectivity through a relationship to literary forms, such as (but not limited to) the conversion narrative, spiritual autobiography, poetry, and sermon. Please send 300 word abstracts and biographical information to tbynum@towson.edu by September 1.