20th/21st C. Americanist Roll Call

[CulturalCriminal]

I noticed other roll-calls and figured it might be “fun” to have one for us 20th & 21st century (US) Americanists.

I concede that I’ve always been a little suspicious of the need to pick a time period and location-based limiter in literature to study, but I admit that my interest in writing research drops significantly pre-20th century. Likewise, I may love literature written or unrelated to the Americas, but cultural studies is my primary sandbox and picking apart (US) American culture is my favorite thing to do in that sandbox. Besides, I spend most of my time with film, tv, and comics. It’d be hard to pull that off as a 18th century Russian Lit person ?

Edited February 17, 2018 by CulturalCriminal

[clinamen]

20th C. Americanist here ?‍♀️ — Interested in American modernism, women writers, and the city. 

[punctilious]

Wife of post-45 Americanist checking in! Husband is interested in "parsing postmodern and post-postmodern or New Sincere American fiction, i.e. contemporary fiction, through the lens of Thing Theory."

[SmallFrenchHouse]

Me too! Though technically I'm an 1860s-present Americanist. Interested in the legacy of the Civil War era in culture and lit.

Edited February 17, 2018 by SmallFrenchHouse
grammar

[a_sort_of_fractious_angel]

Howdy, all - 20th and 21st American (mostly contemporary) in relation to transnational/hemispheric studies.

[LibraryLivingJT]

Hey all! Thanks for starting this thread!

20th and 21st century Americanist here (mostly contemporary) focusing on race, ethnicity, identity, assimilationism. I also like to look at national identity and immigration.

I enjoy doing interdisciplinary work that involves politics and history.

I mainly work with 20th century and contemporary ethnic American lit.

[LibraryLivingJT]

46 minutes ago, clinamen said:

20th C. Americanist here ?‍♀️ — Interested in American modernism, women writers, and the city. 

I audited an amazing history class while I was working on my MA called "Gender and the American City." It was so cool!

[toxicmoss]

20/21st American (also mostly contemporary) with some occasional wanderings toward Woolf and Japanese/Japanese-American lit

[clinamen]

45 minutes ago, LibraryLivingJT said:

I audited an amazing history class while I was working on my MA called "Gender and the American City." It was so cool!

Ahhh omg this sounds so amazing! Do you mind sharing where/who taught it?? 

[LibraryLivingJT]

1 hour ago, clinamen said:

Ahhh omg this sounds so amazing! Do you mind sharing where/who taught it?? 

Clark University in Worcester, MA and it was taught by Dr. Amy Richter

[writethebeats]

20th C. American Lit - interested in modernism and postmodernism with a focus on performance, form, and the body. 

A lot of my work intersects with film and music.

If I was to really narrow it down, my main area of study is the Beat Generation (ie. Ginsberg, Cassidy, Kerouac). 

[Melvillage_Idiot]

I'm mostly a dabbler Americanist - let's just read all of it, dammit! - but I lean pretty heavily into contemporary Southern and Western writers from the Modernist period to today. I did my MA thesis on really contemporary Southern Gothic authors (like, post-2010 contemporary) who live and write about characters outside the traditional South. At the PhD level, I'd like to do something with Appalachian literature, which almost nobody discusses and which really took off in the 1900s.

My theory background is pretty weak, so I hesitate to align myself with any particular school of thought.  *severe Imposter Syndrome begins to kick in*

Fun fact: When you announce to a room full of other English students that you do things with Southern Gothic, there's always this one Brit Lit specialist who really wants you to know how much they hate William Faulkner. Never fails.

[miss-prufrock]

I'm primarily interested in the 20th century--suburbia and sprawl, Asian-Americans, and confessional poetry. I'm starting out, but I am interested in performativity, disability studies with a focus on mental illness, religion, gender, and fandom. When it comes to the 21st century, I do have a focus on comics and graphic novels, as well as fandom. I do love Modern British Literature and Romantic poetry. Some of my favorites come from Japanese literature.

Yes, literary theory is also a weakness, so I'd like to take the Literary Theory and Aesthetics course. I wasn't an English major as an undergrad; I only took lots of English electives and two Comparative Literature electives. And since I'm from the Philippines, I'd love to immerse myself in postcolonial theory.

[automatic]

Hi! I'm interested in 20th century and 21st century American lit -- mostly the aesthetics of fiction vs. nonfiction writing, especially as it involves the rise of New Journalism and the contemporary American memoir--and where the history of autofiction plays into all this--and other forms of inventive, experimental self-narratives that question the generic categories of novel, memoir, autobiography, etc. I have growing interests in disability studies, in affect theory, and also just in plain old American realism!!!! 

[Sandra Kruse]

Present!  I am also interested in the late 19thc, as well as 20thc, and will continue to move into the earlier lit as my work continues [I think].

[Dogfish Head]

Broadly, I am a 20th and 21st century Americanist, but I would most closely align my interests within the genre of science fiction. My theoretical interests revolve around political and ethical theory, representations of the body subjected to violence, and some psychoanalysis.