American Authors: American Women Authors
MIT's literature survey traces American women writers from the seventeenth century to the present, covering genres from the captcaptivity narrative and slave novel to sensational, sentimental, realistic, and postmodern fiction. Readings include Mary Rowlandson, Susanna Rowson, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Harriet Jacobs, Fanny Fern, Rebecca Harding Davis, Edith Wharton, Nella Larsen, Helen Keller, and Toni Morrison, set against events including Puritanism, the American Revolution, nineteenth-century industrialization, the Harlem Renaissance, and the civil rights movements. Course work centers on essays and in-class reports examining specific authors and recurring themes such as labor conditions, class struggle, captivity, and race, with instruction stressing close reading, annotation, and research skills. Materials come from MIT OpenCourseWare and include syllabus, readings, and assignment prompts, free to access with no certificate offered.