| Description |
191 pages : illustrations ; 24 cm. |
| Series |
Oxford studies in American literary history
|
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Oxford studies in American literary history.
|
| Bibliography |
Includes bibliographical references and index. |
| Contents |
Introduction. Racialized Surveillance and Sousveillance in the Antebellum United States ; Antebellum Genres of Surveillance -- 1. Fugitive Slave Narratives as a Literature of Sousveillance. Before the "Slave as Eyewitness" Trope: The Ex-Slave Narrator as Spy ; Racialized Surveillance and Sousveillance in Slave Narratives of the 1820s and 1830s ; Complicating the Dialectic of Racialized Surveillance and Sousveillance -- 2. Inconspicuous and Conspicuous Detection in Ball and Poe. "On the Trail of the Murderer": Charles Ball Solves a Crime ; Poe's Experiments with Detection in The Narrative of Arthur Gordon Pym ; Perfecting Conspicuous Detection in the Dupin Tales -- 3. White Oversight in The Confessions of Nat Turner, Benito Cereno, and The Heroic Slave. The Destruction of White Oversight in The Confessions of Nat Turner ; Black Surveillance in Benito Cereno ; White Undersight in The Heroic Slave -- 4. Speculation Fiction: Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl and The Bondwoman's Narrative. Hypercommodification in Incidents in the Life of a Slave Girl ; Protective Speculation in The Bondwoman's Narrative -- Coda. |
| Summary |
This book argues for the existence of deep, often unexamined, interconnections between genre and race by tracing how surveillance migrates from the literature of slavery to crime, gothic, and detective fiction, not only through the traditional concept of surveillance (top-down), but also the tactics of sousveillance (watching from below). |
| Local Note |
Rider Faculty Publications. |
| Subject |
Slavery in literature.
|
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Slavery in literature. |
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Surveillance in literature.
|
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Surveillance in literature. |
|
American literature -- 19th century -- History and criticism.
|
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American literature. |
| Chronological Term |
19th century |
| Subject |
Enslaved persons' writings, American -- History and criticism.
|
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Enslaved persons' writings, American. |
|
Detective and mystery stories, American -- History and criticism.
|
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Detective and mystery stories, American. |
| Chronological Term |
1800-1899 |
| Genre/Form |
Criticism, interpretation, etc.
|
| ISBN |
9780192856272 (hardcover) |
|
0192856278 (hardcover) |
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