Contemporary American Literature and Excremental Culture

American Sh*t
1. Auflage 2020
ISBN: 978-3-030-46529-2
Verlag: Springer International Publishing

Buch, Englisch, 272 Seiten, Format (B × H): 153 mm x 216 mm, Gewicht: 483 g

Reihe: American Literature Readings in the 21st Century

Contemporary American Literature and Excremental Culture: American Sh*t analyzes post-1960 scatological novels that utilize representations of human waste to address pressing issues, including pollution of waterways, environmental racism, and militarism. Primarily examining postmodern parody, the book shows the value of aesthetic renderings of sanitary engineering for composting ideologies that fuel a ruinous impact on the world. Drawing on late twentieth-century psychoanalytic thinkers Norman O. Brown, Frantz Fanon, and Leo Bersani, American Sh*t shows the continued relevance of psychoanalytic interpretations of contemporary fiction for understanding post-45 authors’ engagement with waste. Ultimately, the monograph reveals how novelists Ishmael Reed, Jonathan Franzen, Gloria Naylor, Don DeLillo, and Samuel R. Delany critique subjects who abnegate their status as waste-producing beings and bring readers back to embrace

Winner of the 2019 Northeast Modern Language Association Book Award for Literary Criticism of English Language Literature

Zielgruppe

Research

Autoren/Hrsg.

Foltz, Mary C.

Fachgebiete

• Geisteswissenschaften Literaturwissenschaft Literarische Stoffe, Motive und Themen
• Interdisziplinäres Wissenschaften Wissenschaft und Gesellschaft | Kulturwissenschaften Kulturwissenschaften
• Geisteswissenschaften Literaturwissenschaft Englische Literatur Amerikanische Literatur

Inhaltsverzeichnis

1. On the American Standard: Post-1960 Scatological Fiction.- 2. Soiling the Black Body: Ishmael Reed Engages White Shit.- 3. Battling the Excremental Self: Civilization and Its Decomposition in Jonathan Franzen’s The Corrections.- 4. Fleeing the Excremental Stain through Acquisition: Getting to the Bottom of Black Suburban Splendor in Gloria Naylor’s Linden Hills.- 5. Waste as Weapon: Fecal Bombing in Don DeLillo’s Underworld. - 6. Shit and Other Forms of Dynamite Refuse: Samuel R. Delany’s Provocative Excremental Eros.- 7. Decay as Gift: Composting American Shit.

Über Autor(innen)

Mary C. Foltz is Associate Professor of English, American Studies, and Women, Gender, and Sexuality Studies at Lehigh University, USA. Her research and teaching focus upon post-1945 U.S. fiction, queer fiction and theory, waste studies, and environmental literary criticism.