Invisible Man may be described not only as a bildungsroman, but also as part protest novel, part roman a clef.  You won't get much out of the novel if you don't know anything about the social history behind it, so begin this mandatory background reading now.  You will be tested on basic information from these readings and from our introductory class on the novel.  Date of test t.b.a.

Some students have reported trouble with some of these links. If a link does not work for you, cut and paste the URL.

I have purposely arranged the information in this order.  Please work your way through the readings as they appear in this list; do not skip randomly from one item to another.

1.  Read "overview" and link to "lyrics" of "Black and Blue".

http://www.pbs.org/jazz/classroom/blackandblue.htm

2.  Read these pages announcing special programming for Black History Month:

http://www.biography.com/blackhistory/ (browse the drop down menus)

http://www.cnn.com/SPECIALS/1998/black.history/ (browse site sampler)

3.  Cultural and Historical Background for Invisible Man

a) Read the timelines for1896 -1929 and 1929 -1954 here:
http://search.eb.com/blackhistory/

b) As you make your way through the timeline, click and read each of these links:  Booker T. Washington, W.E.B duBois, 1919 Chicago race riot; Marcus Garvey; Louis Armstrong.

c) http://www.pbs.org/hollywoodpresents/theoldsettler/about/about_harlem.html - Read this page for background info.

4. Tar Baby -

http://human-nature.com/rmyoung/papers/tar1.html

5. The Jim Crow Museum of Racist Memorabilia

http://www.ferris.edu/news/jimcrow/menu.htm

Click on the links to read:
(a) "Who was Jim Crow?"
(b) "What was Jim Crow?"
(c) “Brute” caricature
(d) "Mammy caricature"
(e) "Picaninny caricature" (as applied to Little Black Sambo)
(f) “Coon” caricature
(g) "New Racist Forms" (note the picture of a bank in the shape of a man at the bottom of the article).

“Reality Anthem”: New York New York
(Grandmaster Flash and the Furious Five)
New York, New York, big city of dreams
But everything in New York ain't always what it seems
You might get fooled if you come from out of town
But I'm down by law, and I know my way around
Stand at a skyscraper reachin' into heaven
When over in the ghetto I'm livin' in hell
Just play ball or be an entertainer
'cause niggaz like me can't read too well
Nobody loves me, nobody cares
I dreamed about a life but I'm livin' in a nightmare
Paranoid schitzo, set back, snowbound
Bad news psycho, heart attack, breakdown!
(Glover, Robinson, Flecter, Griffin - Sugarhill Records, 1983)