The past thirty years have witnessed a rapid growth in the number and
variety of courses and programs that study life writing from literary,
philosophical, psychological, and cultural perspectives. The field has
evolved from the traditional approach that biographies and
autobiographies were always about prominent people--historically
significant persons, the nobility, celebrities, writers--to the
conception of life writing as a genre of interrogation and revelation.
The texts now studied include memoirs, testimonios, diaries, oral
histories, genealogies, and group biographies and extend to resources in
the visual and plastic arts, in films and videos, and on the Internet.
Today the tensions between canonical and emergent life writing texts,
between the famous and the formerly unrepresented, are making the study
of biography and autobiography a far more nuanced and multifarious
activity.This volume in the MLA series Options for Teaching builds on
and complements earlier work on pedagogical issues in life writing
studies. Over forty contributors from a broad range of educational
institutions describe courses for every level of postsecondary
instruction. Some writers draw heavily on literary and cultural theory;
others share their assignments and weekly syllabi. Many essays grapple
with texts that represent disability, illness, abuse, and depression;
ethnic, sexual and racial discrimination; crises and catastrophes;
witnessing and testimonials; human rights violations; and genocide. The
classes described are taught in humanities, cultural studies, social
science, and language departments and are located in, among other
countries, the United States, Great Britain, Canada, Australia, Germany,
Eritrea, and South Africa.
