Date on Master's Thesis/Doctoral Dissertation

5-2012

Document Type

Master's Thesis

Degree Name

M.A.

Department

Pan-African Studies

Committee Chair

Carew, Joy Gleason

Author's Keywords

African American women's theater; Political theater; Suzan-Lori Parks; Theater and pedagogy; Black feminist theater

Subject

Parks, Suzan-Lori. In the blood; Parks, Suzan-Lori--Criticism and interpretation; African American women in literature; African American women--Social conditions

Abstract

This research examined how the dramatic writing of Suzan-Lori Parks functioned as a form of critical pedagogy which may serve to elevate the critical consciousness of African American women. It sought to consider the implications of her dramatic writing in relation to the African American female experience. Specifically, this research explored Parks's dramatic work In The Blood by way of a constructed pedagogical model which utilized Henry A. Giroux's perspective on critical pedagogy and Lisa M. Anderson's perspective of a "black feminist aesthetic" (of theatre). This framework also incorporated methods of a literary deconstructive strategy, a black feminist approach and writing techniques of Parks. This research considered how Parks's work may encourage, or rather incite, women in general, but particularly, African American women to think critically about themselves and their social environment, to move towards social existences which actively oppose hierarchal systems of oppression and repression.

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