EWL 362 “Becoming American”: Immigrant Narratives
US citizens and non-citizens alike struggle to understand immigration, advocate for immigration legislation, and tell stories about immigration. In this course we will be reading fictional and autobiographical stories of the immigrant experience in the United States in their historical and political context. We will explore the ways writers employ and vary cultural expectations of the immigrant experience, engage the political context, and interrogate what it has meant to “become American” in different time periods. In addition, we will explore how the cultural context has affected the stories we tell.