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Beyond Darwin: Race, Sex, and Science in American Literary Naturalism

Masterson, Kelly
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ohiou1525606188894478

Abstract Details

, Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Ohio University, English (Arts and Sciences).
“Beyond Darwin: Race, Sex, and Hereditarian Science in American Literary Naturalism” explores the intersections among science, race, and sex in nineteenth- and early twentieth-century American literary naturalism. The project traces a cultural history of heredity—the means by which individual traits are acquired and passed to offspring—through turn-of-the-century literature. I contend that scientific and cultural debates surrounding heredity gave African American and women naturalists in particular a new conceptual framework with which to understand the effects of racism and sexism on raced and gendered bodies as well as to explore the extent of individual agency in the face of race- and gender-based oppression. Writers such as Paul Laurence Dunbar, Pauline E. Hopkins, Charles Chesnutt, and Edith Summers Kelley deploy concepts drawn from the science of heredity to show the lasting impact of racism and sexism on the body and on the psyche. These writers also challenge heredity as a deterministic force by refusing to reduce their characters to sex- or race-based biological traits and revealing that it is the use of these scientific theories in service of discrimination circumscribes their agency. I argue that a more rigorous examination of how writers engaged with hereditarian science yields a more nuanced discussion of determinism in naturalism and reworks the naturalist canon by recovering the centrality of women and African American writers.
Paul Jones (Committee Chair)
African American Studies; American Literature; Literature; Science History; Womens Studies
American literary naturalism; naturalism; Paul Laurence Dunbar; Charles Chesnutt; Pauline Hopkins; Evelyn Scott; Edith Summers Kelley; race; sex; science; heredity

Recommended Citations

Citations

  • Masterson, K. (n.d.). Beyond Darwin: Race, Sex, and Science in American Literary Naturalism [Doctoral dissertation, Ohio University]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ohiou1525606188894478

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Masterson, Kelly. Beyond Darwin: Race, Sex, and Science in American Literary Naturalism. Ohio University, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ohiou1525606188894478.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Masterson, Kelly. "Beyond Darwin: Race, Sex, and Science in American Literary Naturalism." Doctoral dissertation, Ohio University. Accessed APRIL 26, 2024. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ohiou1525606188894478

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

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This open access ETD is published by Ohio University and OhioLINK.