American Literature / Unit 11 AML 1037 short lesson, about 20 seconds
Charles W. Chesnutt and the Conjure Tales
Captions available
The idea
Chesnutt, born in Cleveland to free Black parents, taught school in North Carolina and later passed the bar. Light enough to have identified as white, he chose not to. His conjure tales frame plantation stories inside a northern buyer's narration.
In practice
Plantation tales, told against the plantation.
Where people slip
The frame narrator is the one being educated.
Your place on the trail
Every lesson rests on earlier ones and opens later ones. Tap any to jump.
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