McKinley Melton

Biography
McKinley E. Melton, visiting assistant professor of literature, holds a B.A. in English and a B.A. in African and African American Studies from Duke University. He is completing his doctoral work in the W.E.B. Du Bois department of Afro-American studies at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst.

Professor Melton's research and teaching interests are in literatures of Africa and the African Diaspora, most specifically 19th and 20th century African American Literature; spiritual and religious traditions throughout traditional and contemporary African diasporic communities; 20th century American literature; intersections of literary, cultural, and political movements; and the representations of social, political, and cultural belief systems in literary texts.

Professor Melton is also the author of “Speak it into Existence: James Weldon Johnson's God's Trombones and the Power of Self-Definition in the New Negro Harlem Renaissance,” in the edited volume The Harlem Renaissance Revisited: Politics, Arts, and Letters (Johns Hopkins University Press, 2010).

Education
B.A., Duke University - English

B.A., Duke University - African and African-American Studies

A.B.D., University of Massachusetts Amherst - W.E.B. Du Bois Department of Afro-American Studies

Courses
 Current Courses Taught: 

Spring 2012: HACU 158: "Voice and Visibility: African Americans and the Power of Spoken Word"

Spring 2012: HACU 244: "I've Got a Testimony: Autobiography in African American Narrative" (co-taught with Prof. Susan Tracy)

Previously Offered:

"Renaissance, Resistance, and Revolution: 20th Century African American Literature" (Fall 2009, Fall 2010, Fall 2011)

"This Film Inspired By...: Screening Multicultural Literature" (Fall 2011)

"North American Slavery: Resistance and Revolt", co-taught with Prof. Susan Tracy (Spring 2011)

"Myth as Motivation: Reflections on World Literature" (Fall 2010)

"Myth, Belief, and Reality in World Literature" (Fall 2007, Fall 2008, Spring 2010)

"The Other America: Reading America Through the Lens of Multicultural Literature" (Spring 2008, Spring 2009)

"U.S. Literature After 1960" (Spring 2008)

Students I Advise
 DIVISION III 

Samantha Bortle - "The Representations of War, and How to Tell the 'Truth'" (Chair - Spring 2012)

Alexandra Futty - "Reimaging Gendered Imagery in Male Constructions of Carribean Belonging and National Identity in the work of Michelle Cliff and Nalo Hopkinson" (Co-Chair - Spring 2012)

Amber House - "A Queer Exploration of Fluid Identities" (Member - Spring 2012)

Spencer Kuchle - "Performing Blackness: Authenticity, Subversion, and the Concept of Racial Malpractice" (Member - Spring 2012)

Monika Martinez - "Being Away from Home" (Chair - Spring 2012)

G. Kenyatta McKenzie - "ARTiculating Post-Racial Blackness" (Co-Chair - Spring 2012)

Brittany Williams - "Turning Tables: Hip Hop's Resistance to Inequality" (Chair - Spring 2012)

 DIVISION II 

 Evan Amundson - "Aesthetics" (Member)

Chiloe Barrera-Cloyd - "Hip Hop Litigation: Restorative justice as a model for healing Hip Hop communities and addressing social injustice" (Chair)

Danielle Jefferson - "The Politics of Beauty: Racial Discourse Among Black Women in the Caribbean and U.S." (Member)

Jeremy Musher - "Film and Screenwriting as a Reflection of War and Struggle" (Member)

Khafre Nurse - "Educating Black Self and Arts" (Member)

Olivia Prato - "The Heritage of Myth in Writing the Modern Speculative Novel" (Chair)

Sierra Shepard - "The End Justifies the Means"

Jonah Simonak - "Languages of Expression: Literature, Music, and the Spanish Language" (Chair)

 STUDENT GROUPS 

The Urban Word

 PASSED COMMITTEES 

Devin Kharpertian - "Theater of the Mind: Black Masculinity in American Popular Music" (Div III - Member)

Jason Oristaglio - "Power and Resistance" (Div II - Member)

Reynaldo Ortiz - "Meshes of a Multi-Media Narrative" (Div II - Member)

Louisa Rockwell - "Divergent Truths: Subaltern Identity in Literature and the Imprint of Imperialism on Modern Structures of Normativity" (Div II - Member)

Louisa Rockwell - "Plague Fighters and Freedom Writers: The Pathology of Du Boisian Double Consciousness in American Counternarratives (Div III - Co-Chair)

Brittney Sampson - "(Re)Membering the Drops" (Div III - Co-Chair)

Rahel Teka - "Power of Representation" (Div II - Member)

Andre Woodberry - "Race, Class, and Education" (Div II - Co-Chair)

Research
African American Literature and Culture

The Black Church (Cultural, Musical, Literary Expressions)

African Diasporic Religion and Spirituality

African American and African Diasporic Oral Tradition(s)

Current Projects
"Pen Stroking the Soul of a People: Spiritual Foundations of Black Diasporic Literature" (Dissertation)

Community Involvement
Omega Psi Phi Fraternity, Inc. - Delta Chi Chapter (Springfield, MA)

- Chair, Scholarship Committee

- Chair, National Achievement Week Committee

- Chair, Voter Registration, Education, and Mobilization Project

- Chair, National High School Essay Contest

  

 Professional Academic Memberships: 

- Association for the Study of African American Life and History

- Modern Language Association

- National Council on Black Studies