Gordon Thompson

For the past nineteen years, Professor Thompson has been teaching African American and American Literature in the English Department at CCNY. He has taught at the Graduate Center and the Center for Worker Education among other locations such as around the nation such as University of Virginia, Stanford University and Louisiana State University.

He is the author of articles on Zora Neale Hurston and Melvin Tolson, Phillis Wheatley in American Literature, Callaloo, and the CLA Journal, respectively. He is a contributing editor to the Encyclopedia of African American Culture and History and has authored several reviews for the American Book Review. He has spoken on Phillis Wheatley, Langston Hughes, Charles Chesnutt, and Paul Laurence Dunbar among several other black literary greats. 

He also teaches courses on New York City in poetry and prose, The Harlem Renaissance, surveys of African American literature, and World Humanities from Homer to Cervantes.

He has been in continuous service to the Langston Hughes Festival Committee since 1990 and is currently the Festival’s Director.
 

Forthcoming Books:

“The Assimilationist Impulse in Representative African American Narratives,” (Edwin Mellen Press, forthcoming, Spring 2011).

“Black Music, Black Poetry: Genre, Performance, and Authenticity”: An Essay Anthology with Contributing authors (Ashgate Press, forthcoming, Spring 2011).

Forthcoming Articles:

“South Dakota”  (co-author, William Gibbons): Black America [Three Volumes]: A State-By-State Historical Encyclopedia, edited by Alton Hornsby Jr.(ABC-CLIO, Inc, forthcoming, Spring 2011).

“North Dakota” (co-author, William Gibbons): Black America [Three Volumes]: A State-By-State Historical Encyclopedia, edited by Alton Hornsby Jr.(ABC-CLIO, Inc, forthcoming, Spring 2011).

“Montana” (co-author, William Gibbons): Black America [Three Volumes]: A State-By-State Historical Encyclopedia, edited by Alton Hornsby Jr.(ABC-CLIO, Inc, forthcoming, Spring 2011).

“Kansas” (co-author, William Gibbons): Black America [Three Volumes]: A State-By-State Historical Encyclopedia, edited by Alton Hornsby Jr.(ABC-CLIO, Inc, forthcoming, Spring 2011).

“Wyoming” (co-author, William Gibbons): Black America [Three Volumes]: A State-By-State Historical Encyclopedia, edited by Alton Hornsby Jr.(ABC-CLIO, Inc, forthcoming, Spring 2011).

 ARTICLES: REFERREED JOURNALS

“Methodism and the Consolation of Heavenly Bliss in Phillis Wheatley’s Funeral Elegies” in CLA Journal, (September 2004; Vol, XLVIII, 1): 34-50.

"Projecting Gender: Personification in the Works of Zora Neale Hurston" in American Literature: (Dec. 1994).

"Ambiguity in Melvin Tolson's Harlem Gallery," in Callaloo: A Journal of Afro-American and African Arts and Letters: (Winter l986).

Articles: other

“Sentimentalism and Aggression in Paul Laurence Dunbar’s ‘When Malindy Sings,” in IRADAC/CAAN Work in Progress Journal,(2004; Vol. II): 161-187.

REVIEWS:

“Sins of Omission,” review of Masculinist Impulses: Toomer, Hurston, Black Writing, and Modernity by Nathan Grant U P Missouri: 2004), in American Book Review (March/April 2005; Vol. 26, 3): 2726 words.

“Love’s Labor’s Lost,” review of The Missing by Rangi McNeil The Sheep Meadow Press: 2003) in American Book Review, (Nov./Dec., 2003; Vol. 25, 1): 1117 wds.

"The Multifarious Dimensions of African American Thought" review of The Origins of African American Literature, 1680-1865, by Dickson D. Bruce Jr. (U P Virginia: 2001) in The American Book Review, (November/December 2002; Vol. 24, 1).

"Forgotten Forbears Resurrected" review of Lost Plays of the Harlem Renaissance 1920-1940, edited by James V. Hatch and Leo Hamalian (1996) in The American Book Review (July - August 1998; Vol. 19, 5).

"An Alignment of Fragments," review of Honorable Amendments by Michael Harper in The American Book Review (August-Sept., 1996; Vol. 17, 6).

Encyclopedia entries:

"Melvin Tolson" in Encyclopedia of African American Culture and History (New York : Macmillan, 1995).

"Charles Chesnutt" in Encyclopedia of African American Culture and History (New York : Macmillan, 1995).