Frances Smith Foster
Frances Smith Foster | |
---|---|
![]() Foster interviewed at Emory School of Law in 2012 | |
Born | February 8, 1944 |
Children | 3 |
Academic background | |
Alma mater | University of California, San Diego University of Southern California Miami University |
Thesis | Slave narratives : text and social context (1976) |
Academic work | |
Institutions | Emory University San Diego State University University of California, San Diego |
Frances Smith Foster (born 1944) is an American researcher and emeritus Professor of African-American studies and women's history. She has previously served as the Charles Howard Candler Professor of English and Women's Studies at Emory University.
Early life and education
[edit]Foster grew up in Dayton, Ohio.[1] Her parents were Quinton Smith, a truck driver and Mabel Smith (née Gullette), a beautician. They had four other children.[2] Smith attended the all-black Wogaman Elementary School and graduated from Roosevelt High School.[2]
She earned her bachelor's degree at Miami University, where she studied education. She made Phi Beta Kappa and graduated cum laude.[2] She earned a master's degree at the University of Southern California in 1971.[2] After graduating Foster moved to the University of California, San Diego, where she investigated slave narratives as part of a doctoral programme in British and American literature.[3] She has said that during her graduate studies in the 1970s she did not encounter the work of Black women scholars.[4][5] She received her Ph.D. there in 1976.[2]
Research and career
[edit]In the early days of her academic career, Foster was appointed as the Chair of Black Students at the San Diego State University.[4] In 1994, she published Witnessing Slavery: The Development of Antebellum Slave Narratives, which was the first text to explore the genre of slave literature. She has argued that African-American literature owes a considerable amount to slave narratives; including humour, irony and the creation of the protagonist character of "The Heroic Slave".[6] The Modern Language Association has said: "Frances proved that the slave narrative was a dynamic and ever-evolving genre of black self-expression." She also studied the literary contributions of African-American women, arguing that Black women not only founded the literary traditions of African Americans but that of all American women's literature.[6] When Foster joined Emory University in 1996, she became Director of the Institute for Women's Studies.[4] She contributed to the 1997 Norton Anthology of African American Literature.[7] She held Fellowships at Harvard University and Leiden University.[8]
Foster served on various committees for the Modern Language Association, including the Division of Ethnic Languages and Literatures, Afro-American Literature Discussion Group and executive committee.[9]
Awards and honors
[edit]In 2009, Foster was awarded the Francis Andrew March award and in 2010 the Hubbell Medal, both of the Modern Language Association.[9] She was the first African-American woman to win such an award.[10]
In 2011, she was awarded the Brandeis University Toby Gittler Prize "for outstanding and lasting contributions to racial, ethnic and religious relations", and the Emory University Feminists Founders award.[11][12] The following year, the Society for the Study of American Women Writers announced that Foster was the inaugural winner of the Karen Dandurand Lifetime Achievement Medal.[13]
Selected works
[edit]- Foster, Frances Smith (1944– ). (1994). Witnessing slavery : the development of ante-bellum slave narratives. The University of Wisconsin Press. ISBN 978-0-299-14214-8. OCLC 985816329.
{{cite book}}
: CS1 maint: numeric names: authors list (link) - Foster, Frances Smith. (1993). Written by herself literary production by African American women, 1746-1892. Indiana University Press. ISBN 0-253-20786-X. OCLC 1178676105.
- Andrews, William L.; Frances Smith Foster; Trudier Harris, eds. (1997). The Oxford Companion to African American Literature. Oxford University Press. ISBN 0-19-506510-7. OCLC 35305158.
References
[edit]- ^ Koolish, Lynda (2001). African American Writers: Portraits and Visions. Univ. Press of Mississippi. ISBN 978-1-57806-258-4.
- ^ a b c d e ""Frances Smith Foster"". Notable Black American Women. Gale. 2002. Retrieved 8 August 2020 – via Gale In Context: Biography.
- ^ Foster, Frances Smith (1976). Slave narratives: text and social context (Thesis). OCLC 917928917.
- ^ a b c Moody, Joycelyn; Elizabeth Cali (2013). "A Tribute to Frances Smith Foster". Legacy. 30 (2): 219–225. doi:10.5250/legacy.30.2.0219. ISSN 0748-4321. JSTOR 10.5250/legacy.30.2.0219. S2CID 154460943.
- ^ "The Study of African American Women's Writing: Pasts & Futures". American Academy of Arts & Sciences. 8 March 2019. Retrieved 2020-08-02.
- ^ a b Koolish, Lynda (2001). African American Writers: Portraits and Visions. Univ. Press of Mississippi. p. 38. ISBN 978-1-57806-258-4.
- ^ "The Norton Anthology of African American Literature". wwnorton.com. Retrieved 2020-08-02.
- ^ Mathilda B. Canter, Recipient of the American Psychological Foundation Gold Medal for Lifetime Achievement in the Practice of Psychology, American Psychological Association (APA), 2002, doi:10.1037/e565682006-014
- ^ a b "Hubbell Medal 2010 | Frances Smith Foster | Report of the Hubbell Award Committee". www.als-mla.org. Retrieved 2020-08-02.
- ^ "Foster's contributions to literature honored". www.emory.edu. January 12, 2011. Retrieved 2020-08-02.
- ^ "NewsCenter | SDSU | Humanities Vital for Personal Growth". newscenter.sdsu.edu. Retrieved 2020-08-02.
- ^ "Frances Smith Foster and Clayborne Carson". www.brandeis.edu. Retrieved 2020-08-02.
- ^ Tuttle, Jennifer S. (2013-11-29). "Introduction". Legacy: A Journal of American Women Writers. 30 (2): 217–218. doi:10.5250/legacy.30.2.0217. ISSN 1534-0643.
- 1944 births
- Living people
- 20th-century African-American academics
- 20th-century American academics
- 21st-century African-American academics
- 21st-century American academics
- Academics from Ohio
- Emory University faculty
- People from Dayton, Ohio
- University of California, San Diego faculty
- University of Southern California alumni