Academic Staff

Dr Jennifer Terry

Contact (email at j.a.terry@durham.ac.uk)

Career Biography

After completing a PhD and teaching at the University of Warwick, Dr. Jennifer Terry came to Durham as Lecturer in English in 2004. Her work is situated at the intersections of such fields as American literature, postcolonial studies and writings of the black diaspora. Previous research has focused on the novels of the contemporary African American author Toni Morrison and appears or is forthcoming in edited collections and journals. Dr. Terry is currently developing a monograph provisionally entitled 'Shuttles in the Rocking Loom of History': Mapping the Black Diaspora in African American and Caribbean Fiction for Liverpool University Press. This comparative study examines how, through symbolic journeys, trajectories and geographies, selected African American, Caribbean and Black British novelists speak to ongoing debates about postcolonialism, nationalism, essentialism, hybridity and cross-cultural relations in the diaspora engendered by racial slavery. Engaging the theoretical writing of Édouard Glissant, Paul Gilroy and Carole Boyce Davies, it explores and interrogates diverse transnational responses and perspectives. Other research includes pieces on Paul Laurence Dunbar, W E B Du Bois and Walter Mosley. Dr. Terry has been the recipient of travel and research grants from the British Library, the British Association for American Studies, the British Academy, Stanford University, the JFK Institute for American Studies at the Free University of Berlin and the University of Wisconsin, Madison. In Spring 2009 she will take up a Fellowship at the Institute of Advanced Studies, Durham.

Supervision

Dr. Terry would welcome supervisees working in the areas listed under Teaching and Research Interests below. She has supervised research on American, African, African American, British and contemporary women's literature.

Teaching Interests

American Literature
Postcolonial Studies
Twentieth Century Fiction

Research Groups

• American Studies
• Critical Theory

Research Interests

• Literatures of Slavery and the Black Diaspora (African American, Caribbean, Black British).

Publications

Books: authored

• Terry, J. 2011. Critical Guide to African American Literature. Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press.
• Terry, J. 2010. ‘Shuttles in the Rocking Loom of History’ Mapping the Black Diaspora in African American and Caribbean Fiction. Liverpool: Liverpool University Press.

Essays in edited volumes

• Terry, J. 2009. 'Toni Morrison'. In A Companion to Twentieth Century American Fiction. Seed, D. Blackwell Publishing.
• Terry, J. 2008. 'The Fiction of W E B Du Bois'. In The Cambridge Companion to W E B Du Bois. Zamir, S. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. 48-63.
• Terry, J. 2007. ''When All the Wars Are Over': The Utopian Impulses of Toni Morrison’s Postwar Fiction.'. In Back to Peace: Reconciliation and Retribution in the Postwar Period.. Usandizaga, Aránzazu. & Monnickendam, Andrew. Notre Dame, Ind.: University of Notre Dame Press. 95-115. (Additional information) (View publication online)
• Terry, J. 2006. “A New World Religion?: Creolisation and Candomblé in Toni Morrison’s Paradise”. In Toni Morrison and the Bible: Contested Intertextualities. Stave, S. A. New York: Peter Lang. 192-214. (Additional information)
• Terry, J. 2005. “A. J. Verdelle”. In The Greenwood Encyclopedia of African American Literature. Ostrom, Hans & Macey, Jr., David J. Westport, Conn.: Greenwood Press. 5: 1653-1654. (Additional information) (View publication online)
• Terry, J. 2005. 'A New World Religion? Creolisation and Candomblé in Toni Morrison’s Paradise.'. In Complexions of Race: The African Atlantic.. Gysin, Fritz. & Hamilton, Cynthia S. Münster: Lit Verlag. 61-82. (Additional information) (View publication online)

Journal papers: academic

• Terry, J. 2007. '“When Dey ’Listed Colored Soldiers” Paul Laurence Dunbar’s Poetic Engagement with the Civil War, Masculinity and Violence'. African American Review 41(2): 269-275. (Additional information) (View publication online)
• Terry, J. 2007. 'Buried Perspectives: Narratives of Landscape in Toni Morrison's Song of Solomon. Narrative Inquiry 17(1): 93-118. (Additional information) (View publication online)

Other media: research

• Terry, J. 2005. ‘Reading Toni Morrison Critically’. Literature Compass 2(AM 147): 1-9. (Additional information) (View publication online)