After you've completed the paper, you will come together as a class to figure out a way to condense your research to create a study guide for Invisibile Man. This study guide can take the form of a webpage, chapbook, a power point presentation, or any other medium you can think of (as long as it can be reproduced and seen by others.)

No individual member of the class can complete the same research topic, so before you pick you must come up with a consensus. More importantly, follow the links and read the description of what each topic entails before you decide on a topic. After you pick a topic fill-out the following table.

Jazz
Influential Personalities
The Labor Movement
Art of the Harlem Renaissance
Writers of the Harlem Renaissance
Ralph Ellison

A great place to start for any of these projects would be: Slave & Freedom Literature

Cool, daddy-o, funky, and hep-cat are all terms that came from Jazz. It is a language beyond the walking bass-line, the improvisational solo, the backbeat, and the scat. Jazz beyond music has influenced the way one talks and Ralph Ellison wrote his novel Invisible Man. Your part of the project is decode the novel as a jazz composition. What symbols might be the walking bass line? What is the backbeat that keeps the various chapters from straying too far from the main theme? How does Ellison's writing style elict sycopation?

You will might want to start at PBS and look up Ken Burns' series on Jazz as he has an interview with Ralph Ellison.

Before you turn in your paper make sure you go over the checklist of things you need to turn in with your paper.

After you complete your paper, meet with your classmates to determine what parts of your research would be helpful in a study guide for Invisible Man.

Is truth stranger than fiction? Ralph Ellison seemed to think that some leaders of "their race" made excellent fictious characters. Is to identify the following people in the novel: Booker T. Washington, W.E.B. Du Bois, Marcus Garvey. After you've identified their characters, compare and contrast their representations in the book versus their real life demeanor, and the institutions these people worked/founded. Did Ellison take many liberties with their personalities and the institutions they served? You might want to start at: Biography Channel or The History Channel

Before you turn in your paper make sure you go over the checklist of things you need to turn in with your paper.

After you complete your paper, meet with your classmates to determine what parts of your research would be helpful in a study guide for Invisible Man.

If it were not for the government, Invisible Man might not ever been written. At one point in his career he received a WPA grant to write. Therefore, it is no suprise that the importance of The Labor Movement shows up in this novel. Your job is to research the history of The Labor Movement and its influence during the great depression. How did The Labor Movement appear in Invisible Man? What were Ellison's feelings about organized labor? Did he or any of his friends get into trouble for organizing labor? Why do you think that organized labor actively sought to recruit people from African-American communities? You might want to check out The AFL-CIO

Before you turn in your paper make sure you go over the checklist of things you need to turn in with your paper.

After you complete your paper, meet with your classmates to determine what parts of your research would be helpful in a study guide for Invisible Man.

The visual artists of the Harlem Renaissance brought a new vision of what America looked liked, how it played, and what stories it would tell. Your job is to study what influenced the artists of the Harlem Renaissance, and how might their style of visual story telling influence Ralph Ellison's writing. Some important topics for you to consider would be: cubism, surrealism, and the art of Aaron Douglas and Jacob Lawrence. A good place for you to start might be at the Art of the Harlem Renaissance

Before you turn in your paper make sure you go over the checklist of things you need to turn in with your paper.

After you complete your paper, meet with your classmates to determine what parts of your research would be helpful in a study guide for Invisible Man.

While Ralph Ellison wrote his major works after the decline of the Harlem Renaissance, he continued the legacy of many of the writers from that era. Like many of the writers during the hey day of the renaissance, Ellison, too, migrated from rural America to New York to be among the elite African-American writers of the time. However, those who preceeded Ellison influenced the scope and style of his work. How did writers such as Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston, Countee Cullen, Jessie Faucet, Claude McKaye, Gwendolyn Brooks, and Ellison's close friend Richard Wright set a precedent for Ellison's writing?

Your job is to look at different literary works from the Harlem Renaissance and compare and contrast the themes, style, and with Invisible Man. How might these works help us better understand Ellison's novel?

You might want to begin by looking at Writers of the Harlem Renaissance.

Before you turn in your paper make sure you go over the checklist of things you need to turn in with your paper.

After you complete your paper, meet with your classmates to determine what parts of your research would be helpful in a study guide for Invisible Man.

We could understand the novel better if we understand the man. Ralph Ellison only published one complete novel in his lifetime, yet the man was considered one of the most brilliant author's of the 20th Century. How did this one novel keep him in the company of such writers as William Faulkner, Ernest Hemingway, and all the other members of the American Literary Canon? Understanding Ralph Ellison will take more than just reguritating some internet biography. Your job will be to find an interesting theme in Ralph Ellison's life and make a connection with Invisible Man. This might not be the easiest assignment, but it might be the most telling.

You might want to start your research at Slave and Freedom Literature

Before you turn in your paper make sure you go over the checklist of things you need to turn in with your paper.

After you complete your paper, meet with your classmates to determine what parts of your research would be helpful in a study guide for Invisible Man.