Toni Morrison and Dissertations -- ep. by Howard Rambsy II

A brief take on Toni Morrison’s extraordinary presence in over 560 dissertations since 2000, revealing her enduring influence on generations of scholars and African American literary studies.

Written by Howard Rambsy II

Read by Kassandra Timm

Transcript

In 2009, emerging scholar of African American literary studies Courtney Thorsson completed her dissertation Women's Work: Nationalism and Contemporary African American Women's Novels.

One aspect of Thorsson’s research placed her among more than 560 other graduate students who completed literature dissertations between 2000 and 2024. In individual chapters or across multiple sections, all of these dissertations focus in some way on the work of Toni Morrison.

You’re listening to Remarkable Receptions — a podcast about the reach and circulation of African American literary art and more.

When we discuss the reception of novelists, we often focus on scholarly books and articles, reviews in newspapers and magazines, and conference presentations. But what about dissertations? The scholarly work of graduate students can reveal what the next generation of researchers might pursue. In fact, dissertations often foreshadow potential directions for future knowledge production and writing in the field.

When it comes to Black writers featured in 21st-century dissertations, Morrison appears more often than anyone else. Time and again, she is a central subject in major graduate student projects. These dissertations explore her portrayals of motherhood, the intersections of memory and history, gender and sexuality, and her use of folklore and myth. They consider her nonfiction, her short stories, and, above all, her novels, especially the core four: The Bluest Eye, Sula, Song of Solomon, and Beloved.

 Between 2000 and 2023, an average of 23 dissertations each year focused at least in part on Morrison’s work. In each of three years—2012, 2011, and 2000—more than 40 dissertations appeared, signaling moments of heightened scholarly interest in her writing and its cultural significance.

 The hundreds of Morrison dissertations also show her compatibility with a wide range of other novelists. Dissertation writers have paired her with Gayl Jones, William Faulkner, Alice Walker, Harriet Beecher Stowe, Zora Neale Hurston, Margaret Atwood, Ralph Ellison, Maxine Hong Kingston, Nella Larsen, James Baldwin, and many more. These pairings highlight how scholars situate Morrison within a broad literary conversation spanning modes of writing and time periods. 

One reason we know so much about the volume of Morrison dissertations is the thorough bibliographic work produced by Thom Snowden, Lynne Simpson-Scott, and Kathleen E. Bethel for the Toni Morrison Society. Through successive and collaborative work, they have compiled an extensive record of books, articles, and dissertations focused on Morrison between 2000 and 2023.

 In many cases, graduate students who wrote on Morrison went on to teach her novels and publish articles and books about her career. In 2013, Courtney Thorsson published Women's Work: Nationalism and Contemporary African American Women's Novels, a revised version of her dissertation. A decade later, in 2023, she published The Sisterhood: How a Network of Black Women Writers Changed American Culture. The book includes a chapter on Morrison and features her as a recurring figure throughout.

 In this case, and many others, a dissertation involving Morrison proved generative. Countless graduate students have completed their studies by contributing to Morrison’s remarkable reception.

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This episode was written by Howard Rambsy, edited by Elizabeth Cali, and read by me, Kassandra Timm.

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