This book investigates the role of the literary canon in the teaching of literature. Drawing on theoretical, historical, and empirical studies, it explores processes of canon formation that emerged long before the teaching of literature became a discipline but continue to inform this teaching in the 21st century.

Robert J. Aston received his Ph.D. from Columbia University. He has taught secondary English for over ten years and in both California and New York; he has also taught at Columbia University's Teachers College. His research, influenced heavily by the ideas of Michel Foucault, focuses on canon theory, literary knowledge, and assemblage theory.

Introduction

Locating the Canon

Chapter One

Suspending the Given

Chapter Two

The Canon, Its Gatekeepers, and the Teaching of Literature

Chapter Three

Power Relations, the Canon, and Resistance

Chapter Four

Assemblages: Lines of Stability and Change in the Canon

Chapter Five

Incompleteness and the Canon in the Teaching of Literature