ABSTRACT
This chapter proposes that the traditional, doggedly historical approach to teaching literature obscures the literary work that women do and have done. It argues that by explicitly contextualizing women's work in spatialized systems of literary production as well as in geographically located place, teachers of literature can more effectively bring forward women's marginalized and undervalued contributions to literary production. The reorganization that author proposes involves a dynamic process of literary "clustering", which requires students to think geographically as well as historically about literary production. The chapter shows how these kinds of clusters emphasize the interplay between social and material conditions of textual production that take account of the particular and differential ways in which literature is produced within space and time. That is to say that literature is produced in multiply-overlapping communities and out of intersectional experiences that are informed by gender, race, class, sexuality, ability, and so on.
