AO3 Flashcards
(23 cards)
Look at the context of the publication date and of the setting conveyed in the passage, and ask yourself…
Time the extract was written?
What were the key historical events at this time?
Setting – different to publication?
Literary context links – link to GG / Passing / other reading
1880s- What key themes and context arise in American literature at this time?
🪙 Gilded Age: Surface wealth, deep inequality
⚔️ Post–Civil War: Start of Jim Crow Era, segregation in the South
🟦 Class: Monopolies rise, working class struggles
🟩 Race: White supremacy resurges, Black Americans disenfranchised
🟧 Gender: Early feminist thought (e.g., Gilman)
📚 Realism emerges in literature
1890s- What themes and literary context arise in America at this time?
Panic of 1893 → mass unemployment
🟦 Class struggle & populist politics
⚖️ Jim Crow laws solidified (Plessy v. Ferguson, 1896)
🟩 Race: Lynching, disenfranchisement
🟧 Gender: Rise of “New Woman”
🟨 American Dream collapses for poor
📚 Naturalism rises (Stephen Crane)
1900s- What themes and literary context arise in America at this time?
🌆 Urban poverty, immigration boom
⚖️ Trust-busting & early social reform (Progressive Era)
🟩 Race: Exclusion despite growing diversity
🟧 Gender: Women fight for suffrage
🟦 Class: Exposé writing, e.g., The Jungle
📚 Naturalism dominant – people shaped by forces beyond control
1910s- What characterises American literary and social context at this time?
🟥 WWI trauma → rise of the Lost Generation
🟨 American Dream questioned after war
🎖 Disillusionment, modernist experimentation
🟧 Gender: Women’s roles expand during war
🟩 Race: 1919 race riots, beginning of Great Migration
🚫 Prohibition introduced (1919)
📚 Early Modernism begins (Hemingway, Eliot)
1920s- What context should be linked to American literature in the 1920s?
🎷 Jazz Age: Hedonism, wealth, modernity
🚫 Prohibition (1920–1933): Crime & rebellion
🟨 American Dream = illusion (e.g., Gatsby). Legacy of WW1
🟧 Gender: Flapper women challenge norms
🟩 Race: Harlem Renaissance celebrates Black identity
🟦 Class: Booming capitalism → 1929 crash
📚 Modernism peaks, e.g., Fitzgerald, Hughes
1930s- What is the dominant social and literary context of this time?
🌪 Great Depression devastates economy
🟨 American Dream shattered
🟦 Class: Working-class literature (The Grapes of Wrath)
🟩 Race: Jim Crow continues, Black Americans hit hardest
🟧 Gender: Women carry families through hardship
📚 Social realism dominates – political, gritty, hopeful
1940s- What themes and context defined American literature at this time?
🟥 War looms in Europe; U.S. not yet involved
🟦 Class: Uneven economic recovery post-Depression
🟧 Gender: Women again pushed toward public roles
🟩 Race: Black soldiers segregated in military
📚 Realism continues; beginnings of wartime tone emerge
What was the American Civil War primarily fought over?
For the Union (North): preserving national unity and stopping the expansion of slavery into Western territories.
For the Confederacy (South): asserting states’ rights and protecting slavery.
Core issues: slavery, territorial control, and sectional political power.
What key challenges defined the Reconstruction Era?
Reconstruction Era (c. 1865–1877)
How to integrate newly freed African Americans into society.
Questions of racial equality, labor systems, and citizenship.
Rise of resistance from Southern states → eventual retreat from reform.
What does the term “Gilded Age” imply about this era?
Gilded Age (1870s–c.1900)
Coined by Mark Twain to describe a society with a shiny surface but deep corruption and inequality.
Economic growth + industrial expansion → huge wealth gap.
Masked social problems: exploitation, poverty, poor working conditions.
What were Jim Crow laws and their impact?
Jim Crow Era (1876–1965) Legalised racial segregation across Southern U.S.
Enforced disenfranchisement and second-class citizenship for Black Americans.
Shaped racial dynamics in American literature and society for decades.
What characterised the so-called “Gay Nineties”?
1890s
Cultural nostalgia for a time of high society, pre-income tax wealth.
Contrasted by real conditions: 1893 Panic → major depression.
Fiction (e.g., Edith Wharton) revealed tensions between surface luxury and deeper instability.
What reforms and movements were central to the Progressive Era?
1890s-1920s
Combatting problems from industrialisation, urbanisation, and immigration.
Focus on workers’ rights, women’s suffrage, anti-trust laws, and cleaning up government corruption.
Reflected in literature critiquing greed, poverty, and injustice.
World War I
1914-1918
U.S. joined in 1917 after German U-boats killed American passengers.
Aftermath shaped the Lost Generation: writers disillusioned by war, modernity, and traditional values.
Sparked themes of trauma, futility, and moral questioning.
What was the Great Migration and why did it matter culturally?
1910-40
6 million African Americans moved from the rural South to urban North/West (1916–1970).
Escape from Jim Crow laws, racial violence, and lack of opportunity.
Fueled urban Black culture (e.g., Harlem Renaissance).
Changed demographics and race relations across the U.S.
What caused the First Red Scare in America?
Fear of communism/anarchism post–Russian Revolution (1917).
Anarchist bombings, labor unrest, immigration panic.
Fueled repression, censorship, and suspicion of immigrants and radicals.
Reflected in themes of paranoia and control in literature.
Why are the 1920s known as the Roaring Twenties?
Post-WWI economic boom, consumerism, and rapid tech change.
New gender roles: the Flapper symbolised women’s independence.
Prohibition (1919–1933): banned alcohol, fueled crime.
Surface prosperity masked poverty, racism, and inequality.
The Great Gatsby critiques this illusion of success.
Harlem Renaissance (c. 1910s–1930s), What was the Harlem Renaissance and how did it influence literature?
Flourishing of Black cultural, literary, and intellectual life in Harlem.
Writers like Langston Hughes, Zora Neale Hurston explored race, identity, and injustice.
Tensions over audience: should art speak to white readers or express Black truth?
Celebrated diverse Black experiences but also critiqued racism and exploitation.
Great Depression, What caused the Great Depression and how did it affect Americans?
1929-1939
Stock Market Crash (1929) + Dust Bowl (1930s) → massive poverty, 25% unemployment.
Collapse of consumerism and the American Dream.
Rural workers displaced; economic system critiqued in literature (e.g., Steinbeck).
Hoover (1929–33) failed to act → rise of Roosevelt & New Deal.
What was the Dust Bowl and its impact on American life?
1930-36
Catastrophic drought + poor farming practices led to ecological disaster.
Millions of farmers displaced (e.g., “Okies”).
Highlighted environmental destruction + capitalist greed.
Central to Steinbeck’s The Grapes of Wrath.
What was the New Deal and what did it aim to solve?
New Deal Era (1933–1938)
FDR’s sweeping social, economic, and infrastructure reforms.
Relief programs (e.g., Works Progress Administration) provided jobs, rebuilt America.
Reflected a shift toward bigger government and social justice.
Literature praised collective effort and dignity of the poor.
What was America’s position at the start of WWII?
U.S. was isolationist until Pearl Harbor (1941).
1939–41: public focused on recovery from Depression.
War loomed in literature as themes of nationalism, sacrifice, and change emerged.
