Exam 1 Literary Movements Flashcards
1
Q
What is Local Color (Regionalism)?
A
- A Literary Movement in the 1860’s-1880’s
- Became popular after the Civil War; life in America was very different than before the Civil War
- More and more people living in cities; nostalgia for old life back in countryside/farm–most of these stories set in these regions
- Americans became interested in life in other parts of the country after Civil War
- Americans became more literary/literate; proliferation of reading material, especially magazines/journals which needed material.
2
Q
What are the characteristics of Local Color (Regionalism)?
A
- Highly localized; get an idea of physical area, but moreso get an idea of the people: customs, values, habits, language, world view.
- Dialect/Regional Language.
- Sophisticated narrator with “normative”, cultivated language compared to the regional dialect.
- Plot not important; plot is not the point of reading Locial Colors stories, it’s about the characters and the region. Many are just sketches showing life in this place as it is.
- Characters are common.
3
Q
What texts are associated/connected with the movement? How do you apply the characteristics of Local Color (Regionalism) to our texts? Explain.
A
Bret Harte was the most popular Local Color author
- “The Luck of Roaring Camp”
- famous for these California stories
- gets the details right, but somewhat romantic view
- his stories became a part of the mythology of California and the West
- Sophisticated narrator
4
Q
What is American Literary Realism?
A
- A Literary Movement from
5
Q
What is American Literary Naturalism?
A
- A Literary Movement from
6
Q
What is the New Woman Theme?
A
abc
7
Q
What are some Multi-Ethnic Themes?
A
(need to finish answer)
- Integration
- Public policy and public attitude
- Chinese Exclusion Act
- Plethy v Ferguson
8
Q
What is a Bildungsroman’s (genre)?
A
- German word
- popular, great American form
- A COMING OF AGE story, movement/transitioning from childhood to adulthood (usually withing age group 10-19); view of the world changes
9
Q
What are the characteristics of a Bildungsroman’s?
A
- Loss of innocence (view of the world, of people)
- Sexuality, homosexuality; love & intimacy; relationships
- Beleifs and values/moral responsibility. Move from received values to evaluating them for yourself and coming to your own conclusions
- Race/ethnicity: skin color, hair type, facial features, accent
- Experience/experimentation, challenging rules, pushing borders; to figure out who they are, what they believe; initiation/rites of passage
- Journey, internal or physical
- Realizing a truth about themselves and about society. Evolution of the adolescent and we get a clearer view of society through the adolescent
- Same world, but awakening of child and how child views the world
10
Q
What texts are associate/connected with Bildungsroman’s…
A
Adventures of Huckleberry Finn
- Moving from received values to evaluating them for yourself and coming to your own conclusions: this is why we love Huck–the idea that adolescents need to learn that sometimes society is wrong.
11
Q
What is the Picaresque Tradition (genre), its characteristics, and how is it associated with our texts?
A
- Form of novel that is episodic. Told in clearly defined episodes with a beginning, middle, and end. Story is an arc. In Huck Finn, each episode has an effect on his moral–learns something.
- Main character is called the picaro. Usually a rogue, lovable character (Don Quixote), picaro is at odds with society–doesn’t fit in. Huck Finn could be considered a picaro
- Satire, critiques society through humor, in order to affect change
- Always a “sidekick” who is the brunt of jokes. (Jim begins as this, but is not really.)
- Huck Finn is the most famous American example of a Picaresqe Tradition. Not many in American Lit.
12
Q
A
13
Q
Advendtures of Huckleberry Finn’s publication history
A
GET THIS STRAIGHT
- Book is set in 1840’s; 1850 Fugitive Slave Act passed, then an escaped slave who passed North of the Mason Dixon Line had to be returned.
- Book published in 1885, 20 years after slavery ends; this is not an abolitionist book–slavery was already abolished. Impt to remember because it’s not about the evils of slavery, it’s using slavery to talk about race. He wasn’t challenging slavery, he was challenging America’s continuing perception of the superiority of whites, and other moral issues such as violence.
- He began writing the book in 1877. Significant because in 1876, end of Reconstruction. Scholars agree that Twain wrote this book as a response to this historical moment. 1865-1876 or so period of reconstruction, commitment from Federal Govt was to rebuild the South AND took millions of freed slaves and helped them become citizens. Then North lost interest, pulled funding, pulled troops, etc. States began regulating selves. Beginning of legal segregation, lost right to vote (Blacks could vote during this time), lynching became common. Also opposing romanticism of South.
14
Q
What is American Literary Naturalism?
A
- 1890-1915 (then rise of Modernism) but rises again 1930-40’s; 1930’s because of Depression, Dust Bowls, etc.
- Rises out of realism
- writers interested in forces: trying to make us see the big picture–readers gain an understanding from the depiction of these forces; the character does not learn, but leads us to understand who we are and who we are in the world
- most Naturalism works are big rambling books (lots of exposition)
- writers, intellectuals, etc. of the time looking at new ideas such as Darwinism, Industrial Revolution (unregulated capital was what Naturalism authors were concerned about) Marxism, Freud (motivated by impulses that we don’t fully understand), journalism, photojournalism–alot of influences on Naturalists
15
Q
What are the characteristics of American Literary Naturalism?
A
- Contemporary setting (from rise of Realism). Stories set in time they are written.
- Social/Reformist writing: showing the harmful forces of society and trying to get people to understand them to change them
- Underclass characters (common characters (like in Realism)), often at margins of society
- Omniscient Narrator–narrator not one of the characters, (usually, but not strictly true such as Soft-Hearted Sioux)
- lots of exposition (explaining)/narrator trying to show patterns of causation (this happened because of this or that happened because of that)
- characters cannot tell own story because s/he at mercy of forces
-
Pessimistic Determinism: how we are caught in forces that we don’t understand, that inevitably victimize us
- Humans caught in the grip of powerful forces (the FORCES that act upon us DETERMINE who we are and what we become)
- Economic Forces (capitalism, poverty)
- Social Forces (race, gender, patriarchy)
- Biological Forces (To Build a Fire) (people don’t usually like the idea of this–that we are not actually in control of ourselves)
- limits to the body
- reproductive realities (a gendered force, especially before 1967 when birth control available
- Darwinian/Freudian Forces (internal forces; idea of survival of the fittest–we are kind of like animals (need for food); another name for this is Atavism (humans=animals)
- Characters = no agency; the decisions in your life do not change your forces
- Ends in tragedy (know it’s Naturalism when it ends in tragedy)
