American Literature Essay

When the English sermonizer and author Sidney Smith asked in 1820. “In the four quarters of the Earth. who reads an American book? ” little did he surmise that less than two hundred old ages subsequently the reply in literate quarters would be “just about everyone. ” Indeed. merely a few old ages after Smith posed his inflammatory inquiry. the American author Samuel Knapp would get down to piece one of the first histories of American literature as portion of a talk series that he was giving.

The class stuffs offered by American Passages continue in the tradition begun by Knapp in 1829. One end of this Study Guide is to assist you larn to be a literary historiographer: that is. to present you to American literature as it has evolved over clip and to excite you to do connexions between and among texts. Like a literary historiographer. when you make these connexions you are stating a narrative: the narrative of how American literature came into being.

This Overview outlines four waies ( there are many others ) by which you can narrate the narrative of American literature: one based on literary motions and historical alteration. one based on the American Passages Overview Questions. one based on Contexts. and one based on multiculturalism. State THE STORY OF AMERICAN LITERATURE Literary Movements and Historical Change American Passages is organized around 16 literary motions or “units. ” A literary motion centres around a group of writers that portion certain stylistic and thematic concerns.

Each unit includes 10 writers that are represented either in The Norton Anthology of American Literature or in the Online Archive. Two to four of these writers are discussed in the picture. which calls attending to of import historical and cultural influences on these writers. defines a genre that they portion. and proposes some cardinal thematic analogues. Tracking literary motions can assist you see how American literature has changed and evolved over clip. In general. people think about literary motions as responding against earlier manners of authorship and earlier motions. For T E L L I N G T H E S T O R Y O F

A M E R I C A N L I T E R AT U R E 3 illustration. merely as modernism ( Units 10–13 ) is frequently seen as a response to pragmatism and the Gilded Age ( Unit 9 ) . so Romanticism is seen as a response to the Enlightenment ( Unit 4 ) . Most of the units focus on one epoch ( see the chart below ) . but they will frequently include relevant writers from other epochs to assist pull out the connexions and differences. ( Note: The motions in parentheses are non limited to authors/works from the epoch in inquiry. but they do cover some stuff from it. ) Century Fifteenth– Seventeenth Eighteenth Era Renaissance American Passages Literary Movements.

( 1: Native Voices ) 2: Exploring Borderlands 3: Utopian Promise ( 3: Utopian Promise ) 4: Spirit of Nationalism ( 7: Bondage and Freedom ) 4: Spirit of Nationalism 5: Masculine Heroes 6: Gothic Undertones 7: Bondage and Freedom ( 1: Native Voices ) 6: Gothic Undertones 8: Regional Realism 9: Social Realism ( 1: Native Voices ) 10: Rhythm in Poetry 11: Modernist Portrayals 12: Migrant Struggle 13: Southern Renaissance 1: Native Voices 2: Exploring Borderlands 12: Migrant Struggle 14: Becoming Visible 15: Poetry of Liberation 16: Search for Identity Enlightenment Nineteenth Romanticist Nineteenth Realist

Twentieth Modernist Twentieth Postmodernist Each unit contains a timeline of historical events along with the day of the months of cardinal literary texts by the movement’s writers. These timelines are designed to assist you do connexions between and among the motions. epoch. and writers covered in each unit. 4 W H AT I S A M E R I C A N L I T E R AT U R E? Overview Questions The Overview Questions at the start of each unit are tailored from the five American Passages Overview Questions that follow. They are meant to assist you concentrate your screening and reading and take part in treatment subsequently. 1. What is an American?

How does literature make constructs of the American experience and American individuality? This bipartite inquiry should trip treatment about issues such as. Who belongs to America? When and how does one go an American? How has the hunt for individuality among American authors changed over clip? It can besides promote treatment about the ways in which in-migration. colonisation. conquering. young person. race. category. and gender affect national individuality. 2. What is American literature? What are the typical voices and manners in American literature? How do societal and political issues influence the American canon?

This multi-part inquiry should incite treatment about the aesthetics and response of American literature. What is a chef-d’oeuvre? When is something considered literature. and how is this class culturally and historically dependent? How has the canon of American literature changed and why? How have American authors used linguistic communication to make art and significance? What does literature make? This inquiry can besides raise the issue of American exceptionalism: Is American literature different from the literature of other states? 3. How do topographic point and clip form the authors’ works and our apprehension of them?

This inquiry addresses America as a location and the many ways in which topographic point impacts American literature’s signifier and content. It can arouse treatment about how regionalism. geographics. in-migration. the frontier. and boundary lines impact American literature. every bit good as the function of the slang in bespeaking topographic point. 4. What features of a literary work have made it influential over clip? This inquiry can be used to trip treatment about the germinating impact of assorted pieces of American literature and about how American authors used linguistic communication both to make art and respond to and name for alteration.

What is the individual’s duty to continue the community’s traditions. and when are persons compelled to defy them? What is the relationship between the person and the community? 5. How are American myths created. challenged. and re-imagined through this literature? This inquiry returns to “What is an American? ” But it poses the inquiry at a cultural instead than single degree. What are the myths that make up American civilization? What is the American Dream? What are American myths. dreams. and incubuss? How have these changed over clip? T E L L I N G T H E S T O R Y O F A M E R I C A N

L I T E R AT U R E 5 Contexts Another manner that connexions can be made across and between writers is through the five Contexts in each unit: three longer Core Contexts and two shorter Extended Contexts. The end of the Contexts is both to assist you read American literature in its cultural background and to learn you close-reading accomplishments. Each Context consists of a brief narrative about an event. tendency. or thought that had peculiar resonance for the authors in the unit every bit good as Americans of their epoch ; inquiries that connect the Context to the writers in the unit ; and a list of related texts and images in the Online Archive.

Examples of Contexts include treatments of the construct of the Apocalypse ( 3: “Utopian Visions” ) . the sublime ( 4: “Spirit of Nationalism” ) . and baseball ( 14: “Becoming Visible” ) . The Contexts can be used in concurrence with an writer or as stand-alone activities. The Slide Show Tool on the Web site is ideal for making assignments that draw connexions between archive points from a Context and a text you have read. And you can make your ain contexts and activities utilizing the Slide Show Tool: these stuffs can so be e-mailed. viewed online. projected. or printed out on overhead transparences.

Multiculturalism In the past 20 old ages. the field of American literature has undergone a extremist transmutation. Merely as the mainstream populace has begun to understand America as more diverse. so. excessively. have bookmans moved to incorporate more texts by adult females and cultural minorities into the standard canon of literature taught and studied. These alterations can be both tickle pinking and confusing. as the comprehensiveness of American literature appears to be about limitless.

Each of the pictures and units has been carefully balanced to partner off canonical and noncanonical voices. You may happen it helpful. nevertheless. to follow the development of American literature harmonizing to the rise of different cultural and minority literatures. The undermentioned chart is designed to foreground which literatures are represented in the picture and the units. As the chart indicates. we have set different multicultural literatures in duologue with one another. Literature African American literature Video Representation

7: Bondage and Freedom 8: Regional Realism 10: Rhythm in Poetry 13: Southern Renaissance 14: Becoming Visible 15: Poetry of Liberation Study Guide Representation 4: Spirit of Nationalism 5: Masculine Heroes 7: Bondage and Freedom 8: Regional Realism 9: Social Realism 10: Rhythm in Poetry 11: Modernist Portrayals 13: Southern Renaissance 14: Becoming Visible 15: Poetry of Liberation 16: Search for Identity 6 W H AT I S A M E R I C A N L I T E R AT U R E? Native American literature 1: Native Voices 5: Masculine Heroes 14: Becoming Visible

1: Native Voices 2: Exploring Borderlands 3: Utopian Promise 4: Spirit of Nationalism 5: Masculine Heroes 7: Bondage and Freedom 8: Regional Realism 14: Becoming Visible 15: Poetry of Liberation 16: Search for Identity 2: Exploring Borderlands 5: Masculine Heroes 10: Rhythm in Poetry 12: Migrant Struggle 15: Poetry of Liberation 16: Search for Identity 9: Social Realism 12: Migrant Struggle 16: Search for Identity 9: Social Realism 11: Modernist Portrayals 14:

Becoming Visible 15: Poetry of Liberation 16: Search for Identity 1: Native Voices 2: Exploring Borderlands 3: Utopian Promise 4: Spirit of Nationalism 5: Masculine Heroes 6: Gothic Undertones 7: Bondage and Freedom 8: Regional Realism 9: Social Realism 10: Rhythm in Poetry 11: Modernist Portrayals 12:

Migrant Struggle 13: Southern Renaissance 14: Becoming Visible 15: Poetry of Liberation 16: Search for Identity 2: Exploring Borderlands 5: Masculine Heroes 10: Rhythm in Poetry 11: Modernist Portrayals 12: Migrant Struggle 13: Southern Renaissance 14: Becoming Visible 15: Poetry of Liberation 16: Search for Identity Latino literature 2: Exploring Borderlands 10: Rhythm in Poetry 12: Migrant Struggle 16: Search for Identity Asiatic American literature 12:

Migrant Struggle 16: Search for Identity Judaic American 9: Social Realism literature 11: Modernist Portrayals 14: Becoming Visible 15: Poetry of Liberation 16: Search for Identity Women’s literature 1: Native Voices 2: Exploring Borderlands 3: Utopian Promise 6:

Gothic Undertones 7: Bondage and Freedom 8: Regional Realism 9: Social Realism 11: Modernist Portrayals 12: Migrant Struggle 13: Southern Renaissance 15: Poetry of Liberation 16: Search for Identity Gay and sapphic literature 2: Exploring Borderlands 5: Masculine Heroes 10: Rhythm in Poetry 11: Modernist Portrayals 15: Poetry of Liberation 16: Search for Identity T E L L I N G T H E S T O R Y O F A M E R I C A N L I T E R AT U R E 7 Literature cont’d Working-class literature Video Representation 2: Exploring Borderlands 4: Spirit of Nationalism 5: Masculine Heroes 7: Bondage and Freedom 9: Social Realism 12: Migrant Struggle 16: Search for Identity

Study Guide Representation 2: Exploring Borderlands 4: Spirit of Nationalism 5: Masculine Heroes 7: Bondage and Freedom 9: Social Realism 10: Rhythm in Poetry 12: Migrant Struggle 14: Becoming Visible 15: Poetry of Liberation 16: Search for Identity LITERATURE IN ITS CULTURAL CONTEXT When you study American literature in its cultural context. you enter a multidisciplined and multi-voiced conversation where bookmans and critics in different Fieldss examine the same subject but ask really different inquiries about it. For illustration. how might a literary critic’s apprehension of nineteenthcentury American civilization comparison to that of a historiographer of the same epoch?

How can an art historian’s apprehension of popular ocular metaphors enrich our readings of literature? The stuffs presented in this subdivision of the Study Guide purpose to assist you enter that conversation. Below are some suggestions on how to get down. Deep in the bosom of the Vatican Museum is an keen marble statue from first- or second-century Rome.

Over seven pess high. the statue depicts a scene from Virgil’s Aeneid in which Laocoon and his boies are punished for warning the Trojans about the Trojan Equus caballus. Their organic structures are entwined with big. devouring snakes. and Laocoon’s face is turned upward in a dizzying portrayal of torment. his musculuss ruffling and flexing beneath the snake’s strong spirals.

The emotion in the statue captured the bosom and oculus of critic Gotthold Ephraim Lessing. who used the work as the starting point for his seminal essay on the relationship between literature and art. “Laocoon: An Essay on the Limits of Painting and Poetry. ” For Lessing. one of the most common mistakes that pupils of civilization can do is to presume that all facets of civilization develop in tandem with one another. As Lessing points out. each art has its ain strengths.

For illustration. literature works good with impressions of clip and narrative. and therefore is more flexible than ocular art in footings of inventive freedom. whereas picture is a ocular medium that can make greater beauty. although it is inactive. For Lessing. the commixture of these two manners ( temporal and spacial ) carries great hazard along with wagess.

As you study literature in concurrence with any of the all right humanistic disciplines. you may happen it helpful to inquire whether you agree with Lessing that literature is chiefly a temporal art. See excessively the peculiar 8 W H AT I S A M E R I C A N L I T E R AT U R E? strengths of the media discussed below. What do they offer that may non be available to authors? What modes do they utilize that complement our apprehension of the literary humanistic disciplines? Fine Arts Albrecht Durer created some of the most distressing drawings known to worlds: they are prevailing with images of decease. the terminal of the universe. and dark animals that inhabit snake pit. Images such as The Last Judgement ( below ) can be found in the Online Archive.

In Knight. Death. and the Devil ( 1513 ) . a devout Christian knight is taunted by the Devil and Death. who joyously shakes a rapidly consuming hourglass. mocking the soldier with the passing of clip. Possibly the tenseness and anxiousness in Durer’s print resonated with the American poet Randall Jarrell in his battle with mental unwellness.

In “The Knight. Death. and the Devil. ” Jarrell opens with a description of the scene: Cowhorn-crowned. shockheaded. cornshucked-bearded. Death is a scarecrow—his death’s-head a top. . . Jarrell’s description is filled with adjectives in much the same manner that the print is crowded with item. The verse form is an case of what critics call ekphrasis: the verbal description of a work of ocular art. normally of a picture. exposure. or sculpture but sometimes of an urn. tapestry. or comforter.

Ekphrasis efforts to bridge the spread between the verbal and the ocular humanistic disciplines. Artists and authors have ever influenced one another: sometimes straight as in the instance of Durer’s pulling and Jarrell’s verse form. and other times indirectly. The Study Guide will assist you navigate through these webs of influence. For illustration. Unit 5 will present you to the Hudson River [ 7995 ]

Albrecht Durer. The Last School. the great American landscape painters Judgement ( 1510 ) . courtesy of the of the 19th century. In the Context focusprint aggregation of Connecticut ing on these creative persons. you will larn of the interCollege. New London. connection of their ocular motives.

In Unit 11. William Carlos Williams. whose poems “The Dance” and “Landscape with the Fall of Icarus” were inspired by two pictures by Breughel. will pull your attending to the usage of ekphrasis. Williams’s work is a important illustration of how multiple traditions in art can act upon a author: in add-on to his involvement in European art. Williams imitated Chinese landscapes and poetic signifiers.

When you encounter plants of all right art. such as pictures. exposure. or sculpture. in the Online Archive or the Study Guide. you may happen two tools used by art historiographers helpful: formal analysis and iconography. Formal L I T E R AT U R E I N I T S C U LT U R A L C O N T E X T 9 [ 3694 ]

Thomas Cole. The Falls of Kaaterskill ( 1826 ) . courtesy of the Warner Collection of the Gulf States Paper Corporation. Tuscaloosa. Alabama. analysis. like close readings of verse forms. seeks to depict the nature of the object without mention to the context in which it was created. A formal analysis references such inquiries as Where does the cardinal involvement in the work prevarication? How is the work composed and with what stuffs? How is illuming or shadowing used?

What does the scene depict? What allusions ( fabulous. spiritual. artistic ) are found in the work? Once you have described the work of art utilizing formal analysis. you may desire to widen your reading by naming attending to the cultural clime in which the work was produced. This is called an iconographic reading.

Here the Context subdivisions of the Study Guide will be utile. You may detect. for illustration. a figure of nineteenth-century pictures of ships in the Online Archive. One of the Contexts for Unit 6 argues that these ships can be read as symbols for nineteenth-century America. where it was common to mention to the state as a “ship of province. ”

The radiance visible radiation or wrecked hulls in the pictures reflect the artists’ jumping optimism and pessimism about where the immature state was headed. Below are two possible readings of Thomas Cole’s painting The Falls of Kaaterskill that employ the tools of formal analysis and iconography. W R I T E R A: F O R M A L A N A L Y S I S

In this picture by Hudson River School creative person Thomas Cole. the falls that give the painting its name catch our attending. The daze of the white falls against the concentrated brightness of the stones ensures that the waterfall will be the focal point of the work. Even amidst this brightness. nevertheless. there is darkness and enigma in the picture. where the falls emerge out of a dark prey and crash down onto broken tree limbs and staggered stones.

The descent is neither peaceable nor pastoral. unlike the presentation of nature in Cole’s other plants. such as the Oxbow. The outrageousness of the falls compared to the lone human figure that perches above them besides adds to the sense of power the falls embody.

Barely recognizable as human because it is so infinitesimal. the figure still pushes frontward as if to encompass the cascade of the H2O in a picture that explores the tenseness between the person and the power of nature. W R I T E R B: I C O N O G R A P H Y I agree with Writer A that this picture is all about the power of nature. but I would reason that it is about a peculiar sort of power: 1 that nineteenthcentury minds called the “sublime. ” Cole’s portrayal of the falls is peculiarly indebted to the aesthetic thoughts formulated by Edmund Burke in the 18th century. Burke was interested in categorising aesthetic responses. and he distinguished the “sublime” from the “beautiful.

” While the beautiful is unagitated and harmonious. the sublime is olympian. wild. and even savage. While viewing audiences are soothed by the beautiful. they are overwhelmed. awestruck. and sometimes terrified by the sublime. Often associated with immense. overmastering natural 10 W H AT I S A M E R I C A N L I T E R AT U R E? phenomena like mountains. waterfalls. or electrical storms. the “delightful terror” inspired by empyreal visions was supposed to both remind viewing audiences of their ain insignificance in the face of nature and deity and animate them with a sense of transcendency. Here the illumination figure is the object of our regard even as he is obliterated by the magnificence of the H2O.

During the 19th century. tourers frequently visited venues such as the Kaaterskill Falls in order to see the “delightful terror” that they brought. This experience is besides echoed in Ralph Waldo Emerson’s essay “Nature. ” in which he writes of his desire to go a “transparent eyeball” that will be able to absorb the oversoul that surrounds him. The power that nature holds here is that of the Godhead: nature is one manner we can see higher kingdom. How make these readings differ? Which do you happen more compelling and why? What uses can you see for formal analysis or iconographic readings?

When might you take one of these schemes over the other? History As historian Ray Kierstead has pointed out. history is non merely “one damn thing after another” : instead. history is a manner of stating narratives about clip or. some might state. doing an statement about clip. The Grecian historian Herodotus is frequently called the male parent of history in the western universe. as he was one of the first historiographers to detect forms in universe events.

Herodotus saw that the class of imperiums followed a cyclical form of rise and autumn: as one imperium reaches its extremum and self-destructs out of hubris ( inordinate pride ) . a new imperium or new states will be born to take its topographic point. Thomas Cole’s five-part series The Course of Empire ( 1833 ) mirrors this Herodotean impression of clip as his scene moves from barbarian. to pastoral. to consummation. to desolation. to devastation.

This vision of clip has been enormously influential in literature: whenever you read a work written in the pastoral manner ( literature that looks back with nostalgia to an epoch of rural life. lost simpleness. and a clip when nature and civilization were one ) . inquire yourself whether there is an inexplicit optimism or pessimism about what follows this lost rural ideal. For illustration. in Herman Melville’s South Sea fresh Typee. we find the storyteller in a Tahitian small town.

He seeks to find if he has entered a pastoral or barbarous scene: is he surrounded by barbarians. or is he plunged in a pastoral cloud nine? Implicit in both is a suggestion that there are earlier signifiers of civilisation than the United States that the storyteller has left behind. Any structural analysis of a work of literature ( an analysis that pays attending to how a work is ordered ) would make good to see what impressions of history are embedded within.

In add-on to the structural significance of history. a duologue between history and literature is important because much of the early literature of the United States can besides be categorized as historical paperss. It is helpful. hence. to understand the genres of history. Like literature. history is comprised of different genres. or manners. Historian Elizabeth Boone defines the chief traditional genres of history as RESs gestae. geographical. and annals. Res gestae. or “deeds done. ” organizes history through a list of achievements. This was a popu- L I T E R AT U R E I N I T S C U LT U R A L C O N T E X T 11 lar signifier of history for the ancient Greeks and Romans ; for illustration. the autobiography of Julius Caesar chronicles his workss. narrated in the 3rd individual.

When Hernan Cortes and other adventurers wrote histories of their travels ( frequently in the signifier of letters to the emperor ) . Caesar’s autobiography served as their theoretical account. Geographic histories use travel through infinite to determine the narration: Mary Rowlandson’s imprisonment narration is an illustration of a geographical history in that it follows her through a sequence of 20 geographic “removes” into Indian state and back. Annalss. by contrast. usage clip as the forming rule.

Information is catalogued by twelvemonth or month. Diaries and diaries are a good illustration of this genre. These three genres can besides be found in the histories of the Aztecs and Mayans of Mesoamerica and in those of the native communities of the United States and Canada.

For illustration. the migration fable. a popular autochthonal signifier of history. is a geographical history. whereas prankster narratives frequently tell the early history of the universe through a series of workss. Memoirists besides mix genres ; for illustration. the first subdivision of William Bradford’s Of Plimouth Plantation is a geographical history. whereas the 2nd half is annals.

Today the most common historical genres are rational history ( the history of thoughts ) . political history ( the narrative of leaders ) . and diplomatic history ( the history of foreign dealingss ) . To these classs we might add the newer classs of “social history” ( a history of mundane life ) and “gender history” ( which focuses on the building of gender functions ) .

Finally. history is a important tool for understanding literature because literature is written in—and arguably frequently reflects—a specific historical context. Readers of literary plants can intensify their apprehension by pulling on the tools of history. that is. the records people leave behind: political ( or literary ) paperss. town records. nose count informations. newspaper narratives. imprisonment narrations. letters. diaries. journals. and the similar.

Even such objects as tools. cemeteries. or merchandising goods can state us of import information about the nature of mundane life for a community. how it worshipped or what it thought of the relationship between life and decease. 12 W H AT I S A M E R I C A N L I T E R AT U R E? Material Culture [ 6332 ]

Archibald Gunn and Richard Felton Outcault. New York Journal’s Colored Comic Supplement ( 1896 ) . courtesy of the Library of Congress. Prints and Photographs Division [ LC-USZC4-25531 ] . When you look at an object. it may name up associations from the yesteryear.

For illustration. for the first-time spectator the clown figure in the image above may look innocuous. yet at the terminal of the 19th century his popularity was so intense that it started a newspaper war fierce adequate to engender a whole new term for ballyhoo artist. irresponsible journalism—“yellow news media. ” Objects such as this amusing addendum constitute “material civilization. ” the objects of mundane life.

In Material Culture Studies in America. Thomas Schlereth provides the following utile definition of material civilization: Material civilization can be considered to be the entirety of artefacts in a civilization. the huge existence of objects used by world to get by with the physical universe. to ease societal intercourse. to please our illusion. and to make symbols of significance. . . .

Leland Ferguson argues that material civilization includes all “the things that people leave behind. . . all of the things people make from the physical world—farm tools. ceramics. houses. furniture. plaything. buttons. roads. metropoliss. ” ( 2 ) When we study material civilization in concurrence with literature. we wed two impressions of “culture” and research how they relate.

As critic John Storey notes. the first impression of civilization is what is frequently called “high culture”—the “general procedure of rational. religious and aesthetic factors” ; and the 2nd is “lived culture”—the “particular manner of life. whether of a people. a period or a group” ( 2 ) . In a sense. material civilization ( as the objects of a lived civilization ) allows us to see how the predominating rational thoughts were played out in the day-to-day lives of people in a peculiar epoch.

Therefore. as Schlereth explains. through analyzing material civilization we can larn about the “belief systems—the values. thoughts. attitudes. and assumptions—of a peculiar community or society. normally across time” ( 3 ) . In reading objects as embedded with significance. we follow Schlereth’s premiss that “objects made or L I T E R AT U R E I N I T S C U LT U R A L C O N T E X T 13

modified by worlds. consciously or unconsciously. straight or indirectly. reflect the belief forms of persons who made. commissioned. purchased. or used them. and. by extension. the belief forms of the larger society of which they are a part” ( 3 ) . The survey of material civilization. so. can assist us better understand the civilizations that produced and consumed the literature we read today. Thomas Schlereth suggests a figure of utile theoretical accounts for analyzing material civilization ; his “Art History Paradigm” is peculiarly notable in that it will assist you approach plants of “high art. ” such as pictures and sculptures. every bit good. The “Art History Paradigm” argues that the interpretative aim of analyzing the artefact is to “depict the historical development and intrinsic merit” of it.

If you are interested in composing an “Art History Paradigm” reading of material civilization. you might look at an object and inquire yourself the undermentioned inquiries. taken from Sylvan Barnet’s Short Guide to Writing about Art. These inquiries apply to any art object: First. we need to cognize information about the artefact so we can put it in a historical context.

You might inquire yourself: 1. 2. 3. 4. 5. What is my first response to the work? When and where was the work made? Where would the work originally have been seen? What purpose did the work service? In what status has the work survived? ( Barnet 21–22 ) In add-on. if the artefact is a pulling. picture. or advertizement. you might desire to inquire yourself inquiries such as these: 1.

What is the capable affair? What ( if anything ) is go oning? 2. If the image is a portrayal. how do the trappingss and the background and the angle of the caput or the position of the caput and organic structure ( every bit good as the facial look ) contribute to our sense of the subject’s character? 3. If the image is a still life. does it propose luxury or desire? 4. In a landscape. what is the relation between human existences and nature? Are the figures at easiness in nature. or are they dwarfed by it? Are they one with the skyline. or ( because the point of view is low ) do they stand out against the skyline and possibly look in touch with the celestial spheres. or at least with unfastened air?

If there are forests. are these forests endangering. or are they an ask foring topographic point of safety? If there is a glade. is the uncluttering a vulnerable topographic point or is it a topographic point of safety from baleful forests? Do the natural objects in the landscape somehow reflect the emotions of the figures? ( Barnet 22–23 ; for more inquiries. see pp. 23–24 ) Material civilization is a rich and varied resource that ranges from kitchen utensils. to advertizements. to agrarian tools. to vesture. Unpacking the significance of objects that appear in the narratives and verse forms you read may assist you better understand characters and their motivations. 14 W H AT I S A M E R I C A N L I T E R AT U R E? Architecture.

Most of the clip we read the concealed significances of edifices without even believing twice. See the edifices below: Above: [ 9089 ] Anonymous. Capitol Building at Washington. D. C. ( 1906 ) . courtesy of Prints and Photographs Division. Library of Congress [ LC-USZ62-121528 ] .

Right: [ 6889 ] Anonymous. Facade of the Sam Wah’s Chinese Laundry ( c. 1890 –1900 ) . courtesy of the Denver Public Library. Even if we had ne’er seen either of these edifices before. it would non take us long to find which was a authorities edifice and which was a smalltown retail constitution. Our holding seen 1000s of edifices enables us to understand the intent of a edifice from architectural hints.

When first seeing a work of architecture. it is helpful to take out cultural premises. You might inquire: 1. What is the intent of this edifice? Is it public or private? What activities take topographic point within it? 2. What features of the edifice reflect this intent? Which of these characteristics are necessary and which are simply conventional?

3. What buildings or edifice manners does this edifice allude to? What values are built-in in that allusion? 4. What parts of this edifice are chiefly cosmetic instead than functional? What does the decoration or deficiency of it say about the position of the proprietors or the people who work at that place? 5. What buildings environment this edifice?

How do they impact the manner the edifice is entered? 6. What types of people live or work in this edifice? How do they interact within the infinite? What do these findings say about the comparative societal position of the residents? How does the edifice design restrict or promote that position? 7. How are people supposed to come in and travel through the edifice? What clues does the edifice spring as to how this motion should take topographic point? L I T E R AT U R E I N I T S C U LT U R A L C O N T E X T 15

These inquiries imply two basic premises about architecture: ( 1 ) architecture reflects and helps set up societal position and societal dealingss ; and ( 2 ) architecture