AMERICAN LITERATURE

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AMERICAN LITERATURE

• Where did we come from? Who are we? Where are
  we now? Where are we going? What about the
  American Dream? Does it still exist?

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Early ExplorersThe Literature of Exploration

• The explorers were first and foremost navigators
  and explorers, not writers.
• The explorers had a specific audience in mind
  their investors.
• From the beginning, what came to be known as the
  American Dream is evident in these writers since
  America was held to be a potential location for
  financial and spiritual rejuvenation.

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Explorers (continued)

• The literature of exploration considers the
  Indians not just different, but inferior.
• The literature of exploration is a record of
  history in the making, a document of the events
  that befell these early explorers.

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Early ColonistsLiterature of the Puritans

• Settlers of the early colonies were too busy
  keeping themselves alive to produce a large body
  of literature.
• Early colonial literature included useful prose
  such as reports and records, descriptions of
  the country, legal and governmental documents,
  private journals, diaries (for self-examination),
  and most importantly, sermons.
• Only literary forms found in the Bible were
  acceptable and all forms of fiction was despised.
  

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The Age of Reason/EnlightenmentLiterature of
the Revolutionary Period

• Growing America became aware that much of their
  present miseries was a result of corrupt
  governments and outmoded economic policies.
• A rational man began to see that these present
  problems could be swept away by intelligent
  legislation or revolution, if necessary.

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The Age of Reason/EnlightenmentLiterature of
the Revolutionary Period

• The writing produced by Americans of this period
  was practical, related to the events evolving
  around them.
• They wrote
• to defend
• to justify and
• to persuade.

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English III The Whole Picture

• SubjectsWho?
• -Native Americans
• -Americans, In General
• -African Americans
• -Women

• TopicsWhat?
• -The American Dream
• -Freedom Equality
• Race
• Gender (Womens Roles)
• Class
• -War/Politics

American Literature is viewed from two
perspectives HISTORICAL CULTURAL
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English III The Whole Picture

• Collection One Encounters Foundations(3
  Weeks)
• Introduction
  Overview
• (Exploration,
  Colonialism, Enlightenment/Age of
• Reason)
• -American Dream,
  Freedom Equality, Womens Roles,
• African
  Americans, Native Americans
• Collection Two American Romanticism(3 Weeks)
  
• -Age of
  Romance and Gothicism (Irving, Hawthorne,
• Poe, Fireside
  Poets)
• -Transcendentalism
  (Emerson Thoreau)
• Collection Three American Masters( ½ Week or
  2 days)
• -Whitman and
  Dickinson
• Collection Four The Rise of Realism(2 Weeks)
• -The Civil War
  (Focus African-American Condition)
• -Westward Expansion
  (Focus Native American
• Condition)

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English III The Whole Picture

• Collection Five The Moderns(5 ½ Weeks)
• -Roaring
  Twenties (FitzgeraldThe Great
• Gatsby) (Focus
  Class Women Roles)
• -The Harlem
  Renaissance (Focus African-American
• Writers)
  
• -The Jungle
  (Upton Sinclair) (Focus Immigration
  
  
• Exploitation)
• -The Grapes of
  Wrath (John Steinbeck) (Focus
• Depression)
  FILM
• -Southern
  Womens Roles
• (Gilman,
  Faulkner, Glaspell Porter)
• Collection Six Contemporary Literature(4
  Weeks)
• -The 1950s
  Communist Red Scare
• (MillerThe
  Crucible)
• -The 1960s The
  Civil Rights Movement
• 
  The Vietnam War
• (OBrien-The Things
  They Carried)

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Unit One Overview

• 1. What is an American? (1782)
• -Jean de Crevecoeur Immigration American
  Dream
• 2. Autobiography of Benjamin Franklin and Poor
  Richards Almanac (1739)
• -Benjamin Franklin American Dream
• 3. Speech to the Second Virginia Convention
• -Patrick Henry
• 4. The Crisis, No. 1
• -Thomas Paine

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Unit One Overview

• 5. The Declaration of Independence (1776)
• -Thomas Jefferson Freedom Equality
• 6. Declaration of Sentiments of the Seneca Falls
  Womans Rights Convention (1848)
• -Elizabeth Cody Stanton Womens Rights
• 7. Amistad (1839)
• -Film directed by Stephen Spielberg African-
  
• Americans
• 8. Sell A Country Why Not Sell the Air
• -Tecumseh Native Americans

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1st Period Reading Days Honors Class

• 1st Period (Reading Days) COUNTS FOR A GRADE
• -Reading 15 minutes/Writing 15 minutes
• (15 min. X 5 days75 min. per week)
• (75 min. X 1st 9 wks 11.25 hrs)
• (75 min. X 2nd 9 wks11.25 hrs)
• -The Ultimate Gift (Contemporary Piece) Film
• -The Jungle (Early 1900s Immigrants to U.S.)
• -TBA
• Honors Classes
• -The Jungle
• -The Great Gatsby (216 pages) Film
• -The Things They Carried (246 pages)