New England College American Literature Freedom Question

    I’m working on a literature discussion question and need support to help me learn.

Discussion 7 Assignment

This discussion post has four parts. For full credit, you must respond substantively to all four questions

1. Post at least one question/point in response to Lecture 7.
2. Post at least two questions about any stories you’ve read in this unit?
3. Recommend any story in this unit to our colleagues and say why you recommend it.
4. What is the most important thing you’ve learned in this course?

(The Discussion Assignment is due tomorrow at 11:59pm ET so start this immediately)

Peer responses

respond to each of the two students and use 150-200 words when responding. Start of by saying (Hello name)

Desirae

• • Post at least one question/point in response to Lecture 7.

Based off the lecture by Doctor Melander from this week. 

I have anoverall question. Why did people in small towns live in quietdesperation?

 Is this because they did not think they could do better forthemselves?

 Were they held back by societal status?

• • Post at least two questions about any stories you’ve read in this unit?

1. Were there a lot of communities with widowed women that did notremarry like the one Kate Choplin grew up in during the late 1800’s andearly 1900’s?
2. Was it typical in that time for people to just leave their babiesat other people’s doorsteps? 
3. What could be the reason for thisrationalization?

• • Recommend any story in this unit to our colleagues and say why you recommend it.

I would recommend reading ‘A Rose for Emily’ by William Faulkner. Ialways enjoy a good mystery with a fun twist at the end. 

We had thepleasure of reading about the life that people judged Emily for and feltsorry for her downfalls. 

Little did they know that she kept to herselfso much because she was keeping a body preserved in an upstairs bedroom.

Faulkner knows how to get the mind wandering when his stories arecompleted.

 In the last paragraph we found out how ‘crazy’ Emily reallywas and it inspired thoughtful thinking about who the body could be aswell as how that person died.

• • What is the most important thing you’ve learned in this course?

Something important that I have learned from this course is thatAmerican Literature has a lot of history attached to it. 

We read throughthe emotions of writers going through certain time era’s throughouthistory since the 1800’s.

 I learned that seeing history throughsomeone’s writing can bring a new perspective to certain situations.

 Forexample, during week 5 we read through Black American Literature. 

Thistaught me that when these people were dealing with racism they were onlyallowed to suffer in silence and lived in absolute fear. 

They taught menot just facts about the situations but also how it affected themmentally and emotionally.

Tamara

Post at least one question/point in response to Lecture 7.

1). Afterreviewing Don W. Melander’s lecture video, “Modern American Fiction:Thumbnail sketches and commentaries,” one of the key points in which hediscussed is how greed, money, social status as well as betrayal’sbecame more prominent in Modern American Fiction Literature.

Post at least two questions about any stories you’ve read in this unit?

2). InSherwood Anderson’s poem, “Hands” in the book, “Grotesque,” I wonder ifSherwood was reflecting upon himself when he writes, “One runs from treeto tree over the frosted ground, picking the gnarled, twisted applesand filling his pockets with them?” 

I also wonder if Anderson isreferring to the apple tree as if the apples were people when he writes,”On the trees are only a few gnarled apples that the pickers haverejected?”

Recommend any story in this unit to our colleagues and say why you recommend it.

3).Although the poem and writer seem rather dismal, I would highlyrecommend reading the poem, “Howl,” by Allen Ginsberg. 

However, I wouldnot necessarily recommend this particular piece of poetry for youth dueto the fact that its content is not only dark, but very twisted! 

Hence,after reading this piece of work, I am inclined to believe that I willnever think or feel the same again in regards to my own personalsprtituality! 

My reasoning for recommending this particular piece ofwork is that I feel it would be helpful to an audience in which might bestruggling with past trauma or unadressed torments of the past ingeneral.

 For those of us who have lost hope, faith, and have struggledto find our inner strength and spirituailty or for those of us who mighthave found our spirituality and lost it altogether. 

Heed the fairwarning! This poem is deep!

What is the most important thing you’ve learned in this course?

4). Tosum it all up, the most important thing in which I have learnedthroughout this course is how much literature and writing has evolvedover time.

 Whereas, artists and poets today are able to voice theircreative expression without the shallow limitations and judgements inwhich artists seemed to have faced in the past.

 I would also like to addthat any type of literature in general can be very political whether werealize it or not!

Response Essay

Write a three–paragraph (2 pages)critical essay on the story you liked the most, the story that spokethe most meaningfully to you. In this essay, talk about:

• The way the story is set up
• Point of view (first-person, unreliable narrator, center-of-consciousness)
• How tensions are developed and resolved (or not)
• What the turning point is
• How the story culminates, its endgame
• What the reader goes on with after reading the story, that is, why it is meaningful to you

Please submit assignment by Sunday at 11:59 p.m. EST

• Ifan essay is below standard (below a “C”) in terms of content, style,and punctuation, you will have to rewrite it to receive a grade, so besure not to submit first drafts.
• Acceptableessays will graded “B” if they meet the demands of the assignment, “A”if they both meet the demands of the assignment and teach me something,and “C” if they are minimally satisfactory.
• Youmay rewrite C- and B-level essays (except for the final essay), but ifyour essays progress in quality, you will earn a final grade based onimprovement rather than an average of all assignments (of course, if youwork is “upand-down,” your final grade will be more of an averagegrade).

Pages to help you with Discussion Assignment and Essay

Volume 2

• William Dean Howells, “Editha,” pp. 314–326
• Ambrose Bierce, “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge,” pp. 326–338
• Sarah Orne Jewett, “A White Heron,” pp. 432–441
• Kate Chopin, “Desiree’s Baby,” pp. 441–446
• Charlotte Perkins Gilman, “The Yellow Wall–Paper” and “Why I Wrote ‘The Yellow Walpaper’,” pp. 479–524
• Edith Wharton, pp. 524–526, “Roman Fever,” pp. 540–549
• Stephen Crane, “The Open Boat,” pp. 611–631
• Jack London, “To Build a Fire,” pp. 639–652
• Willa Cather, “Neighbor Rosicky,” pp. 691–714
• Sherwood Anderson, “Hands,” pp. 761–767
• Scott Fitzgerald, pp. 973–975, “Babylon Revisited,” pp. 991–1005
• William Faulkner, “A Rose for Emily,” pp. 1005–1015
• Ernest Hemingway, “Hills Like White Elephants,” pp. 1030–1036
• John Steinbeck, “The Chrysanthemums,” pp. 1044–1053
• John Cheever, “The Swimmer,” pp. 1182–1191
• Flannery O’Connor, “Good Country People,” pp. 1366–1392
• John Updike, “Separating,” pp. 1450–1460
• Philip Roth, “Defender of the Faith,” pp. 1460–1483
• Thomas Pynchon, “Entropy,” pp. 1519–1531
• Raymond Carver, “Cathedral,” pp. 1531–1543
• Maxine Hong Kingston, “No Name Woman,” pp. 1543–1553
• Leslie Marmon Silko, “Lullaby,” pp. 1579–1587
• Sandra Cisneros, “Woman Hollering Creek,” pp. 1613–1622
• Louis Erdrich, pp. 1622–1624, “Fleur,” pp. 1626–1635
• George Saunders, “CivilWarLand in Bad Decline,” pp. 1664–1677
• Jhumpa Lahiri, “Sexy,” pp. 1691–1708
• Junot Diaz, “Drown,” pp. 1708–1716