Best of Luck To Ye All: Some Joy To Accompany the Bitterness

And Pleasant Dreams....



Good night.

TERM PAPER INFORMATION

Order of steps to create a term paper

1. Topic Assignment
2. Working title
3. bibliography
4. thesis statement
5. notecards
6. outline
7. annotated bibliography
8. rough draft
9. peer editing
10. final draft

Research Proposal has 4 steps
1. purpose of the paper (explain, analyze, argue)
2. Intended audience (general or specialized)
3. Your voice as a writer (info or advocate
4. Preliminary thesis sentence

-Make sure the topic of your paper isn't too broad. Narrow it down from subject area to topic

-Biblio
-Citations are NOT numbered
- indexed in alphabetical order
- last name of author first
- if there is no author title goes first.

WORKING TITlE
-example
subject is drugs
drugs, drug testing, drug testing in the workplace, random drug testing in the workplace, random drug testing in professional sports, Arguments for random drug testing in professional sports (final title for paper)

NOTECARDS (format)
1.top left corner- source of research
2.top right corner- letter (alpha order)
3. middle- MLA cited biblio
4. bottom- significance of relevance
5. name on back EVERY TIME
6. write in pen
7. DO NOT use encyclopedias (too broad)

OUTLINE

- full sentances
-one idea per line
- EVERY A MUST HAVE A B every one MUST have a 2.
- make sure your outline is organized
-outline to....
-define, classify or analyze something
- use descriptive details or give examples
- compare or contrast
- argue a point of view

ANNOTATED BIBLIO

-includes a summary or evaluation of each of the sources
- they do one or more of the following......
- summarize- main arguments etc.
- assess- how is it useful
- reflect- does it fit into research?

-PURPOSE OR WRITING AN ANNOTATED BIBLIO
-learn about your topic- forces you to read info critically
- helps formulate a thesis
- helps other researchers

FORMAT

-biblio-same as normal biblio in MLA format of course
- annotations
- paragraph form
- **use literary present tense **
- Start writing directly after biblio. DO NOT tab down.

Kaitlyn

Mythic Heroic Archetype Overview

Archetype: formed by the repeated experiences in the lives of our ancestors
- Inherited in the “collective unconscious” of the human race (Carl Junger’s theory)
- Exposed in myth, religion, dreams, fantasies, and literature
- Evokes profound emotional response because reader already has the image in their mind
- Can be things, sequence of events, certain kind of place, talismatic objects, etc.

Archetypes are remarkably constant. Examples include...
1. Journey/Quest
2. Rite of passage (often compatible with #1)
3. Loss of/ search for Eden
4. Growth through conflict
5. Nature/Life cycle
6. Religion (search for God or a personal code)
7. Reconciliation of opposites

Symbols include: water, the sun, etc.

Mythic Hero Components

1. Obscure mysterious background
Hero is from outside the community OR if hero is within community, they are hiding an innate difference.
-The “threshold guardian”
Test which separates hero from the adventure/journey. May be a person, thing, or event. Note: if hero is from outside of a community, they have no ties. If from within community, hero must break ties before quest begins.

2. Hero is not invincible, but not a fool.
Usually has a weakness (kryptonite). Hero often has average intellect, but possesses common sense. (Oh how I envy that trait!)

3. The path is not always clear or direct, but there is a goal.
Hero may know destination, but not how to get there OR hero knows the route, but not the obstacles.

4. Journey is filled with danger, lonliness, and temptation.
Burden is only on the hero’s shoulders, and no one else understands. Frequently tempted to abandon the quest.

5. Hero often accompanied by friends, servants, or disciples to offset lonliness.
None quite understand the hero’s responsibilities, though.
-There is a guide.
Often an unlikely character revealed after initial test. May have an unknown connection to opposing force.

6. Things are not spelled out or given to the hero.
Never warned of danger. Gets into trouble before final test.

7. Descent into Darkness
This can be literal (cave and dark imagery common) or figurative. It is the lowest point when a hero faces the greatest conflict. Victory is symbplized by return to the light by which the hero is cleansed and renewed.

8. Difference in hero after descent
Hero has new maturity and wisdom. Other characters do not understand the change or that the goal was only a symbol.

9. Hero suffers a physical wound.
May heal, or hero may be killed. Does not matter as long as the goal is accomplished/mission achieved.

10. Hero’s knowledge is brought back to the community.
The hero may bring back their experiences. If hero dies, some other character will fullfill the duty.

Other Notes:
-Huck Finn is a picaresque story because it occurs in episodic chapters/stories.
-No Name Women is not a mythic heroic archetype tale. In fact, it is the antithesis of the mythic heroic archetype because the aunt dies alone and ashamed without accomplishing anything noble. White Tigers, however, follows the mythic heroic archetype.
-There are many more mythic heroic archetype stories in which a male is the hero. Females are much harder to represent because of the inconveniance of childbirth and family values.

Good luck everyone,
Theresa

... for Mythic heroic stuff

· Twain

· Kingston

Same thing for transcendentalist period

· Thoreau

· Emerson

· Whitman

Same thing for Romantic Period

· Irving

· Bryant

· Longfellow

· Lazarus

· Poe

· Hawthorne

· Melville

neoclassical period

I thought that it would be too much trouble to sort through all of the posts if we all just commented on one. So I'm dividing the 43 reading into four separate posts so we can access the information more quickly.

So it would be helpful if those with the following authors would comment on this post so we can have some order through the chaos.

· Benjamin Franklin

· Patrick Henry

· Thomas Jefferson

· Thomas Paine

· Phillis Wheatley

· Crevecoeur

· Freneau

I'm not sure if you guys will like this idea so...
*Raises flame shield and cries "THIS IS SPARRTTAAAA!!"*

Enjoy,
Dan

A General Overview of Romanticism

Like I said, this is a general overview... there are many gaps that need to be filled in, so if you have anything to add, PLEASE DO!

Romanticism

- Reaction against the old order (Neoclassicism) -- the French Revolution was the death knell for Neoclassicism
- Emphasis on the common man and nature
- Emotion ruled over logic and reason
- DRUNKENNESS OF THE SPIRIT: man is ruled by instinct rather than by neoclassical logic

- 3 CATEGORIES
1. Early Romantics: focus on American culture (nationalism!) and nature - Irving and Bryant
2. Gothics: focus on human nature and psychology (anything creepy and "thriller-esque") - Hawthorne, Melville, Poe
Transcendentalists: a whole bunch of hippies - Emerson, Thoreau, Whitman

- Strongly influenced by British Romanticism (which took off right before the Revolutionary War), e.g. Bronte Sisters, Sir Walter Scott, et. al.
- Americans at this time held a belief that fiction would inflame the emotions and passions
* Women kept from reading fiction
* Romanticism not really accepted until after the Civil War
- Poetry was of the highest moral value
* Americans tried to write a national poem -- FAILURE (well, it was Romanticism wasn't it?)
- Sir Walter Scott: made the novel acceptable; redirected poets from the epic poem to poems of internal reflection, etc. (greatly influenced Hawthorne, Melville, and Thoreau)
- Irving: first to prove that American writers could gain acclaim and popularity in Europe
- At this time in history, writing did not guarantee a living except for best-sellers like Harriet Beecher Stowe (Uncle Tom's Cabin); as a result, many authors became newspaper editors so they could publish thier own work
- Some works, like Thoreau's Walden were attacks against the materialism and conformism of Americans (basically all the transcendentalists)
- Transcendentals rejected Christianity and formed their own secular religion, believing in the "Oversoul"
- Slavery inspired the Romantic writers, though most of them died before the Civil War -- many Romantics championed the cause, especially Thoreau who made a speech against slavery and burned a copy of the Constitution in protest

I feel like my notes on Romanticism in general are lacking, so like I said, if you have anything to add, please do so.

Transcendentalism
- Protestantism was dominant in New England (where most writers/intellectuals were from) throughout the 18th and 19th centuries
- Romantics disliked the rigidity and authority of Protestantism -- combining this with their hatred of industrialization and commercialism, the stage was set for transcendentalist st speak out
- Materialism in America begins with the advent of the machine because more goods could be produced and sold for lower prices -- transcendentalists wanted to get away from the overbearing materialism that most Americans sought
- Many factors, especially Eastern philosophy, showed the transcendentalists that people could live thier lives differently than the way that mass society does
- Transcendentalism: a secular religion; wanted to come into contact with the "Oversoul" by understanding oneself and coming into unity with nature/the universe
* Does not require an outward show of faith -- no rituals, only internal reflection
* No church, no Sabbath -- every day is a holy day and every place is a holy place
* Everyone become reunified with God by going back to the earth after death
- Celebrated the commonplace -- seek God through the common, everyday occurences
- No one cared and no one listened during that period -- most saw the transcendentalists as a big joke
- Every new counterculture looks back to these ideals and tries to make the principles work, but then we realize they don't -- war is usually the death knell for transcendental movements

TRANSCENDENTALISM DOES NOT WORK; IT IS IMPOSSIBLE TO ACHIEVE UTOPIA!

- On a side note, I just remembered something: Throughout history there have been numerous Romantic/Transcendental movements

These movements last for a few years, but then society becomes disillusioned (usually by war) and the movement collapses; society enters a phase of realism and logic; something sparks the Romantic ideals into action again -- ROMANTICISM IS CYCLICAL IN NATURE


- Elizabeth

And Now for a Few Notes on Neoclassicism

(The parantheses part here is Danielle, who has hijacked Liz's post. I counted up the works that our class has covered. Including the ones I already did, it's 43. What does that mean? It means I'm going to hand out 2 to each person in our class tomorrow for him/her to blog on, so please do so. The final exam can have any of the pieces out of those 43 works, so you should at least be able to analyze them when given an entire weekend. //end demanding rant// Thanks.)

I was going to add this to Danielle's post but it seemed like it could get confusing, so I decided to make a post solely dedicated to Neoclassicism

- "New Classics" -- was a second Renaissance; looked back to Greeks and Romans for inspiration
- 1763 to early 1800s: Age of Reasoning and Enlightenment; Revolutionary Period
- focus on poltics and propaganda -- used thier wit/words to trick and entertain readers, esp. Franklin
- FORM: long ideas strung together in one sentence and punctuated by semicolons
- form showed education and clarity
- city life led to Neoclassic development -- cities were the hubs of intellectual activity where new ideas were exchanged
- RISE OF RATIONALISM AND LOGIC: people began accepting Newton & Galelaio's ideas -- the world & universe could be explained & rationalized through other means than God or the supernatural
- led to the philosophy of DEISM: there is a God & he created the earth, but he does not control its every action
- the universe is a very intricate clock: God is its maker & he started it, but he let it run by itself
- major philosophical minds: Descartes, Voltaire, and Locke brought their ideas to the new world

DESCARTES: thought & existence were two different things; thought proved one's being, not one's physical existence -- caused people to question authoritative traditions (divine right of kings)
VOLTAIRE: brings Descartes's philosophy of questioning authority into the next generation -- questions rigid dogma (objection to concepts of principle that unerlie authority)
LOCKE: 1. government as a social contract, NOT a hereditary right
2. we become what we are because of how we are raised and the experiences we have (NURTURE,not nature)
3. TABULA ROSA: "blank slate" -- we come into the world blank and inscribe who we are thorugh our experiences and nurturing
**Locke's theories were used t influence the Declaration of Independence**

TENETS OF DEISM:
1. fact that the universe exists proves that God exists
2. we know innately that man is not perfect, however we accept the imperfections and that he can be made better
3. human nature provides us with the ultimate truth
4. one must love Truth and practice Value: by discovering Truth and practicing it with Virtue, happiness will result
5. evil is the force that gets in the way of happiness in whatever form it takes for a person
6. we have a responsibility to follow God and His machine in its plan for the universe
7. education and science are essential to man's happiness -- used to perfect ourselves (hold over from Puritanism)
- education is needed to bring society to its fullest
- in order for education to be free to all, civil & religious freedom must be granted to all
8. civil and religious liberty needs to be used for education
9. there is no authority who was empowered to speak on behalf of God
**HYPOCRISY: runs counter to the Revolutionary Period --> leaders claimed that God was on our side & wanted us to have a revolution

-PROPAGANDISTS: members of the upperclass; extremely well educated and wealthy
- willing to argue from a political standpoint, but not willing to fight on the front lines
- had to encourage the people ofthe nation into revolutionary thought and then into revolutionary action

4 GROUPS PROPAGANDISTS NEED TO CONVINCE:
1. Nationals: People whose support for the cause is already there, just need to be organied; need to focus their hatred on one target
2. Allies: Don't have the same goals as Nationals, but believe in what the Nationals stand for; must show them what will benefit them by supporting your cause
3. Neutrals: Neither for nor against the Nationals; must convince them to support your cause -- make the other side look bad & your side look good, but in a placid way so that you don't scare them away
4. Enemy: Not on your side - need to demoralize them; try to get them to stop fighting for their side & stop their belief in their cause

- a great propagandist can appeal to all 4 groups in one document if he or she has great control of the language and semantics
- INTENTIONAL PROPAGANDIZING: intentionally trying to make a point and getting people to support it
- UNINTENTIONAL PROPAGANDIZING: stating one's beliefs and getting people to support it without meaning to

The Neoclassic movement was relatively short-lived and ineffectual

More to come on Romanticism later...
- Elizabeth

List of Authors and Works (Correct if incomplete)

LIST OF AUTHORS AND WRITINGS---CORRECT IF INCOMPLETE

NEOCLASSICAL

Benjamin Franklin
Rules by Which a Great Empire May be Reduced to a Small One

Patrick Henry
Give me Liberty or give me Death!

Thomas Jefferson
The Declaration of Independence

Thomas Paine
The American Crisis

Phillis Wheatley (also though to be pre-Romantic)
On Imagination
On Being Brought From Africa to America
To His Excellency, General Washington

Crevecoeur
Letters From an American Farmer (Letter III: What is an American?)

Freneau
To the Memory of the Brave Americans
The Indian Burying Ground
The Wild Honey-Suckle
The Republican Genius of Europe

ROMANTIC

Irving
Rip Van Winkle (A Posthumous Tale of the Late Diedrich Knickerbocker)

Bryant
Thanatopsis
To a Waterfowl

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
The Goblet of Life
The Jewish Cemetery at Newport
The Slave's Dream
A Psalm of Life

Emma Lazarus
In the Jewish Synagogue at Newport
--used to compare to Longfellow's Jewish Cemetery at Newport

Poe
Masque of the Red Death
Fall of the House of Usher
Cask of Amontillado
The Raven

Hawthorne
Young Goodman Brown
The Minister's Black Veil
The Birthmark
Ethan Brand

Melville
Billy Budd


TRANSCENDENTALISM

Thoreau
Civil Disobedience
Walden (Conclusion)

Emerson
Self-Reliance

Whitman
Biography (this won't be quoted though, right?)
O Captain! My Captain!
Song of the Open Road
When I heard the Learn'd Astronomer
The Commonplace
I Hear America Singing
Excerpts from "Song of Myself"
Ashes of Soldiers
Give Me the Splendid Silent Sun

MYTHIC HEROIC ARCHETYPAL TALES

Twain
The Adventures of Huckleberry Finn

Hong Kingston
No Name Woman
White Tigers


--Danielle

I'll try to write up some stuff about one or more of the authors... I'm feeling tired. If you guys are up to it, it'd be awesome if we could all split up the work or lay claim to specific authors/works so that we all have to do less.

Billy's Thoughts on the "Woman Warrior"

Bill M said...

This post is about The Woman Warrior, I just can't figure out how to start a new topic thingy.

I just finished the first chapter, No Name Woman, and there were a lot of interesting things in the story.

The woman telling the story is living in America and trying to cope with being "Chinese American". She is trying to take the best of both worlds and often looks to her mother’s stories for advice, which I thought was cool. One of her mother's stories (which was told to her after her first menstruation) was about her aunt who had committed suicide after being shunned by the "familial" community.

Four main things bugged me about this story even though I was enthralled by it.

The first thing is the aunt's unwillingness to give the name of the "baby's daddy" as it were. I don't understand why she wouldn't give up his name, I mean, from what the author tells us she was raped. Was the position of being a woman looked down upon so much that you had to obey a man if he said sleep with me? Then if he says, "don't tell anyone about this." the woman would have to obey that as well? Because of him, she got kicked out of her in-laws, disgraced her family, and basically caused the ransacking of her family's house. However, I felt the decision to take the baby with her was the right one (hopefully I don't incur too much wrath here) because she essentially spared him a life of ridicule, ostricization, and anonymity.

The second thing isn't too important, I just felt it was hypocritical to say that sex was never talked about, and then have an instance of her using sexually crude terminology.

Third, I didn't like the way she called the baby the little ghost at the end. Ghosts are the result of death, not new life. Was this child's life so hopeless that he could already be considered dead?

Fourth, I was confused and maybe even a little angered at the last paragraph. She says she is "telling on her aunt" which confused me. If your aunt was forgotten who are you going to tell on her, and why would you? I also was upset that she couldn’t understand where her aunt was coming from, and she is afraid of her even twenty years later. Does she fell she might be the substitute she warns about?

Please feel free to cut my arguments to shreds.


(Switch from comment to post courtesy of Danielle, so don't call Bill narcissistic for titling the post after him.)

Huck Finn

I'm going to be honest, I really didn't like Tom Sawyer when I read it back in the seventh grade, therefore leaving me with a bias towards Mark Twain.

Huck Finn, though, is admittedly different from Tom Sawyer and more interesting.
What I found interesting was the dichotomy created between the river and the towns along it. Whenever Huck and Jim are on the river by themselves, they tend to be safe and calm, whereas on land Huck is having to lie and is always confronted with society's restrictions (attitudes towards slaves, stigma associated with helping a slave, etc.) When the "duke" and "king" end up on their raft, society's gullibility seems to come with it.

To be honest, I really didn't like the reintroduction of Tom Sawyer towards the end of the story, probably because I don't like Tom's character. He complicates everything has this arrogance about him that always gets in the way of Huck's simple and straightforward plans. I thnk that throughout the story Huck demonstrated that he is capable of duplicity and cleverness as well, but Tom always seems to fail to acknowledge that. Do you think that Tom represents something at that point in the story? Or maybe Mark Twain made him annoying on purpose? Or...I'm the only one that finds him aggravating?

Discuss anything else Huck Finn related. :]

-Tina