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takes the gratification away from a job; taylorization of work (breaking it down into separate roles to increase efficiency); don't get the satisfaction of seeing the end product; humanity divorced from the product it is making
Life in the Iron Mills (Davis): The workers work in horrible conditions doing the same work continuously without seeing the final product of what is made by the iron they are producing; they are separated from society and never-ending work does not allow for any free time to pursue individual interests; because of the stifling nature of their work, Hugh finds his creative outlet in making statues from the korl
Bartleby (Melville): The scriveners are simply copying legal documents and not participating in the actual creation of them; no intellectual creativity involved |
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Introduction that shows humility; authenticates a traumatic narrative/enhances the believability of the narrative; underplaying sophistication to increase ethos
Slave Girl (Jacbos): Jacobs uses the basic form of apologia in the beginning of the novel; says it is a work of fiction and that she wishes she were more competent; underplays her sophistication
Bartleby (Melville): the narrator prefaces the story by saying "I am a very old man"; a kind of apology/precursor to details he may have mangled/confused in the story |
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direct and explicit address to an absent person or inanimate object; sudden emotional impetus; goal is to elicit emotions
Iron Mills: When Hugh Wolfe commits suicide in jail, Davis states that the look on his face was one asking the Lord how long it would take for him to die
Song of Myself: Whitman is constantly addressing the nature that surrounds him, such as the earth, the sun, the universe; emotional impetus derived from his constant proclamations of his own omnipotent power and the need to embrace life
Slave Girl: Jacobs directly addresses the reader and asks for pity and forgiveness regarding her shameful life; also cries out in pain as she wishes her children were dead, believing that death would be a better fate than slavery |
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embalming became a standard practice after the Civil War; with the high mortality rate of children during this time, families would dress the dead children up in white lace garments, flower, and put bibles next to them and take pictures; a portrait book would be made of the dead children's photos
Huck Finn: Emmeline Grangerford was obsessed with death and was remembered through her poetry and artwork that dealt with corpses and the dead
Song of Myself: Whitman's portrayal of dead soldiers and how he describes them as young boys; his poetry creates a image of the deceased youth |
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women in the mid 19th century; pure, submissive, pious, domestic
The Awakening: Edna rejecting the concept; not attached to her children, shuns domestic chores, especially not submissive to her husband (seen when he asks her to come in from the hammock and she refuses); Adele embodies the cult of true womanhood to a tee (dotes on her children and her husband)
Bartleby: The narrator takes on a kind of paternal role
Slave Girl: writing to tell Northern White women of the large role slaves play in keeping up domestic appearances (take care of the children; clean the house; exposes how the white women do not embody this cult (don't nurse their children, don't cook for themselves) |
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a regional variety of language distinguished by features of vocabulary, grammar, and pronunciation from other regional varieties and constituting together a single language; romantic conventions; in-sync with culture and conventions
The Awakening: Creole/French dialect used in Louisiana/New Orleans (Edna from Kentucky and is unable to speak much French/Creole; separated from society through dialect); shows class distinctions because Creole used by the common people
Iron Mills: Hugh/Deborah/Janey all speak in a kind of slang common to the workers and the lower class; distinction seen in Kirby/Dr. May/Mitchell
Huck Finn: uses Southern 1840s lower class dialect; Twain gives a note at the beginning of the novel that the story uses the dialect of the time; Jim uses a "slave dialect" |
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genre that is encyclopedic that attempts to include everything; it is a system that is working to be the last word on a culture but also critical of that culture
1. Theological/real of divinity
2. Political and historical
3. Domestic/quotidian/banal/daily life
4. Usually involves trip to the underworld
5. Oral traditions and other mythologies
6. Foundation of a culture; shows its formation
7. Usually deconstructs itself; contradictory
Song of Myself: Whitmans description of dead bodies & graveyards, his poem overall is an epic. Whitman re-routes death into cycle of life. Oral traditions and older mythologies
- sound of labor in "song of myself"
-usually deconstructs itself
Dickinson's poetry is the opposite of an epic because it is a microcosm of ideas and uses sparse language. |
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writing of a letter; direct dialogue with the reader; fosters a sense of community
Jacobs' letter to Dr. Flint and Grandma
Dickinson poems were used in letter to her friends and family |
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1815: to return escaped slaves back to the South to their rightful owners; perverted patriotism
Huck Finn: Pap describes the black man/slave in the white hat and suit who hasn't been in the state long enough to be sold back into slavery; Jim constantly running to the North to escape slavery
Jacobs' narrative is about her own experience with the Fugitive Slave Law; even in the North, she is wary of the white people around her who may turn her in |
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pertains to the unspeakable; deals with live burial
uncanny: that which is most familiar, but most strange
Slave Girl: Linda hides in the attic in the "The Loophole of Retreat"; lying in a dark, confined space (vulnerable to the weather/insects)
Dickinson's poetry from the perspective of the dead or dying ("I heard a fly" trivializes death & "Color-Caste-Denomination" talks about Death's large democratic fingers rub away the brand)
Huck Finn: fakes his death |
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| Historical Double-consciousness |
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an author writes about a past era in order to comment on the present time period; "double consciousness" comes from W.E.B. DuBois and the idea that African Americans see doubly with eyes of themselves as black people and with the eyes of white people who are looking at them
Huck Finn: Twain writes about the 1830s before the abolishment of slavery to comment on the dilemma in his own time of 1880s about the condition of African Americans not truly being free even tough the law states otherwise (Jim Crow laws, separate but equal)
Slave Girl: Linda understands her place as a slave but understands how Northern white women would view her situation (emphasizes the shamefulness of her condition/pregnant without being married)
Iron Mills: Hugh realizes his wretched state once he steals money from Mitchell; believes that money will allow him to achieve higher status and a better life that was denied him |
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dependent group (slaves) need the host (master) to survive; the master class believes they are benevolent and the slave cannot live without them
Bartleby: narrator seems like the master (provides the scriveners with jobs/food); but he is also dependent on the scriveners to do his copying work
Slave Girl: Dr. Flint tries to show that he has absolute power over his slaves; but once Linda tries to defy that power by trying to get married and getting pregnant by Mr. Sands he is consumed with thoughts of controlling her/threatening her to sleep wit him
Iron Mills: the rich men believe they are doing the workers a service by promoting reforms and providing them jobs, but they are dependent on the workers for their labor and gaining from their hard work
The Awakening: men say that they are providing a stable/comfortable life for their wives, but in reality Mr. Pontellier needs Edna to take care of the children, host Tuesday afternoon visits that help his business |
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undoing of parasitism; inversion of power dynamics; self-awareness and consciousness of one's worth/power
Slave Girl: Linda realizes that Dr. Flint won't physically harm her so she can say defy him without worrying about the consequences (can say "no" to his requests for her to be essentially free from slave labor if she provides him with sexual favors)
Bartleby: "I prefer not to"; narrator realizes that they has no power to force Bartleby to do his work or to get him out of the office (Bartleby is able to control the narrator's actions)
The Awakening: Edna regains power once she says no to her husband (doesn't come in from being in the hammock; doesn't hold Tuesday afternoon meetings; moves out of her house) |
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Seurat's painting "Sunday Afternoon on the Grand Jatte"; painting composed of short brushstrokes that comes into focus when you stand back; a piece of writing is composed of lots of little details that only come into focus when you stand back and look at the narrative as a whole; subjectivity of people's views define the impression; nobody is unreliable, people’s self-knowledge is qualified; their interior experiences make up their point of view
The Awakening: multiple viewpoints add to the complexity of the story (the doctor hopes that Edna is not affected by Arobin; Adele tells Robert not to play with Edna's emotions)
Song of Myself: Encompasses all aspects of American life (comments on nature, the working class, soldiers) to give a comprehensive picture of life |
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during the presidency of Andrew Jackson in the late 1820s and 1830s; democracy ruled by white males; anti-Wall Street/anti-central banking (pro-restriction on the federal government); pro-farmer and pro-worker
Song of Myself: honoring of the working class by giving them a voice
Bartleby: anti-Wall Street; shows the negative aspects and impersonality of big business
Huck Finn: working class whites just got the vote; criticizes this idea that a Jacksonian Democracy was the government of the people because most of the voters were ignorant/racist whites men that did not understand/care about blacks (embodied in Pap's character) |
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black and white telling of a story; flat/Manichean characters (idea of duality; either good or bad); not able to sympathize with both sides (unlike in a tragedy); invented by the middle class; a way to relate to the plebeians in a simplistic way to get across who or what is wrong and right; exaggerated emotions/stereotypical characters/interpersonal conflicts
Slave Girl: Dr. Flint is obviously bad (embodies enslavement; dominant/controlling tendencies) and Linda is obviously good (embodies this idea of freedom and self-sacrifice)
The Awakening: Opposite of a melodrama because Edna can be seen as a good person (trying to pursue a kind of personal happiness and fulfillment) but still abandons her family/children and commits adultery
Iron Mills: The workers can be seen as the "good" characters that are just victims of circumstance; whereas Kirby/Mitchell/Dr. May embody the rich bourgeoisie that exploits the working poor and benefits from their labor |
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talking about the metaphysical or huge ideas in a microcosmic space
Dickinson: tries to express huge ideas (such as equality in "Caste, race, denomination") by using very sparse language
Song of myself: opposite of a miniature because it tries to express the grand concept of living life to the fullest through using elaborate phrasing |
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| song and dance performance phenomenon; fantasy of blackness/plantation life that most Northerners did not ever see (use burnt pork fat to create black face) |
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figure in the text who stands for the values of the reader
Iron Mills: Kirby is the normative character; the factory owner and believes that it is enough to provide the workers with a job and wage (doesn't think it he should concern himself with their poor conditions/life); standard mindset of the middle-upper class
The Awakening: Adele Ratignolle is the normative character because she embodies the Cult of True Womanhood which was exalted/the societal norm during that time period
Slave Girl: Mrs. Bruce (#1) helps Linda hide from the Flints; Mrs. Bruce (#2) is an abolitionist American who protects Linda at great risk to herself and ultimately buys her freedom from Mr. Dodge; appeals to the Northern white women who was her primary audience |
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fear of always being watched; being able to self-govern; paranoia
-In slave girl, the Fugitive Slave Law creates a panoptic environment because the runaway slaves are never sure who they can trust.
-In Song of Myself, the scene where the woman is in the house watching the young men bath is sort of panoptic because the young men are unable to see who is watching them.
-In Dickinson's I heard a fly buzz, the fly is watching the woman die and the woman is watching the fly. So its sort of a double panopticism. |
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inanimate objects take on human attributes
-In "life in the iron mills", the factory is given human qualities, the machinery groans and shrieks, and the workers are "governed" by the machinery.
-In Dickinson's Color, Caste, Denomination, she personifies death by giving death hands that rub away the brand (also capitalizes death) |
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a novel built in episodes strung together with themes as beads are strung on a necklace
-Huck Finn is the main example of this idea because it takes place as a series of incidents along the river, with the journey down the river tying the incidents together. Incidents include the Sheperdsons and Grangerfords, the duke and the dauphin, etc.
-Whitman's Song of Myself could also be considered a picaresque because it is a series of vignettes strung together to create a whole narrative on American life in general. |
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form of radical Protestantism; belief in predestination and that only some are chosen; radical conversion moment where you hear the voice of God and are saved
-The narrator in Bartleby tries to live up to the ideals of puritanism by trying to be charitable towards Bartleby, and he is very concerned about his soul and uses his kindness towards Bartleby as a "sweet morsel" he can store in his conscience.
-In Huck Finn, the Widow Douglas and Miss Watson especially, represent the Puritan mindset of the American middle class in their attempts to instill religious belief in him. Miss Watson's description of a vengeful God is especially Puritan in its mindset.
-Dickinson is anti-puritanical because in Color, Caste, Denomination, she talks about how in death everyone is equal, which goes against the Puritan and Christian belief in heaven and hell. Also, in I saw a fly buzz, death and the passage into the afterlife is depicted as insignificant. |
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an attempt to capture life as it really is; especially sociological problems; attempts to show readers the truth; deals with issues of class conflict, status, race, journalistic/photographic attention to detailing the world in its complexity; perhaps the opposite of idealism; looked at race prejudice in the work place, child labor, prostitution
-The depiction of the life in the iron mills is an attempt to accurately portray what life was like for the working poor of the time, including the darker aspects.
- Jacobs writing about life as a slave also tries to accurately depict the darker aspects of slavery, though censored to an extent for her white, northern middle class audience. |
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movements to change specific societal issues during the mid 19th century; temperance, abolition, suffrage, immigration, worker's rights/child labor
-Jacob's narrative was an example of the abolitionist reform movement, especially with her favorable depiction of the northern abolitionists
-Life in the Iron Mills is an attempt to further the cause of workers rights, and to bring to light the terrible conditions under which they lived and worked.
-The Awakening is an early attempt to promote women's rights and feminism. Edna's belief that a woman putting herself before her household and her children is desireable was especially radical for the time. (Dr. Mandelet asks Leonce if Enda has been associating with “pseudo-intellectual women,” alluding to the contemporary women's clubs that served to educate their members and to organize them politically) |
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| Scientific Racism v. Romantic Racialism |
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scientific racism: hierarchy in society; blacks are lesser than whites on all levels (biologically and intellectually)
romantic racialism: blacks are not intellectually equal, but morally equal; have special talents such as excessive strength/musicality (uncle tom idea; sparks a kind of paternalism in white people towards blacks)
-Whitman's descriptions of Black performers and performative language
-Huck Finn- Jim is not smart enough to learn French; "has a level head for a negro"; does not understand Huck when he explains King Solomon's wisdom; but is able to discuss morals with Huck (why they should stop stealing so much) |
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| Sentimentalism and Sympathy |
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sentimentalism: Literary movement that came out of sympathy; illicit a conversion experience in the reader; appeals to reader's affect, not rationalism
sympathy: idea of walking in their shoes and becoming them; garners a fellow feeling; imaginative migration
-Bartleby- narrator attempts to gain sympathy from the reader by claiming he sympathizes with Bartleby
-Jacobs- reached out to the reader for sympathy "What would you do in my situation?"
-Iron Mills- attempts to garner sympathy from the audience (upper middle class) to see the plight of the working poor
-Huck finn- by making Jim a three dimensional character you are more easily able to sympathize with him when Huck mistreats him |
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| suggestion that hierarchy in class, race, gender can be explained by evolution; selection in favor of the strongest/intelligent |
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completely cut off from society; loss of identity
1. no legal rights
2. alienation from society
3. breaking up of kinship (familial level)
Jacobs: Especially seen when Linda is in the attic (unable to communicate with her children/still has no rights because she is a slave in the South)
Iron Mill: The workers in the factory lack adequate housing and sustinence, and are basically at the level of a slave, with possibly even worse conditions. They have as little rights as slaves, and the pressures of the work and struggle for survival break up the family.
Huck Finn: Huck has no family and as a child has no rights,and Jim as a slave has obviously experienced social death. |
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practiced by Emerson and Thoreau; rejection of Puritanism; belief in the perfectibility of humans, the bond between people and nature, and an emphasis on self-reliance; Thoreau's idea of the "transparent eyeball" which is nothing and sees all
-Bartleby is a sort of critique of transcendentalism in the sense that he tries to be self sufficient, yet that attempt eventually ends up killing him
-Whitman is transcendental because of the connection with nature and his praise of humanity, his belief in the perfectibility (woman watching the 29 bathers, but the narrator watching the woman)
-The awakening is transcendental because she experiences her awakening to become self-reliant while swimming in the ocean. |
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A stereotypical/common scene that comes up across a range of literature that revolve around the same theme
Slave Girl: Linda's realization that she is a slave after her mother died and overhears people talking; is in an edenic state before this realization
The Awakening: coming to knowledge of one's own existence (realization that she does not want to be part of the cult of true womanhood/that she is unhappy in subservience and in her marriage) |
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