American Realism - Short Story Journaling Blog (Due: Monday, March 2, 2009)

This week you will read two short stories by a single author writing during the period of American Realism in the late nineteenth/early twentieth century. You will keep a short reader's journal in response to your readings.

You have been asked to choose from one of the following authors: Mark Twain, Jack London, Willa Cather, and Kate Chopin. You will read two short stories from one of these authors. The following texts will be made available to you for each author:

➢ Twain: “The Celebrated Jumping Frog of Calaveras County” (pp. 460-465); “The Story of the Good Little Boy”/"The Story of the Bad Little Boy" (provided via handout)
➢ London: “To Build a Fire” (pp. 481-492); “The Mexican” (provided via handout)
➢ Chopin: “A Pair of Silk Stockings” (pp. 504-508); “Lilacs” (provided via handout)
➢ Cather: “A Wagner Matinee” (pp.514-520); “Consequences” (provided via handout)
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Guiding questions for your journal:

As you read, you will keep a reading journal guided by the following questions:

1) How do the writings of this author compare to those of the American Romantics we have read? Can we note some progression from American Romanticism into American Realism?

2) What topics, themes, social/political issues does this writer take up in his/her work? What might these tell us as readers about this author and his/her worldview?

3) With regard to author’s purpose consider the following: To whom is this writer writing? For whom are they writing?

4) What relevance does this author’s writing hold for you as a reader?

5) What drew you to the work of this author? Pick a short passage from one of his/her works and write in response to his/her words.
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NOTE: I would prefer to email digital copies of the stories not included in your textbook rather than print these. (This saves both time and paper.) As soon as you know which author's work you would like to read, let me know and I can send you the additional story as a attachment.

Poetry as Protest (Due: Monday, February 23, 2009)

This week we read writings from three male writers/speakers/activists (King, Gandhi, Thoreau) who spoke/wrote in support of non-violent resistance to the injustices they sought to combat in society. For this week's blog I'd like you take a look at some poets who have used the power of their voices to work in non-violent ways to speak out against violence and war.

Below you will find a poem by June Jordan, a female American poet of Jamaican ancestry who was born in Harlem in 1936 and published several books of poetry before her death in 2002. In her poem "The Bombing of Baghdad" she writes in protest against the first war in Iraq.

For this week's blog, I'd like you to consider the following question as you write:

Does writing have the power to enact social change?

In addition to Jordan's poem, you might be interested to check out the work of some other poets who have used verse as a means for non-violent resistance. The website Poets Against War contains writing from a number of renowned poets who have taken up this cause.
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THE BOMBING OF BAGHDAD

I

began and did not terminate for 42 days
and 42 nights relentless minute after minute
more than 110,000 times
we bombed Iraq we bombed Baghdad
we bombed Basra/we bombed military
installations we bombed the National Museum
we bombed schools we bombed air raid
shelters we bombed water we bombed
electricity we bombed hospitals we
bombed streets we bombed highways
we bombed everything that moved/we
bombed everything that did not move we
bombed Baghdad
a city of 5.5 million human beings
we bombed radio towers we bombed
telephone poles we bombed mosques
we bombed runways we bombed tanks
we bombed trucks we bombed cars we bombed bridges
we bombed the darkness we bombed
the sunlight we bombed them and we
bombed them and we cluster bombed the citizens
of Iraq and we sulfur bombed the citizens of Iraq
and we napalm bombed the citizens of Iraq and we
complemented these bombings/ these "sorties" with
Tomahawk cruise missiles which we shot
repeatedly by the thousands upon thousands
into Iraq
(you understand an Iraqi Scud missile
is quote militarily insignificant unquote and we
do not mess around with insignificant)
so we used cruise missiles repeatedly
we fired them into Iraq
And I am not pleased
I am not very pleased
None of this fits into my notion of "things going very
well"

II

The bombing of Baghdad
did not obliterate the distance or the time
between my body and the breath
of my beloved

III

This was Custer's Next-To-Last Stand
I hear Crazy Horse singing as he dies
I dedicate myself to learn that song
I hear that music in the moaning of the Arab world

IV

Custer got accustomed to just doing his job
Pushing westward into glory
Making promises
Searching for the savages/their fragile
Temporary settlements
For raising children/dancing down the rain/and praying
For the mercy of a heard of buffalo
Custer/he pursued these savages
He attacked at dawn
He murdered the men/murdered the boys
He captured the women and converted
them (I'm sure)
to his religion
Oh, how gently did he bid his darling fiancée
farewell!
How sweet the gaze her eyes bestowed upon her warrior!
Loaded with guns and gunpowder he embraced
the guts and gore of manifest white destiny
He pushed westward
to annihilate the savages
("Attack at dawn!")
and seize their territories
seize their women
seize their natural wealth

V

And I am cheering for the arrows
and the braves

VI

And all who believed some must die
they were already dead
And all who believe only they possess
human being and therefore human rights
they no longer stood among the possibly humane
And all who believed that retaliation/revenge/defense
derive from God-given prerogative of white men
And all who believed that waging war is anything
beside terrorist activity in the first
place and in the last
And all who believed that F-15's/F-16's/"Apache"
helicopters/
B-52 bombers/smart bombs/dumb bombs/napalm/artillery/
battleships/nuclear warheads amount to anything other
than terrorist tools of a terrorist undertaking
And all who believed that holocaust means something
that happens only to white people
And all who believed that Desert Storm
signified anything besides the delivery of and American
holocaust against the peoples of the Middle East
All who believed these things
they were already dead
They no longer stood among the possibly humane

And this is for Crazy Horse singing as he dies
because I live inside his grave
And this is for the victims of the bombing of Baghdad
because the enemy traveled from my house
to blast your homeland
into pieces of children
into pieces of sand

And in the aftermath of carnage
perpetrated in my name
how should I dare to offer you my hand
how shall I negotiate the implications
of my shame?

My heart cannot confront
this death without relief
My soul will not control
this leaking of my grief

And this is for Crazy Horse singing as he dies
And here is my song of the living
who must sing against the dying
sing to join the living
with the dead

June Jordan
Kissing God Goodbye: Poems 1991-1997

Price of a Child Post (Due: 2/15/09)

Remember to post your Price of a Child creative pieces on your blogs this weekend. It would be great, also if you could read through other students' posts and respond to your classmates' writings. I'd like to see you post a thoughtful response to at least one blog post from someone not in your advisory group.

You will receive credit for both of these pieces.

Have great holiday weekend. See you Tuesday.

-F