American Lit Final

Front 1

promotional literature-

Back 1

Come to America type stuff. Works: Drayton’s “Ode to Virginia Voyage” (describes America as paradise and land of opportunity)

Front 2

captivity narrative-

Back 2

Related Ideas: Providence, Englishness (and/or Christian-ness, Civilization) in the face of savagery. Works: “Hannah Dustan’s Captivity Narrative,” as told to Cotton Mather (Dustan is kidnapped then prays and finds opportunity to escape)

Front 3

sea-deliverance narrative-

Back 3

Accounts of sailors lost at sea who face all sorts of hardship and then, once they appreciate what they have/ask for God’s help, they are saved. Works: “Christus super aquas,” Cotton Mather (shipwrecked, almost dies, is thankful for small things, is rescued)

Front 4

providence (all senses)-

Back 4

God’s influence in the world, can be positive or negative. Designed to test His followers or rewarded them, or both. Works: “Circumstance” (captured by beast, has to sing to survive, only after she sings hymns/has faith in God does her husband find her)

Front 5

typology-

Back 5

interpretation of life-- providence. Living in New Testament, everything has an Old Testament precedent. Everything has meaning. Works: “Wonders of the Invisible World” Cotton Mather (parallel with ancient Israelites who had to survive wilderness)

Front 6

Puritan attitudes toward nature-

Back 6

Bradford: nature is a test, something that has to be overcome, wilderness is desolate. Works: “Of Plymouth Plantation,” Bradford ("Besides, what could they see but a hideous and desolate wilderness, full of wild beasts and wild men?")

Front 7

Jeremiad-

Back 7

group has fallen from original righteousness, God promises punishment unless you repent. Works: “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God,” Jonathan Edwards (describes hellfire fate of sinners, only God's hand holds them up from the pits of hell)

Front 8

Deism-

Back 8

belief that reason and observation of natural world prove existence of God. Works: "Thoughts on the Works of Providence," Wheatley (balance of the universe is an act of providence, proof of God)

Front 9

Quakerism-

Back 9

Christian sect, doesn’t believe in violence or swearing oaths, first abolitionists. Works: Life in the Iron Mills (Quaker woman at end saves Deborah, takes body of Hugh to bury where it's nice and green)

Front 10

religious enthusiasm-

Back 10

religious fervor/excitement, the Great Awakening. Works: "Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God," reeking of religious enthusiasm, many people saw Edwards as crazy

Front 11

Horatian aesthetic-

Back 11

to instruct and delight. Works: “The Contrast” (funny but morals at end)

Front 12

John Locke-

Back 12

Father of Classical Liberalism, deist

Front 13

satire-

Back 13

sarcastic, mocking, says something about society. Works: “Blockheads,” Mercy Otis Warren (makes fun of British soldiers, comedy around Battle of Bunker Hill)

Front 14

sensational-

Back 14

depictions of graphic violence and horror, insider accounts of the underside of American life Works: Douglass descriptions of torture of slaves, Crevecoeur description of slave in cage with eyes eaten by birds

Front 15

sentimental-

Back 15

indulgence of emotionalism, focus on women and children, try to tug at the heartstrings of readers. Works: Frederick Douglass (doesn't remember his momma)

Front 16

plantation novel-

Back 16

slaves are happy, kind masters, the law protects them. Works: Douglass proves these false.

Front 17

blackface-minstrelsy-

Back 17

racist portrayals of slaves, super popular, comedy skits/music, downplays severity of slavery, plays into notion that slaves sing and dance and have a good time on the plantations. There are also songs about how miserable the freed slaves were.

Front 18

sublime-

Back 18

pit of stomach falls, physical reaction to an idea, image, etc. Works: “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God,” Jonathan Edwards (descriptions of hellfire, fate of sinners)

Front 19

gothic-

Back 19

Sensational, mysterious, perverse. Woods become sign of Gothic in America in absence of castles. Works: “Young Goodman Brown,” Nathaniel Hawthorne (witchcraft). “Bartelby, The Scrivener,” Herman Melville (Bartelby is like a ghost).

Front 20

perverse-

Back 20

People torture themselves psychologically, act in ways opposite of their self interest. Works: “The Raven,” Poe (keeps asking questions, knowing it'll only say Nevermore)

Front 21

romanticism-

Back 21

movement in 18th century; emphasized inspiration, subjectivity, and the primacy of the individual. Works: "The Indian Burial Ground," Philip Freneau (talks about the positions of the Indians and their spiritual adventures "reason is no match for imagination when in a romantic setting")

Front 22

realism-

Back 22

describes real life Works: “Common Sense,” Paine (straightforward arguments about why America should be independent)

Front 23

epistolary novel-

Back 23

piece of work written in letters Works: Crevecoeur’s Letters

Front 24

grave robbing-

Back 24

digging up graves for valuables or for the body for research. Works: “An Oration” (speaker describes how his mistress died and then he dug up her body to cut up in the name of science)

Front 25

unreliable narrator-

Back 25

things narrator says cannot be taken as 100% true. Works: “Ligeia,” Poe (dude was high on opium the whole time)

Front 26

narrative layers-

Back 26

story within a story Works: "Sleepy Hollow," Irving (speaker tells story of how he met another man who tells the story of sleepy hollow)

Front 27

subscription (as a publishing practice)-

Back 27

Method of publishing where people “subscribe” to a book that is trying to get published, promising they’ll buy it. So it has some sure-thing buyers. Works: Wheatley

Front 28

autobiography (especially elements of the American autobiographical tradition)-

Back 28

rags to riches, slavery to freedom, family history Works: Ben Franklin (becomes model for almost all future autobiographies)

Front 29

closet drama-

Back 29

plays you read at home instead of going to see them. Works: “The Contrast,” Royall Tyler

Front 30

Dame Van Winkle-

Back 30

Rip Van Winkle’s wife, angry and naggy, becomes the predecessor of all naggy housewife tropes. Works: Rip Van Winkle

Front 31

Natty Bumppo-

Back 31

likes the Indians, complains about farmers, complains about wasteful habits of men (The Pioneers excerpt with pigeon shooting), inspired by Daniel Boone. Works: Last of the Mohicans, James Fennimore Cooper

Front 32

speaker (of a poem)-

Back 32

person who is narrating the poem, not the same as the author. can have different thoughts, opinions, experiences, etc. Works: Annabel Lee, Poe ("my" annabel lee, poe isn't speaker)

Front 33

Hudibrastic-

Back 33

iambic tetrameter, satire. Works: Samuel Butler's Hudibras (a mock-heroic satirical poem ridiculing the Puritans)

Front 34

meter-

Back 34

The patterned structure of a poem. Works: "The Author to her Book," Anne Bradstreet (uses heroic couplets)

Front 35

ballad/hymn meter-

Back 35

iambic lines of 7 accents, each arranged in rhyming pairs, usually arranged in a 4-line stanza. can be sung to “Amazing Grace” Works: Emily Dickinson ([Because I could not stop for death])

Front 36

heroic couplet-

Back 36

2 lines that rhyme. Works: "The Author to Her Book," Anne Bradstreet

Front 37

blank verse-

Back 37

unrhymed iambic pentameter. Works: “Thanatopsis,” William Cullen Bryant.

Front 38

free verse-

Back 38

not any rhyme or reason Works: “Leaves of Grass,” Walt Whitman

Front 39

slant rhyme-

Back 39

almost rhymes Works: Dickinson

Front 40

anaphora-

Back 40

lists, repetition Works: Whitman