Nella Larsen - Quicksand

Author background: Nella Larsen was born in Chicago to a Danish mother and a black father, and she later lived in New York. She was accused of plagiarism, and she died friendless in New York. She was a key figure of the Harlem Renaissance. The novel is and is not autobiographical - some elements match her life story, and others obviously do not.

• Central theme: belonging related to class and race
• Tragic mulatto: she doesn't know her identity, society doesn't know what to do with her, she doesn't know where she belongs; this genre typically ends in depression or suicide; page 51 she describes herself as a "despised mulatto"
• Naxos: Helga is unhappy there because she can't conform, and she can't be happy in her non-conformity; she is threatening to the faculty there because she is different as a half-white woman and she has no family or connections; she gets upset with Anderson when he says she's got good breeding or stock; the name Naxos plays off of "saxon"
• Objects: Helga is more comfortable with objects than people (page 36)
• Great Migration: blacks moved from deep south to industrial north; Helga can't get a job in the north without references because these legitimize Helga's social state
• Harlem: it's perfect, too-good-to-be-true; she is discontented because Anne rages against whites and half of Helga is white
• Audrey: she's the opposite of Helga; she mixes in both crowds, and she knows where she belongs
• Copenhagen: no oppression or racial discussions; the painting of her is primitive, stereotypical, "bad, wicked" (119), and it displaces her identity
• Quicksand: she has her fifth child at the end, and it's like she's stuck in quicksand - the more she struggles, the more she gets stuck; by latching on to Reverend Green, she has been a fool
• the South: Helga misreads important scenes in her life such as the moment when she wanders into the church; implies the theme of everyone being a fool and misreading moments in their lives; she acts in "bad faith" - she ruins her life every day, limits herself with her choices because she makes choices out of fear/denial of her free will (Jean-Paul Sartre)
• Repetition compulsion: abandonment (her father left her, she leaves everything, she can't leave her kids), repeats traumatic event as a way to master that event; America stuck in repetition compulsion in thinking about race
• Helga is constrained to the role of a tragic mulatto so she repeats stuff because she doesn't know what else to do

Ernest Hemingway - Hills Like White Elephants

In this story, it's important to look at what's on the surface level and what's not. Hemingway tends to present a lot of things on the surface level without giving them much context, and this style of writing becomes typical of modernism. The story itself is presented as a fragment, suggesting that modern individuals have fragmented identities. Another way to describe this technique of Hemingway's is the iceberg theory, in which the author presents the tip of the character or 1/8 of the plot.

Another interesting thing to think about in this story is the title. How are white elephants used in the story? There is obviously the adage of an elephant in the room, and the elephant in the room is the woman's abortion which should be "nice." Furthermore, the girl is the first person to see that the hills are like white elephants, which suggests that there is always more than one perspective.

The short story is weirdly feminist, and this is weird primarily because Hemingway was definitely not a feminist. But this story validates women. The girl is genderizes her innocence/ignorance, her naivete, her timidity, her emotion in order to gain autonomy over the man. For example, she shuts down his knowledge by threatening to scream, which plays into that gender stereotype. By shutting down the man, she is able to breakthrough and gain some momentary autonomy.

The Awakening by Kate Chopin

This novel is chiefly about psychological realism and the interiority of the mind. Psychological realism precedes modernist authors like Virginia Woolf and James Joyce, whose novels deviate slightly. The novel was published in 1899 during the suffragist movement, and the concept of the "new woman" is reflected in the character of Edna Pontellier. The "new woman" smoked, voted, wore pants, worked, etc. In Edna's case, this "new woman" enjoyed men and worked for herself. The Victorian woman has evolved at this point through different forms of literature: first American, then realist, reformist, and finally feminist.

The biggest emotion expressed in the novel is desire: Edna awakes sexually and experiences longing and passion. She further desires to be independent and live selfishly. Men during this period were allowed to live selfishly, but Edna is unique in her selfish living because she is a woman. This is just one side of the novel, however. The novel could also be read politically, though Edna herself isn't political. She is too rebellious and can't assert individuality, but the novel itself is a push for the feminist movement, and it was a very controversial book when it first appeared on the shelves. Edna experiences an increase in agency, resulting in her ability to make choices for herself. Edna can't explain her emotions and passions very well, however.

The style in which Chopin tells the story is very straightforward. The novel is about selfishness and the individual, sex, and ennui. She doesn't sugar coat the hard stuff. Early on in the novel, she writes, the "Beginning of things . . . is necessarily vague, tangled, chaotic, and exceedingly disturbing" (14). This is Chopin's strength: she allows the novel to be tangled and disturbing. It ends in Edna's suicide, which is presented as both wonderful and horrible. The novel isn't meant to be clear cut even though the issues are presented in a straightforward manner.

A huge metaphor throughout is the image of the sea. Edna is reborn through the sea because she gains the power to live and the power to die through it. It also symbolizes her sexuality, which is likewise shapeless and shifting. Furthermore, the historical frame of reference for sexuality during this period is solitude and internalization. The sea represents both of these because she is all alone while she is out swimming.

The passions that Edna experiences are her vehicle to agency and individuality. Her passions reflect Victorian passions: for women, it is acceptable to embrace one's passions, but for men, it's acceptable to show great restraint.

To conclude, the Awakening could fit into three different genres that gained popularity during the 19th century: domestic (nostalgic, sentimental); local color (weird, off the wall); modernism (new beginnings). Typically the Awakening is placed in the last genre because it is all about starting over. It could also typify the first, domestic, because Edna dies in the end for love. The genre is obviously up for interpretation.

David Copperfield

Background on Dickens

1. From the same generation as Bronte, and his pen name was "Boz"
2. Dickens's personal history was very similar to David's: he labored as a boy, his dad was imprisoned for debt, and he was a self-made man
3. Serialization: the book was published as three chapters a month, and the serialization resulted in lots of characters; it also allowed Dickens to respond to his readers' responses
4. To help his readers remember the characters from month to month, Dickens created character driven "types": Micawber said "in short" often, Uriah was famous for his "umbleness," and Gummidge classified herself as a "lone lorn creature"
5. Dickens was one of the greatest writers of realism because he encompassed the whole world. He plays off of fears and values of the time period to help readers relate. Some of these characters are larger than life, like Peggotty and her buttons. This inflation is similar to the characters in "The Office"
6. It's a bildungsroman like Harry Potter; the protagonist is destitute, the chosen one, and is friendless in his own home

Themes

1. Firmness=Murdstones enforce firmness of character, and david has to grow up a lot; similar to Jane Eyre because the childhood trauma affected David a lot (in this novel, David goes away to school branded with the placard denouncing his behavior, and in Jane Eyre, Jane goes to school with the fear that no one will like her because her aunt branded her as a bad child)
2. Class=overcoming class status; doesn't matter what class you're from, you can still be very generous; men are expected to be gentlemen (educated, foppish, effortless), and for some men, like Steerforth, this comes naturally, but for Micawber it is entirely unnatural
3. Gender=Betsey Trotwood always compares David to his imaginary sister; men are often dominated by women, and the men fulfill stereotypes (fool, ass, crazy); the women are strong but very eccentric, and they serve as vehicles for emotion
4. Domesticity=Anges is the "angel in the house," the domestic and sensible housewife
5. Fallen woman=very popular in Victorian period; these women wanted to increase their statuses; Emily runs off with Steerforth because he's attractive, and she is subsequently ruined; Steerforth is the rake, and Ham is the good guy stereotype
6. Self-improvement=hard-work doesn't always mean success, and this was a radical idea for Dickens's time; David tries to improve Dora, and Murdstones try to improve David's mother
7. Idealized love=David idealizes every woman he falls for, including Agnes; he makes her into a tool of his own self-improvement

Bodies

1. Miss Dartle is marked by her scar, and she represents a fallen woman
2. Dora is like a fairy (similar to Jane Eyre), and David gets rid of her body and idealizes her
3. Miss Mowcher says David should not disregard someone for his or her physical defects
4. Uriah Heep writhes, and he's ugly and slimy; he's trying to climb the social ladder, and perhaps Dickens is insinuating that people shouldn't try to escape their class
5. David is a symbol of immaturity, and his young face and his nickname, Daisy, further this image
6. Martha is connected to the river because it comes innocently from the country and becomes polluted in the city
7. Dora's body becomes a martyr
8. Steerforth's mother becomes just a moaning shell

Values

1. Simplicity=Traddles, despite becoming successful, remains humble and simple
2. Strong moral character and sincerity/frankness
3. Character/personality vs status
4. Family (blood ties) - domesticity (simplicity)
5. New beginnings=Micawber goes to Australia (where criminals are sent)

Last few notes:

1. Dickens emphasizes emotional intensity through characters. Micawber loses his senses when he accuses Uriah Heep, and his face turns purple. Miss Dartle loses her temper when Steerforth dies, and she accuses the mother. What does this say about society when self-control is so valued? When some of the upper class can't express their emotions in the same way that the lower class can, their emotions spurt out as super intense.
2. Women faint a lot in the novel, and that's a comedic tool that Dickens uses, just like Peggotty's buttons popping off and Uriah's writhing. It's also important to note that Dickens isn't very familiar with the female perspective, and he doesn't do a great job of expressing their internal emotions.
3. At each stage of David's life, Dickens brings in characters in situations similar to David's to provide context

ESL tips

A few ideas to take away from ESL training:

1. American society values some things that make communication with other cultures difficult. Individualism and equality are valued in the US, and sometimes they are valued in other countries, but that isn't the case always. Closely related to these values is competition: Americans rank themselves in comparison to others all the time, and that can make multicultural experiences more difficult because we might not appreciate all the opinions or viewpoints of another culture.
2. A bad way to teach ELLs: have them do worksheets that aren't related to each other and don't help the children develop communication skills. A good way to teach ELLs: have them discuss something like a field trip together as a class, and make notes on a flip chart with words that describe the trip. The students can then split up and write about their experience, and they can refer to the chart if they need to.
3. ELLs and really any English learner benefits from speaking and writing. A great exercise for an ESL class or a Lit class is having the students write stories every day when they come in, and then they share the stories later in class. Or have them predict newspaper headlines, and then they can comb through the newspaper to find those headlines. When there's a new ELL, assign a buddy to them every week, someone who can help them understand what is going on in class.
4. Tests are great assessments, but they don't help students learn very much

Data Analysis Tasks

Data analysis tools typically take one of two different forms: collecting data (survey, interviews, questionnaires) or finding existing data (databases). Data collection tools don't need to be complicated to be effective. A great tool for collecting data is InspireData, a tool that is usually downloaded on school computers. I used it for an English project to compare the number of deaths during the plague in Europe across different locations. Data analysis tools allow students to develop their own conclusions from evidence and learn to back up the conclusions. They also allow students to learn where something comes from, as too often in classrooms the students are told the "rules" without knowing where they come from. Furthermore, it teaches students problem solving skills. A great example for English is recording the "arc" of the plot for each of Shakespeare's most famous tragedies. Another idea from Linguistics is to let the students know why grammar is the way it is (history, Latin, etc).


Other data analysis tools: tinkerplot, wordle.com, and Go!Motion