American Romanticism (1815-1865)
Learning Points
Distinct Features
Representatives Conclusion
Much classroom discussion will involve close textual commentary upon the assigned works.
Course Outline
1.Literature of Colonial American 2.Early Romantics 3.Transcendentalism 4.High Romantics 5.Realism 6.Local Color Fiction 7.Naturalism 8.Modern Poetry 9.Modern Fiction Before 1945
Philip Freneau
Philip Freneau(1752-1832)
A forerunner of American Romanticism or a transitional figure towards Romanticism.
Wild Honeysuckle a lyrical lament for the mutability of nature and an expression of faith in man’s ability to learn universal truths from nature. An indirect eulogy of America predicting Whitman
---- Having faith in human accomplishment and progress
---- Believing that an individual with industry and thrift will improve himself and his community, a self-mad man and an archetypal American success story that has since become part of American popular culture ---- Almost the first example of achieving the “American Dream”
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Class attendance(10%)
Assignments(10%)
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4.
Classroom Discussion(10%)
Final Exam(70%)

Literature of Colonial American
“The first American literature was neither American nor really literature. It was not American because it was the work mainly of immigrants from England. It was not literature as we know it---- in the form of poetry, essay, or fiction---- but rather an interesting mixture of travel accounts and religious writings”
American Literature
Introduction
Course Description
This course will survey American literature from the Colonial period to the Post-World War II period. Readings will include poems, novels, essays, autobiographies, short stories, and philosophical writings, originating in different regions and social settings across the country. Some works are chosen from their historical importance, others for their aesthetic virtues. Taken as a whole, they form a rich collection of imaginative and critical writings.
10.Postwar Realism in Fiction 11.Beat Generation 12.Women Writers in America 13.Black Literature 14.Southern Literature 15.Modern Drama
Course Requirements
Our goal will be to analyze these works as diverse representations of American experience, ideas, and values. As it is created, literature in its widest sense can function as moral instruction, personal expression, and casual entertainment.
Benjamin Franklin
Benjamin Franklin(1706-1790)
An inventor, scientist, printer, political statesman, diplomat, exemplary self-made man, revolutionary hero, author.