Definition of Regionalism

Regionalism is the literary subgenre of Realism. In this genre, the writer uses themes and ideas particular to the area and setting (Anderson). A lot of emphasis is given to the setting, as well as the history to develop the universal theme of each piece of Regionalism literature. A Regionalism author, even if creating a fictional story, oftentimes draws details from real places and ideals from particular areas. This oftentimes adds very specific details and drama to how characters interact and to the environment in which they interact (Anderson). One example of how a writer would use regionalism would be as in writing about the Midwest, there would be a use of small towns, rural settings, and characters with strong values about family as these are traits and characteristics particular to that area. For most writers of Regionalism literature, the more specific they become with details of settings, the stronger and more believable the characters become which eventually allow the writer to tie in universal themes and values held by the character that were caused by the setting they are in (Anderson). The connection to Realism can be made because as an author chooses to use settings particular to an area, the characters fit into the setting well. This is what oftentimes makes the protagonist an everyday, common person rather than the traditional "super hero." There are many famous American writers that were very good at using the style of Regionalism. Willa Cather, William Faulkner, Ellen Glasgow, and Robert Penn Warren, all used Regionalism to add specific details to the setting and ultimately create a character that truly is a part of the setting (Werlock). The stories associated with Regionalism are often the most believable, even if fictitious, because the setting and the characters become one in the same. Universal themes are drawn from both the character and the setting because both are of equal importance to the theme. Regionalism is a major part of the genre of Realism because of its focus on setting to create a truly believable story.



Works Cited

Anderson, George P., Judith S. Baughman, Matthew J. Bruccoli, and Carl Rollyson, eds."regionalism." Encyclopedia of American Literature: Into the Modern: 1896–1945, vol. 3, Revised Edition. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2008. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. Online. http://fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=5&iPin= EAmL1330&SingleRecord=True. February 6, 2011.

Werlock, Abby H. P. "regionalism." The Facts On File Companion to the American Short Story, Second Edition. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2009. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. Online. http://fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=5&iPin= Gamshrtsty0581&SingleRecord=True. February 6, 2011.

Definition of Realism

Realism is a movement in American literature that began around the time of the Civil War, caused by the increase in scientific and rationalist thoughts (Quinn). With the aftermath of the Civil War, Romantic literature no longer was appropriate to the time period, and Realist literature took its place. The typical style of a work of Realism would be almost monotonous, while still containing vivid descriptions. The style is quite plain and an artistic flow, as seen in Romantic works and poems, was avoided. While most previous movements of literature focused on a hero or heroin, the protagonist for most realism works is an average, middle-class character with events in the story that are also ordinary (Barney). With the new style of writing came a new underlying theme to stories. Many works in the Realism genre have content concerning the psychology of the characters as well as the thoughts on the social structure at the time (Quinn). This lead into the creation of naturalism, a subgenre of Realism, in which the social and economic standards and levels held by a person are of utmost importance to the individual and how they are scene in their society. Another subgenre of Realism that formed as a result of the realist movement is regionalism. This is a genre in which the author pays a lot of attention to how the setting affects the events and message of the story (Anderson). A writer of regionalism uses ideas and history of specific areas to tell the story. Even if the story is fictitious, the writer will still take the concepts and ideas held by a specific area to create a setting that embodies the story itself as well as the message. The psychological aspect of literature of Realism is actually very important to the setting of the story. Writers often use the setting to project or create and image of what the character is thinking or feeling about something (Barney). The common, middle-class hero, the vivid descriptions, and the psychological breakdown of characters are what separated Romantic literature into the new genre of the mid 1800s, known as realism.


Works Cited

Anderson, George P., Judith S. Baughman, Matthew J. Bruccoli, and Carl Rollyson, eds."regionalism." Encyclopedia of American Literature: Into the Modern: 1896–1945, vol. 3, Revised Edition. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2008. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. Online. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=5&iPin= EAmL1330&SingleRecord=True. January 26, 2011.

Barney, Brett, and Lisa Paddock, eds. "realism." Encyclopedia of American Literature: The Age of Romanticism and Realism, 1816–1895, vol. 2, Revised Edition. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2008. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. Online. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=5&iPin= EAmL0738&SingleRecord=True. January 26, 2011.

Quinn, Edward. "realism and naturalism in American literature." A Dictionary of Literary and Thematic Terms, Second Edition. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2006. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. Online. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=5&iPin= Gfflithem0707&SingleRecord=True. January 26, 2011.

Journal 34 ACT Essay Writing

Writing for the ACT is very important. The ACT is a test that will help determine what a student can do with their future. The first thing that one needs to do when writing an essay for the ACT is choose a clear side on the topic. Although the prompt states that you can choose a third side to support instead of the two provided, it is better to choose one of the provided sides because it is much easier for the person grading it to determine what you are trying to prove. It helps to take some notes of what points you would like to hit before actually beginning to write the essay. You shouldn't spend too much time on this though because when writing the essay, time is a big factor in how much you write and the quality of your writing. In the essay it is very important that you have a good introduction that states your opinion on the topic. Throughout the entire essay it is vital that you have strong support on all of the points that you make. Most likely this will be in the form of personal experiences, but otherwise you can use facts that you know of the top of your head for support. Another important part of writing a argumentative essay for the ACT is that you present the counterargument. This adds clarity to your opinion and when you disprove the ideas of the other side, it makes you seem all the more right in your opinion. Lastly, you need to make sure that there are minimal to no errors in the grammar and mechanics of the essay that could possible distract the reader from the main topic. After completing it is best to look over your writing again to ensure that there are no grammatical errors. This is how you write a good essay for the ACT Writing portion of the test and hopefully get the score that you want.

Journal 33 Something from around here...

Corn Hole is a game that is particular to this area. Apparently it started in fourteenth century Germany, at least a very similar version of the game. It then became popular in America, specifically in the Midwest. There is a lot of argument that Illinois was the first state to really bring it back, but Iowish (people from Iowa) say that they were the ones that started it back up in modern America. The game consists of two boards that are angled up with a hole in the center. Players stand behind their box thing and try to show usually some sort of bean bag, or bag of "corn." It is quite the enjoyable game to play outside during the summer. It is kind of similar to washers. Something that shows that it is particular to this area is the fact that my good friend Luke is actually working on building his own. He needs something to paint on each box and I honestly don't know what he should do but it just needs to be epic. It'll probably be something like a dragon or unicorn, anything that is all around awesome would be fine. We'll will probably end up playing it quite a bit when the weather changes and it is a little warmer outside so it won't be freezing outside. One time when I went to Alabama, there were some people in the same condo complex as me and they were playing it on the beach and I overheard them saying that they only reason that they knew about it was because they had friends from Illinois. Somebody asked what it was called and I was like that would be corn hole and it is from my home state of Illinois. Along with the horseshoe, I would say that the game of corn hole is one of the most important things to ever come out of Illinois. And it most definitely did come from Illinois, not Iowa.

Journal 32 Memoir

During my winter break, some very interesting events took place in my life. One morning I woke up to find that I could not remember anything about my life at all. When I went to a bank, I found a safety deposit box that was apparently mine. It contained a couple different passports, money from all sorts of countries, and a nine millimeter handgun. As I collected all of these things and was on my way out, a couple of police guards tried to stop me and to my surprise I was able to fight all of them off with amazing hand to hand combat skills that I did not know that I had. I began to run and soon I realized that I was not actually in my hometown of Springfield, but rather in a small French town. I don't know how I didn't realize this sooner but that's besides the point. I pulled over a car and told the driver that I would give her ten thousand dollars if she would take me to Paris. Desperate for money, she agreed and we began our journey together. Along the way I encountered more and more assassins trying to end my life. Along with my new found skill in hand to hand combat, I also found that I had skills with both weapons and linguistics, as well which serve as great help throughout my experiences. The young lady that was in the car taking me to Paris reluctantly stayed with me and helped me on my quest to find out the truth about my life and my past. At one point, when stopping for some food at a dinner, I thought that all of the skills that I have and my recent experiences could only mean one thing... I had to be a government trained operative or assassin of sorts. Through these experiences I found that I wasn't really looking for revenge for what happened to me, but rather I was simply looking for myself. Who knows, maybe I will find out who I am in two more series of events similar to this one as I get closer to the truth.

Realism In An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge

The short story “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” by Ambrose Bierce displays many of the characteristics that can be found in realism literature. There is a strong attention paid to detail in the writing style as well as a focus on an average person as the protagonist. Along with these two characteristics, the simple diction used and the events are naturally plausible, hence the style known as realism (Campbell). With all of these characteristics found in this story, it is clear that this is a model for realism literature.

Throughout the story, there is a clear focus on the details of the setting and other aspects of descriptions. In the first part of the story a lot of detail is put into description of the setting. Simple details such as distance to the forest and what the forest looks like are added to create a distinct style (Bierce). An attention to very specific details is one of the parts of realism literature that sets it apart from other types of literature (Campbell).

Similar to the specific details presented in the story, the diction used is quite important to the style of realism (Campbell). The language in which realism stories are written is usually in something close to the vernacular of the time period and setting. This characteristic is evident in the story. The style is very simple and lacks a poetic sound that many other categories of literature (Bierce). Most of the sentences are simple, but not necessarily monotonous because of the vivid descriptions found throughout as previously mentioned.

Another major component of the realism of this story is the inner realism and psychology of the character. The entire final part of the story consists of a daydream of a person’s life, which obviously is a focus on psychology of a character (Bierce). The realistic nature of the daydream also ties into the fact that this work is part of realism literature.

One part of realism that is extremely important to the style and story itself is that the protagonist be a member of the middle class and be an average person (Campbell). This aspect of romanticism displayed is one of the most important to show the accordance to realism literature (Renfro). In the story, Farquhar is in fact a very average person. He does not necessarily have any amazing characteristics that make him better or more amazing than other people (Bierce).

Obviously, one of the aspects of the realism literature is that the events that happen are actually plausible and realistic. In this story, the events that occur are actually plausible for the time period in the sense that a man was captured for a wrongdoing during the Civil War (Bierce). Now, the daydream that the protagonist has is not necessarily the most likely series of events to take place, but nonetheless it is still plausible.

The characteristics of realism like diction used, vivid descriptions, as well as the focus on a simple, average character for a protagonist are used throughout all of “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge.” This story is a good model of realism literature because it contains most all of the characteristics of realism.



Works Cited

Renfro, Y. P. "'An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge'." In Barney, Brett, and Lisa Paddock, eds. Encyclopedia of American Literature: The Age of Romanticism and Realism, 1816–1895, vol. 2, Revised Edition. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2008. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=5&iPin= EAmL0691&SingleRecord=True (accessed January 18, 2011).

Campbell, Donna M. "Realism in American Literature, 1860-1890." Literary Movements. Dept. of English, Washington State University. Online. http://www.wsu.edu/~campbelld/amlit/realism.htm January 18, 2011

Bierce, Ambrose. “An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge.” Online http://fiction.eserver.org/short/occurrence_at_owl_creek.html. January 18, 2011.

Journal 31 Daydream

There are many times in my life that daydreaming has helped me figure out what to do in a bad situation. One of these situations occurred quite recently in fact. On Saturday I went to the county championship game with my good friends Miguel, Tucker, and Kirk. During the final quarter of the game, there was a cheer done by the cheerleaders and I did not participate by standing up with the other fans. When the game resumed I drifted into a daydream in which during the next time where the cheerleaders were trying to get the fans involved with a cheer I would stand up and support the team. I told my close friend Kirk of the vivid daydream, well almost an epiphany, that I had. He thought that it was a great idea and said that he would join me in my supporting of the team and the cheerleaders. The very next time that there was a timeout and the cheerleaders came over to the fan section to get everyone pumped up for the end of the game, Kirk and I joined the other fans in cheering on the team. I think that we really helped in a situation that could use the support of people like Kirk and I. After doing this, Kirk informed me that I could then write about what just happened for my blog for English class about daydreaming and deciding what to do in a situation. I told him that was a wonderful idea and that I would do just that, which obviously I am now doing. This situation wasn't exactly a bad situation in a sense that something bad would happen if I didn't act the way that I did, but still it was a daydream that made me take action in a situation. I'm sure that if I thought about it long enough, I could think of an actual serious situation where daydreaming helped me but this is still a fine example from my life.

Journal 30 School Uniforms

I think that uniforms in school is a practice that should not be a part of our school here at Pleasant Plains, and even be abolished completely. It takes away from individuality of the students which overall is not the best situation to put everyone in. Some may argue that it is safer to keep all students looking the same, and is a great security measure but I think that students would be more upset with having to dress the same as everyone else. Conformity is usually a part of control. I think that authorities feel that it is easier to control a large group of people when they are all the same. Although forcing people to wear the same clothing isn't exactly keeping everyone the same psychologically, it is the first step to it. When groups of people realize that someone is trying to control them, there is the chance for an uprising among students or for action to be taken to make a point. The use of school uniforms alone wouldn't cause a breakdown, but it would add fuel to the fire. When someone speaks of how they feel about how they have been wrong, there is a strong chance that one would bring up the fact that the authority is trying to make everyone the same and conform. In my experience, clothing is one way for students to express themselves. Some may say that it causes cliques that exclude many people and creates violence among them, but I feel that it actual allows people to find friends out of a large group of their peers. Even if something of the sort of uniforms were implemented, I think that students would still find a way to modify them to make themselves different from everyone else. Overall, I feel that school uniforms are something that our school does not need. It would create issues among many groups of students and also between the students and the authorities.

Journal 29 Bling Bling Bling!

You. Yes, you should buy the album Bling Bling Bling! by the Millionaires. It is a quality album that really has a style that can get true music lovers into it. Anyone that likes bands like Nine Inch Nails, Radiohead, Protest the Hero would like the Millionaires even better. All of the bands seem like very good groups with a lot of talent, they do not even come close when compared to the Millionaires. The album Bling Bling Bling! has some of the best selections ever recorded by the group. The song Alcohol is on this album, which happens to be the greatest song ever written by the millionaires. A good way to describe the Millionaires is Ke&ha times three, seeing as there are basically three Ke$has in one group... only better. Anyone that already has a love for Ke$ha will become even bigger fans of the Millionaires. There are enough songs to make someone fall in love with this group. Even if one does not necessarily end up liking the Millionaires completely, they will at least like one song on the album. So to anyone that thinks that they know of all of the good bands in the world, they need to listen to the Millionaires so that they can have their entire perspective on music change.

Just kidding. The Millionaires are really quite terrible. There is an obvious lack of musical knowledge and very little substance to the lyrics. This is not to say that I don't listen to them, because I do have quite a few of their songs on my iPod. I like to listen to them because I think it is hilarious that someone could make music like they do, but also some of the songs are just funny in general. If I really wanted to convince someone that the Millionaires are good, I easily could as one could tell from my previous paragraph. But in all honesty, I don't think that I would show this group to someone that I think has a good taste in music. But who knows, maybe some people could end up liking the Millionaires because of my persuasion to buy one of their albums.

Journal 28 Convincing

the. Upon beginning this blog, I requested from my good friend Matt to type the word "the" for me. I thought that it would help me make up a story for the blog so I could say that I had convinced someone to do something for me. By convincing him to do something, I benefited because I could now complete part of my homework assignment for English class. Being able to convince someone to do something for you is something that can really help with a lot of situations in life. This skill can be worked at and mastered, but sometimes it is just natural for some people to be able to argue points to have someone help them. Convincing people to do something for you is actually a possibility for a career because having this skill is the basis for business. There is a lot of profit to be made in the career of business and the industry revolves a lot around people skills. If one can convince someone to help you with what you need help with and build a rapport with people to become quite successful. Although me convincing Matt to type the word the on my blog for me wasn't really that impressive, it still shows that people will help you out if you really need them too. Now if Matt needed me to do something for him, I would, because I owe him a favor for his helping me. In the business world, convincing investors to give money to you for whatever it is you are trying to accomplish, you will either end up paying them back or owing them a favor for their help to you. There are a lot better examples of convincing someone to help me with something, but even something as simple as having someone type a word for me shows how this skill can help in the big scheme of things of all of life.

Journal 27 Persistence

Persistence is a very important part of life. It helps people become successful because of the quality that they never give up. There are many situations in which persistence would help people. If someone tells you that you have done something wrong and gives you the opportunity to fix your mistake, you should. If you make another mistake you should try again to make sure that you eventually get whatever you are doing right. This could happen in a job or in school. A situation that shows my persistence in the recent opportunity to fix the essays that we wrote for our final in English class. Given the chance to fix a part of my paper that was done incorrect originally, my grade will not suffer. With this opportunity I made sure that I fixed everything that needed to be correctly. There is no saying that if I mess up again that I would be given another chance to fix it again. If i did I would make sure that I fixed it correctly the second time. Another time in which persistence is key is when learning a new skill or something of that sort. When playing an instrument, there are some songs that are more difficult than others to play. When practicing them, one needs to keep working at it until it can be played. Sometimes it is better to work on the song in chunks but still you have to remain persistent on each part that you attempt to learn. Sometimes you may even learn a song wrong and then when someone tells you that you had been playing it incorrectly it is important that you relearn how to do it the correct way. Sometimes there are situations in which persistence becomes inappropriate. If you are talking to a girl and she says that she is not interested in you, you should not keep talking to her. There are some other situations like this in which persistence can become inappropriate, but for the most part, persistence is really, really awesome.