Regionalism

As Werlock described it Regionalism is "A literary subgenre that emphasizes the setting, history, speech, dialect, and customs of a particular geographical locale or area, not only for local color, but also for development of universal themes through the use of the local and particular." Regionalism as the name implies is a literary style that focuses on specific regions as and the society of the area. The style developed out of a necessity for nationalism for people after the Civil War. People saw themselves as either southerners and northerners instead of as a collective Americans. This literary style introduced pride in your region ie. New Yorkers referred to themselves as New Yorkers and Bostonians referred to themselves as Bostonians.

Vernacular was an integral part of regionalism which was extremely evident in Mark Twain's novels. Accents and phrases specific to certain areas was revealed in regionalism works such as Mark Twain's novels set around the Mississippi. Regionalistic novels often revealed much about the society in the novel through the author's use of vernacular and accents.

Most of the time in regionalism settings were not as large as major cities such as New York, but usually smaller and more remote like Hannibal in Twain's Tom Sawyer. The use of setting to confine the story to one place is a common element in regionalism writings. The settings usually don't evolve from the small town or area the novel starts in. Usually this is to provide the plot a smaller area to evolve in because it generally only involves members of the community in most cases.

These are some of the common thematic elements of the works of regional writers. Most stories are also told thorough a narrator who tells the reader the events that transpired in the novel. They involve community-centric plots and settings and don't evolve past these settings with characters from the community playing central roles to the development of the plot. Trough the characters use of language and vernacular readers are able to discover values of the society and other aspects through these simple literary uses.

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. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=5&iPin= Gamshrtsty0581&SingleRecord=True (accessed January 31, 2011).

Naturalism

Similar to Realism, Naturalism was a literary movement that was born to take over after the Romantic period ended. Naturalism is described as "...naturalism has been devoted to documenting, with apparent objectivity, the extreme experiences of characters existing on the margins of society. Like the so-called realists, naturalists are committed to documenting the surfaces of American life and to probing its concealed depths, but unlike realists, who most often treated recognizable middle-class lives, naturalists usually focused on the desperate existence of characters trapped in slums or in other oppressed settings (Giles.)" Out of the two Naturalism is the one most in common with Romanticism due to the depressing nature of the stories and the poor situation the character is in. It was also very different from Romanticism in that it was more realistic and focuses less on the extra-ordinary drawing some influence from Darwin and his theories. The more well known writers of Naturalism were Stephen Crane, and Jack London.

The city was the primary setting of Naturalism as evidenced by this quote "The city has been the favored setting of most naturalists, whose novels and stories are filled with characters living on the margins of society and overwhelmed by forces beyond their control and comprehension (Giles.)" The settings of Naturalistic writings were often times depressing and the character was usually surrounded by awful things from growing up in the slums such as alcoholics and prostitution.

The naturalistic style was more depressing than realism but they attempted to paint a more convincing picture of the lower class of cultures and they often times succeeded bringing new light to the abysmal conditions of the lower class in many occasions. These were the primary characteristics of naturalism, a setting in the lower class and a hero who although an everyman was often brought up in a poor neighborhood and during the course of the book resided in the poor neighborhood so the author was able to paint a convincing portrait of the lower class society with focus on the people who resided in these lower class areas and their behaviors.


Giles, James R. "naturalism." In Anderson, George P., Judith S. Baughman, Matthew J. Bruccoli, and Carl Rollyson, eds. Encyclopedia of American Literature, Revised Edition: Into the Modern: 1896–1945, Volume 3. 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= EAmL1255&SingleRecord=True (accessed January 27, 2011).

Realism

As this quote says about realism, "As a movement in American literature, realism is associated with the rise of novelists such as Mark Twain (Samuel Langhorne Clemens), Henry James, Rebecca Harding Davis, and William Dean Howells, who defined it as "nothing more and nothing less than the truthful treatment of material (Barney, Paddock)." Realism was a literary genres in which many famous and stereotypically representative novels were released including Mark Twain's Tom Sawyer, and Stephen Crane's The Open Boat." Novels such as these were instrumental in realism and are often regarded as the high-point for realistic literature along with their embodiment of the American culture.

One of the most important aspects of Realism was the American dream. The American dream was the driving force behind the realism literary movement and lent itself to American culture. The dream was "to rise above one's situation at birth, to live self-sufficiently without financial worries, and to own land (Werlock)." With the American dream people enjoyed reading novels in which human protagonists with feelings, needs, and wants similar or the same to theirs received their just dues and ended up happy.

Along with the stereotypical American Dream came that everyman protagonist who would come to be known as the American Hero. The American Hero was the embodiment of American ideals and characteristics. Usually a strong, hardworking, middle class hero who rose above any challenges and through struggle and character growth gained his happiness throughout the course of the novel.

The outlook of society by the writers could often be revealed through the mannerisms and thoughts of the characters in their novels. One famous Realist writer, Howells, was one of the better known examples of this as evidenced by this quote by Barney and Paddock, "The spokesman for American realism, Howells wrote novels that are almost sociological in their emphasis on mundane details of dress, speech, and action."

Realism as a movement started out at much the same time as the Civil War was coming to an end. After the bloodiest years the United States had seen most people were disillusioned by the so called "Glory of War" and were melancholic at the loss of so many friends, brothers, sons, and husbands. People began to have a more realistic outlook on life and were less entertained by the fabulous stories of romanticism with larger than life heroes and characters.

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. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=5&iPin= EAmL0738&SingleRecord=True (accessed January 25, 2011).

Werlock, Abby H. P. "American dream." 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. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=5&iPin= Gamshrtsty0031&SingleRecord=True (accessed January 25, 2011).

Journal #34: ACT Argumentative Essay

There are several good ways to write an argumentative essay but the ACT demands their argumentative essays in a certain format with certain things highlighted to get your point across. First off you need to pick which side of the topic you will be supporting. You can't go one way or another you have to concrete your side in your essay so you make it clear which side you are supporting. The best score you can get is a 6 out of 6 and two judges score it so there is a maximum of 12 points to receive on the ACT writing portion. If you can get a 12 you are a pretty good righter and are deserving of that. So you right your essay and mention the counterargument disproving it and arguing for your side of the argument being the better side. So you do all of this and hopefully you have a pretty solid argument on your side using a decent amount of support for your claims as to why the argument you are supporting is the better side and why you are more awesome than the counter to your argument. After you've got your really sweet essay done you need to proofread. If you have a bunch of silly grammatical mistakes or you use the wrong words it will detract from your score, but if you only have a few where you are missing periods, commas, and whatnot it's not a big deal and you shouldn't get any points detracted from your score. So these are the steps that are necessary to getting an awesome 6 out of 6 your writing essay. I still have about 50 words left in this blog however so I need to talk more about your awesome ACT writing style and whatnot. Just use support and don't make a fool out of yourself when you are putting your points in your essay. Make sure you mention why you are better than the counter argument and don't make any stupid grammatical mistakes then you are pretty set on getting a good score on your essay. HIGH FIVE FOR AWESOME. YEAH! *Freeze frame*

Journal #33: Area stuff

Ok so I'm going to be telling YOU about this fantastic band called Hum. They hail from a town called Champaign which is pretty close to Springfield. Hum is pretty similar to a fantastic band called Failure. They're both in this genre called Space Rock. Really trippy and out of this world guitar with layered vocals that make a trippy kind of spacey feel to their music. Great song by Hum is called Stars which I recommend you check out when you get the opportunity. They had four albums released their first Fillet Snow, then Electra 2000, followed by You'd Prefer an Astronaut, and their final release was Downward is Heavenward which was their final release in 1998. After that album they broke up and they have all gone their separate ways and they do reunion tours every once in a while. They never got very big but they were a very talented band and made some very rocking music. So yeah that's one interesting thing that came out of the area near Springfield. I'm kind of done writing about them at this point I guess. If you like Hum you should check out Failure who were another really big Space Rock band and in my opinion were even better than Hum. Failure's album Fantastic Planet was great and if you like any of Hum's album's you should check that out because that is one of the most under rated album's I have ever heard. 18 songs long and every single one is just fantastic and I wouldn't skip a single one of them. So yeah that's my opinion of Hum and Failure. Space Rock is not a Springfield only thing but Hum was pretty close to Springfield. All in all Hum is a pretty great band that you should totally check out because they were original to this area and were very talented individuals who released four great albums in a rare and talent necessary genre.

Realism in An Occurence at Owl Creek Bridge

Realism is defined as Born out of the ideas of the romantic novel but infused with concrete details and accurate descriptions of society, the characters of realist fiction are drawn from the events and contexts of modern life and face everyday obstacles (Diamond.) In An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge realism is the main literary genre of the story and it’s characteristics are prevalent throughout the story.
Several characteristics of the novel demonstrate it’s realistic influence and draw. The characteristics the primarily demonstrate it’s realism are it’s setting, it’s characters, and the conflict the protagonist encounters in his time during the novel.
The main character Fahrquhar is a southern sympathizer during the Civil War who is attempting to help the Confederacy by burning down a railroad bridge at Owl Creek. The south constantly fought with Guerrilla warfare against their more powerful Northern opponents. The nationalism in the South was rampant and southern farmers were fighting for their right to slavery and their land, as well as their right to be their own nation so it was a much more urgent war for them. Due to this they were constantly using covert tactics to sabotage Northern efforts in the war. In this line from the story by Bierce Fahrquhar hatches his plan to sabotage the bridge to assist union troops as evidenced by these lines from the story, “How far is it to the Owl Creek bridge?" Fahrquhar asked. “About thirty miles." "Is there no force on this side of the creek?" "Only a picket post half a mile out, on the railroad, and a single sentinel at this end of the bridge." "Suppose a man -- a civilian and student of hanging -- should elude the picket post and perhaps get the better of the sentinel," said Fahrquhar, smiling, "what could he accomplish?" The soldier reflected. "I was there a month ago," he replied. "I observed that the flood of last winter had lodged a great quantity of driftwood against the wooden pier at this end of the bridge. It is now dry and would burn like tinder." In this small excerpt the reader sees Fahrquhar begin to probe for evidence of the bridge so he may destroy it.
This goal of Fahrquhar reveals his loyal and devoted character and gives him validity as a real person, as the author gives him real characteristics that flesh out his character. His issues and dilemmas are human and relevant to the time period because he is trying to assist his nation and help the greater good in his eyes. This type of quality is very human and exposes the realistic nature of the character which in turn provides realism for the story bunching it in with other romantic stories of the time.
The issues dealt with, the setting, and the character of Fahrquhar in the short story all lend themselves to the stories realistic nature and group it into the realism group due to it's similar qualities to other realistic works and the definition of realism.






Diamond, Marie Josephine, ed. "realism." Encyclopedia of World Writers, 19th and 20th Centuries. New York: Facts On File, Inc., 2003. Bloom's Literary Reference Online. Facts On File, Inc. http://www.fofweb.com/activelink2.asp?ItemID=WE54&SID=5&iPin= GEWW480&SingleRecord=True (accessed January 18, 2011).

Bierce, Ambrose. "An Occurrence At Owl Creek Bridge, by Ambrose Bierce; I Page 1." Page By Page Books. Read Classic Books Online, Free. Web. 18 Jan. 2011. .

Journal #: 32

My memoirs would be quite the epic tale if I wrote it. Here is an excerpt of my time over the 2010 Winter break from my high school. One day as I was sitting in my study I viewed a raven fly into my study and perch itself on a bust of Athena, so I shot it with my hunting shotgun and had raven stew that night. Afterwards I retired to my room and played some Diablo II or something. After this I experienced some emotional growth after my hardcore character died and I was just heartbroken or something that affect. After this I began donating my money to charities for children who lost their characters on Diablo II. This experience really documented growth in myself emotionally and psychological. I helped millions of children around the world who were killed because of that jerk Summoner in the Arcane Sanctuary, Duriel, Mephisto, and others (except those who got killed by Andariel because if she kills you then you are a failure at Diablo and shouldn't be playing in the first place.) So after saving millions of kids lives I went back and played more Diablo got to about Act IV with my barbarian and then just stopped playing because Act IV scares the living bejeezus out of me. Playing it alone is a bad idea but I was playing with Drew so it was all cool. After all of this occurred I ended yet another successful day in my life because let's face it, I'm probably one of the most awesomest people you will ever meet in your entire life. But yeah anyway charity and philanthropy is good and this is the memoir of Dylan ******** and that would be that for tonight me compadres. Except I still have a few sentences to write so I gotta keep doing this for another few words or so and then I should be good. So...anybody seen any good movies lately? You should all go see True Grit right now.

Journal # 31: Daydream

Ok, well a daydream I had that helped me get out of a sticky situation was when I daydreamed that I was fighting this really epic dragon with red scales and it could breath molten fire, but being awesome I was immune to the dragons totally rad powers and defeated it with my sweet skills of the nunchucks. Obviously this was all an analogy for something that would help me out later but it didn't matter because I was having the time of my life fighting that dragon. I did a totally awesome triple quadruple flip over the dragon and knocked it out and killed it with my awesome nunchuck skills. Obviously this was a metaphor for my attempts to cure cancer through awesomeness. After the dream I realized how to cure cancer using the dragon as a metaphor for the disease and the nunchucks being a metaphor for my awesome motorcycle skills. Using this amazing skill I was able to cure cancer and AIDS while I was at it, finally getting a billion dollars for my scientific endeavors. Oh man I am freaking awesome. So after doing that I ended world hunger and had a dream about fighting a group of yetis, obviously a metaphor for the tyrannical communistic dictatorship of Kim Yong Ill II in North Korea. Launching a full scale invasion of the nation all on my lonesome I was able to take down the terrible dictator installing my own tyrannical rule on the area in his place. After this I solved everything that was wrong in the world and went on to be known as the most awesome person in the entire history of all of mankind because it's true. I then flew to Mars and colonized the planet and rules the entire galaxy shortly after that...then again this could be like Inception and it turns out that this entire story was a daydream. Cue Twilight Zone music! And that is that.

Journal #30: School Uniforms

School uniforms would be an awful idea for Pleasant Plains High School. School uniforms are usually only required at private schools where they attempt to take your individuality and crush it into tiny little pieces then take those tiny little pieces and crush them into little molecules and take those little molecules and crush them up into little protons and neutrons and electrons, and finally take those and smash them up into tiny little quarks. So yeah uniforms are bad because they cause conformity and strip students of their individuality causing them to lose their full capability of doing whatever it is they are doing. I would bet money that at Private schools where kids are forced to wear uniforms for their daily lives had lower test scores than kids who are allowed to dress however they want when they attend school. School uniforms cause children to act similar to all of their other peers and lose their capability of individual thought and they aren't able to perform as well as those children who are not forced to wear uniforms at their school. You also have the issue of cost for families who are not as wealthy as their peers. For some families it would be difficult for them to buy several sets of uniforms as well as their clothes for after school so cost would be an issue for families when it comes to uniforms being required for schooling. My final point is just what is the reason behind uniforms? I don't get them they just don't make sense. It confuses me that you would want all these kids just walking around in the same exact clothes instead of clothing that really reveals their personality or cool little things that you would not be able to find out about them when they are wearing just your boring and bland school uniform that makes them look just like everyone else. Those are my thoughts on uniforms.

Journal # 29: Year Zero

Alright I'm here to tell YOU about my personal favorite album, an album by the name Year Zero by one of my favorite artists who is miles better than any crappy band known as the Millionaires. He is known as Trent Reznor, and more popularly known as Nine Inch Nails, or NIN. Year Zero is his 5th album which was much more experimental than his previous material. It is categorized as an Industrial Metal album, but in my opinion Year Zero is much more similar to an electronic type of music known as Glitch. Starting off with an instrumental track called Hyperpower we're given a great intro to the album with booming drums and an eerie backdrop. Next we have The Beginning is the End which is an awesome track altogether and we see the shift towards erratic elctro music. Next we have Survivalism and The Good Soldier which kind of reveals the story behind the album (It's a concept album.) We get a few more songs in and all of them are very different, but similar in lyrical theme and basic music behind them until we get to the last two songs, In This Twilight and Zero-Sum which are slower and are used to basically summarize the entire album up. Actually they are in the process of making an HBO series based on the album's storyline, and it is a very interesting storyline. The entire album came out with this ARG, Alternate Reality Game, that helped to reveal the story behind the album, and it's really quite the mindbending story if I do say so myself. It's hard to explain but if you are into Sci-Fi story's and are a fan of Reznor's past material I would highly recommend it. The coolest thing is that he was able to make an kind of elctro album without ostracizing his Industrial fans who have been with him since the very beginning. Year Zero. Go buy it.

Journal # 28 - Convincing

Persuasion is an art. I like to think I am as good at persuasion as Obi Wan was in Star Wars Episode IV. As a great Jedi once said, "these are not the droids you're looking for." Those star troopers believed him and they went on their way and it was awesome. I wish I could use the force to persuade people, but I digress I am still good at convincing people. I once convinced a man a dieing man whose only hope to survive was his coat, to give me his coat because I was kind of chilly and my arm was cold. I also once convinced a man to buy me a sandwich with money out of his own pocket because in 20 years he would get that money back 1 trillion fold, which is not going to happen, but at least he believed me and I got my sandwich. Anyway yeah convincing people is not that hard because I am one charismatic guy. I would say I am about as charismatic as a really charismatic guy, like a politician but not a corrupt one I mean a straight forward charismatic politician who is great at convincing people to follow his cause. Yeah that's as charismatic as I am. I convince people of stuff all the time and I'm pretty good at it. I once convinced a dieing man to give me all of the money in his pocket so I could go give it to somebody. I don't know what else to write, but yeah I do a lot of convincing in my day. Anywho I am hungry, actually no I am not I just ate, but anyway whoever is reading this you should send me a pizza roll in the mail because I would eat it and be forever in your debt and I would give you a cookie or something. See? Convincing and what not. Five more words now and done.

Journal #297 - Persistence

Persistence is pretty important and stuff. You always have to persist and never give up in all of your attempts at stuff and what not. That reminds me of a song by Kanye West. The line goes something along the lines of "giving up is so harder for me than trying" or something like that. That is a great example of persistence. Persistence means just to keep on going and trying the hardest you can in all of your attempts at everything. That was hilarious I just made this funny noise and it was funny and it demonstrated my attempts at persisting to be funny. TIE IN TO THE BLOG OH MAN WHO IS THIS KID!?!?! Anyway yeah just keep trying and stuff. It's like that story The Little Train that Could. That train BELIEVED that he could succeed and by the Train Gods he made it up that hill and did it all through persistence and in my opinion a little light steroid use buy hey whatever man. Yea persistence is great and what not it's good for you and you gotta keep on goin and not stoppin to you get there and stuff. So yeah just keep on persisting and you'lll get what you desire, just keep the Little train that could and the tortoise in the tortoise in the hare. Good things will come if you continue on in your efforts and just attempt your hardest at everything and never giving up. Persistence is a Greek word I believe. I don't know actually I just made that up on the spot. I'd have to look it up but yeah it's a word to be sure, just that I am a little sketchy on the origin of the word itself but hey whatever not that big of a deal right? I just need twenty or so more words and I am done with this blog on persistence that I just wrote about so admirable and like a boss if I do say so myself.