Literature Laboratory 2

The Modern Moment

What is this lab about?

Modernism is the label usually attached to cultural period that occurred between 1900 and 1940. That is the easy definition--but Modernism is not that easy to define, particularly when it is regarded as a cultural moment, rather than just a literary phenomenon. Why? Because the forty years of Modernism included social and political movements that the United States to which the U.S. is still adapting, the so-called "war to end all wars," the Harlem Renaissance and migration of African Americans to the North, increased immigration, the Great Depression, and the beginning of World War II. If that's not enough, literature was only one of the means of cultural expression--art, photography, dance, music, psychology, and architecture all assumed "modernist" tendencies. This lab gives you the opportunity to explore the literature, music, art, and culture of the modern period, the chance to realize just how complicated these years were, and the challenge of creating your own definition of the modern moment based on primary and secondary source research.

Literary Texts (all texts can be found in your Heath Anthology)

Cluster: Modernism, Lyric Poetry, Facts (1313)
Faulkner, "Barn Burning" (1543)
Hemingway, "Hills Like White Elephants" (1422)
Hurston, "Sweat" (1657)
3-4 poems each of Stein (1226), Hughes (1598), McKay (1673), Lowell (1213), Williams (1238), Pound (1190)
Porter, "The Jilting of Granny Weatherall" (1459)
Toomer, any of the excerpts from Cane (1581-1589)
Wharton, "The Valley of Childish Things" (1012) and "Roman Fever" (1067)

Cultural Materials

Photographs, cultural artifacts, and modern art and art displayed at the 1913 Armory Show Lyrics and melodies of jazz and blues
Video clip that sets the jazz scene of the modern period

Discussion Starters

What do you notice about the content of literature--that is, what is the subject matter, who is written about, are there difference in appropriate subject matter from literature that comes before modernist literature?
What do you notice about the style of the literature? The music? The art?
Note that I've been referring to "modernisms"--in the plural. How might these texts be divided as if there are competing definitions of the movement? Or should there be?
Consider the language that is used, as well as the form the language takes.
Do you see some of the same tendencies in literature reflected in music or art?
Why might all these modernist tendencies be happening at this time in history?

Group Work

Initial groups will be assigned at the start of the lab; halfway through the discussion, groups will be divided and mixed--one person from each group will share lab's findings with another group. At the end of the lab, each member of each group should:

• have a definition of "modernism" that the individual group has decided upon
• select two texts that exemplify this definition (one must be a literary text)
• select one text that seems ill-fitted to this definition, either in whole or in part
• be prepared to talk about one of the important modernist people might have contributed to a particular mindset of the times and how this person's ideas are visible in the literature and other cultural texts

Assignment

Individual Assignment : Of all of the texts you examined during Lit. Lab 2 (literary, visual, film), select the one that you think best represents or exemplifies the definition of "modernism" that you have created. For this written response, you do not need to describe the text in detail--assume your audience knows the text/image. Rather, spend your time developing and detailing your definition, using the text you have selected as the evidence to support your definition.

Length: 3 pages.

This assignment is due April 4 in class.