Bolivarian Republic of Venezuela

Ministry of Education

Unesr Palo Verde Branch

Twentieth Century American Literature

Paper 2
How tendencies in American Literature influenced the American
people minds to build a nation called USA ?

Prof. Norelkys Fornerino Participant:

Twentieth Century American Literature Isadacis

Cisneros
British Facilitator ID. 12.261.998

1. How American Literature influenced the American people minds to build a

great nation called USA ?

Keywords:

- Puritanism

- Racionalism

- Pragmatism

- Realism

- Naturalism

- Determinism

- Regionalism

- Post Wars

- Poetries

- Novels

2. The main idea in this paper is to show, how thinkings and ideas printed in literature
(in formal and informal way) may change thinking patterns, circumstances and inclusive
the history course in a nation and people together...

3.In this present paper i'll try to show how American literature influenced to American
people in their history, since its initial in17th Century as nation until the end of 20th
century.

What are the origins (historic context), their consecuences and characteristics in
the different philosophic movements in that period?
4. American literature since its initials (first registred in 1620) shows a rude reality in the
context of first colony immigrants from England (Mother Nation) turbulent travel to, that
makes us to know the real circumstances that motivated them to write about.

To understand this i will expose some concepts about to determine it as well as

possible...

- Puritanism:

A religious reform movement in the late 16th and 17th centuries that sought to “purify”
the Church of England of remnants of the Roman Catholic “popery” that the Puritans
claimed had been retained after the religious settlement.

Puritans lived a simple life based on the concepts of humility and simplicity. This
influence comes from their religious beliefs and the Bible. Wearing elaborate clothing or
having conceited thoughts offended Puritans. Puritan writing mimics these cultural
values in its plain writing style. Puritans wrote directly to the point, and avoided much of
the eleborate writing style that became popular in Europe. Simple sentences with
common language allowed Puritans to communicate information without feeling like
they were drawing attention to themselves.

- Rationalism:

Rationalism is a doctrine that prioritizes reason over emotion. If you're scared of the
dark and convinced there's a monster in your closet, your parents will beg you to be
rational, and rely on what you know (empty closet) instead of what you fear (monster!).

French philosopher René Descartes, who wrote "I think therefore I am," is considered
the father of rationalism. He believed that eternal truths can only be discovered and
tested through reason.

- Pragmatism:

Pragmatism is a philosophical tradition that considers words and thought as tools and
instruments for prediction, problem solving, and action, and rejects the idea that the
function of thought is to describe, represent, or mirror reality. Pragmatists contend that
most philosophical topics—such as the nature of knowledge, language, concepts,
meaning, belief, and science—are all best viewed in terms of their practical uses and
successes.

Pragmatism began in the United States in the 1870s. Its origins are often attributed to
the philosophers Charles Sanders Peirce, William James, and John Dewey. In 1878,
Peirce described it in his pragmatic maxim: "Consider the practical effects of the objects
of your conception. Then, your conception of those effects is the whole of your
conception of the object."

Realism:

Realism, in philosophy, the viewpoint which accords to things which are known or
perceived an existence or nature which is independent of whether anyone is thinking
about or perceiving them.

the word is used to describe a doctrine based not upon imitating past artistic
achievements but upon the truthful and accurate depiction of the models that nature and
contemporary life offer the artist.

- Naturalism:

In philosophy, naturalism is the idea or belief that only natural laws and forces (as
opposed to supernatural or spiritual ones) operate in the universe. Adherents of
naturalism assert that natural laws are the only rules that govern the structure and
behavior of the natural world, and that the changing universe is at every stage a product
of these laws.

According to Steven Schafersman, naturalism is a philosophy that maintains that;

"Nature encompasses all that exists throughout space and time;

Nature (the universe or cosmos) consists only of natural elements, that is, of spatio-
temporal physical substance—mass–energy. Non-physical or quasi-physical substance,
such as information, ideas, values, logic, mathematics, intellect, and other emergent
phenomena, either supervene upon the physical or can be reduced to a physical
account;

Nature operates by the laws of physics and in principle, can be explained and
understood by science and philosophy;

The supernatural does not exist, i.e., only nature is real. Naturalism is therefore a
metaphysical philosophy opposed primarily by supernaturalism".
Or, as Carl Sagan succinctly put it: "The Cosmos is all that is or ever was or ever will
be."

-Determinism:

Determinism is the philosophical view that all events are determined completely by
previously existing causes. Deterministic theories throughout the history of philosophy
have sprung from diverse and sometimes overlapping motives and considerations. The
opposite of determinism is some kind of indeterminism (otherwise called
nondeterminism) or randomness. Determinism is often contrasted with free will,
although some philosophers claim that the two are compatible.

Determinism often is taken to mean causal determinism, which in physics is known as

cause-and-effect. It is the concept that events within a given paradigm are bound by
causality in such a way that any state (of an object or event) is completely determined
by prior states. This meaning can be distinguished from other varieties of determinism
mentioned below.

Other debates often concern the scope of determined systems, with some maintaining
that the entire universe is a single determinate system and others identifying other more
limited determinate systems (or multiverse). Numerous historical debates involve many
philosophical positions and varieties of determinism.

- Regionalism:

In politics, regionalism is an ideology that highlights the local identity, the need for
independent regional planning and administrative freedom. It promotes the
manifestation of cultural singularities and prioritizes the interest of the region over the
interest of the nation as a whole.

In other words, the regionalist politics of a region are centered on that specific territory;
they aim to direct the national agenda towards the local interests and look for greater
autonomy for that region.

Regionalism Characteristics

Local Identity. One of the main characteristics of regionalism is its strong local identity
and a loyalty to the region. Regionalist politicians and many residents feel pride in the
local culture and its people. ...

Autonomy. The search of greater autonomy is usually a priority of regionalism.

Some productions in literature topics after the two (2) post world war are:

The literary historian Malcolm Cowley described the years between the two world wars
as a “second flowering” of American writing. Certainly American literature attained a
new maturity and a rich diversity in the 1920s and ’30s, and significant works by several
major figures from those decades were published after 1945. Faulkner, Hemingway,
Steinbeck, and Katherine Anne Porter wrote memorable fiction, though not up to their
prewar standard; and Frost, Eliot, Wallace Stevens, Marianne Moore, E.E. Cummings,
William Carlos Williams, and Gwendolyn Brooks published important poetry. Eugene
O’Neill’s most distinguished play, Long Day’s Journey into Night, appeared
posthumously in 1956. Before and after World War II, Robert Penn Warren published
influential fiction, poetry, and criticism. His All the King’s Men, one of the best American
political novels, won the 1947 Pulitzer Prize. Mary McCarthy became a widely read
social satirist and essayist. When it first appeared in the United States in the 1960s,
Henry Miller’s fiction was influential primarily because of its frank exploration of
sexuality. But its loose, picaresque, quasi-autobiographical form also meshed well with
post-1960s fiction. Impressive new novelists, poets, and playwrights emerged after the
war. There was, in fact, a gradual changing of the guard.

Not only did a new generation come out of the war, but its ethnic, regional, and social
character was quite different from that of the preceding one. Among the younger writers
were children of immigrants, many of them Jews; African Americans, only a few
generations away from slavery; and, eventually, women, who, with the rise of feminism,
were to speak in a new voice. Though the social climate of the postwar years was
conservative, even conformist, some of the most hotly discussed writers were
homosexuals or bisexuals, including Tennessee Williams, Truman Capote, Paul
Bowles, Gore Vidal, and James Baldwin, whose dark themes and experimental
methods cleared a path for Beat writers such as Allen Ginsberg, William S. Burroughs,
and Jack Kerouac.

One of Penguin Books' most successful publications in the 1970s was Richard Adams's
heroic fantasy Watership Down (1972). Evoking epic themes, it recounts the odyssey of
a group of rabbits seeking to establish a new home. Another successful novel of the
same era was John Fowles' The French Lieutenant's Woman (1969), with a narrator
who freely admits the fictive nature of his story, and its famous alternative endings. This
was made into a film in 1981 with a screenplay by Harold Pinter. Angela Carter (1940–
92) was a novelist and journalist, known for her feminist, magical realism, and
picaresque works. Her novels include, The Infernal Desire Machines of Doctor Hoffman
1972 and Nights at the Circus 1984. Margaret Drabble (born 1939) is a novelist,
biographer and critic, who published from the 1960s into the 21st century. Her older
sister, A. S. Byatt (born 1936) is best known for Possession published in 1990.

Martin Amis (born 1949) is one of the most prominent of contemporary British novelists.
His best-known novels are Money (1984) and London Fields (1989). Pat Barker (born
1943) has won many awards for her fiction. English novelist and screenwriter Ian
McEwan (born 1948) is another of contemporary Britain's most highly regarded writers.
His works include The Cement Garden (1978) and Enduring Love (1997), which was
made into a film. In 1998 McEwan won the Man Booker Prize with Amsterdam.
Atonement (2001) was made into an Oscar-winning film. McEwan was awarded the
Jerusalem Prize in 2011. Zadie Smith's Whitbread Book Award winning novel White
Teeth (2000), mixes pathos and humour, focusing on the later lives of two war time
friends in London. Julian Barnes (born 1946) is another successful living novelist, who
won the 2011 Man Booker Prize for his book The Sense of an Ending, while three of his
earlier books were shortlisted for the Booker Prize: Flaubert's Parrot (1984), England,
England (1998), and Arthur & George (2005). He has also written crime fiction under the
pseudonym Dan Kavanagh.

5. This present Paper is addressed to each student of American Literature in 20th

Century at Palo Verde Unesr branch that need to know about the importance to be
aware of the all kind of Philosophyc tendencies and what it it'll be the position of any
student will take about to accept them or refuse them, and the theoretical bases by not
about.

The idea is that each one of them may have all tools to create theirselves concepts that
each one of them it suppose should have, and why about them too, through the first
pillar of teaching "learning by learning"

6. The problem with students that struggle with literature topics are that don't know the
intention of them, their meanings and benefits of them when we know about new
concepts and ideas as a new frontiers to discover and conquer every time.

7. Generally this problem causes aversion and rejection in the student; and every time
he/she can avoid interacting with this type of subjects or objectives they will do this
again and again...
* Consequencies:

- Ignorance

- delays in studies

- Poverty in general culture

- Slavery to others that really know them or to another toxic ideologists...

* Causes:

- Bibliophobia (pathology)

- Ignorance to the topics or concepts

- Demotivation

- Previous different kind of traumas

Conclusions:

The importance to face literature as American literature history, let us to know that
apathy and ignorance are not an option, when it comes to defending our interests and
rights (while still fulfilling our duties) and that we can continue to make history through
written ideas and being aware of ourselves ones, and how to help others to get
theirselves too. The same for the benefit of personal and common good. In short ... we
still have time to change the course of our own history and that of others as well ...

Recomendations:

Finally, taking encourage to face every fear or ignorance in our lives or nations will be
the best medicine we will have ever and ever...

So, by reading, interacting, facing and fighting our fears we will overcome every
circumstances we have and we will have in the future too...