Department of English
Permanent URI for this community
Browse
Browsing Department of English by Subject "American studies"
Now showing 1 - 4 of 4
Results Per Page
Sort Options
Item All about the Benjamins: the nineteenth century character assassination of Benjamin Franklin(University of Alabama Libraries, 2011) Dixon, Charles Robert; Crowley, John William; University of Alabama TuscaloosaEarly in his Autobiography, Benjamin Franklin proclaims that the chief benefit of the autobiographical form is that it affords one the opportunity to replicate oneself. In his self-replication, Franklin creates an American mythos of success that shaped America's imagined nationalist identity. Franklin's construction of the American success hero was informed by his philosophy of tangible character-building via the traits we traditionally associate with Franklin, such as industry and frugality. Yet, one of the most evident, but perplexingly overlooked features of Franklin's Autobiography is his extensive use of irony as a rhetorical and literary device. Franklin's use of irony indicates an awareness that his hero was first and foremost a written creation, which infuses his narrative with a complexity that belied the matter-of-fact prescriptions for success lying on its surface. Over the course of the nineteenth century, autobiographical emulators of Franklin appropriated his narrative to suit their own purposes, ignoring or suppressing his irony in the process. These appropriations result in a fracturing of Franklin's original character into multiple Benjamins. Franklin becomes, then, not just his own creative project, but a national creative project. This dissertation presents a lineage of Franklins created by the multiple appropriations of his story over the nineteenth century, tracking how each replication of him participates in the reshaping of the Franklinian hero into a kind of synecdoche that denies the complexity and irony present in the original sources, thus "assassinating" the original Franklinian character and, in the process, the early American concept of "character" itself.Item From architecture to archetype: space and self in suburban literature(University of Alabama Libraries, 2017) Wells, Matthew; Whiting, Frederick; University of Alabama TuscaloosaMy project examines the complex correlations between architectural changes in the suburban home and representations of the suburban man. For years, these ideas have been discussed separately, but I forward a reading that presents architecture and archetype in concert. My project focuses on architectural changes to the suburban home and how those changes affect middle class anxieties of the midcentury. To further my argument, I rely on twentieth century suburban literature, starting with Sinclair Lewis’ Babbitt and ending with John Cheever, Richard Yates, and John Updike. By comparing literature and architecture, I highlight the cracks in the monolithic image of the suburban man in media. To identify shifts in his character, I study the suburban man’s home. Material and architectural changes to the suburban home create specific zones within the house. For this project, I have designation the bedroom, office, living room, lawn, and kitchen as the key spaces to understanding the suburban man. The suburban man responds to the changing issues of his time, and the design modifications in the twentieth century work in tandem with the nuanced changes of the archetype. The suburban man performs a different identity dependent upon the room he is in, and as the rooms change, so does the suburban man. Despite his attempts to adapt, economic, social, and architectural changes leave him grasping for an identity that is no longer relevant to a world in which he lacks total control over his social and occupational life.Item Kindred ambivalence: art and the adult-child dynamic in America's Cold War(University of Alabama Libraries, 2010) Marberry, Michael Odell; Whiting, Frederick; University of Alabama TuscaloosaThe pervasive ideological dimension of the Cold War resulted in an extremely ambivalent period in U.S. history, marked by complex and conflicting feelings. Nowhere is this ambivalence more clearly seen than in the American home and in the relationship between adults and children. Though the adult-child dynamic has frequently harbored ambivalent feelings, the American Cold War--with its increased emphasis on the family in the face of ideological struggle--served to highlight this ambivalence. Believing that art reveals historical and cultural concerns, this project explores the extent to which adult-child ambivalence is prominent within American art from the period--particularly, the coming-of-age story, as it is a genre intrinsically concerned with interactions between adults and children. Chapter one features an analysis of Katherine Anne Porter's "Old Order" coming-of-age sequence, specifically "The Source" and "The Circus." Establishing Porter's relevance to the Cold War period, this chapter illustrates how her young heroine (Miranda Gay) experiences ambivalence within her familial relationships--which, in turn, comes to foreshadow and represent the adult-child ambivalence within the Cold War period. Chapter two expands its scope to include a larger historical context and a different artistic mode. With the rise of cinema during the Cold War period, the horror film became a genre extremely interested in adult-child ambivalence, frequently depicting the child as a destructive force and the adult as a victim of parenthood. Attempting to identify models of ambivalence within these horror films, this chapter considers whether said models might provide readers with new ways of understanding classic coming-of-age texts.Item Unsettling hope: Emily Dickinson, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, and the record of a reform friendship(University of Alabama Libraries, 2011) Ellis, Elizabeth Anne; Bilwakesh, Nikhil; University of Alabama TuscaloosaIn my thesis I reassess the relationship between two of nineteenth-century America's most radical figures: Emily Dickinson and Thomas Wentworth Higginson. Dickinson, of course, is a private radical, in her invention and interrogation of poetic forms. Higginson, conversely, is a public radical, as militant abolitionist, member of the Secret Six, and commander of the first regiment of emancipated slaves. This friendship, I contend, finds its roots in the reform movement--an effort in which men and women in nineteenth-century America crossed socially imposed boundaries to forge friendships that might aid them as they sought to remake their world.