LITR 4340 American
Immigrant Literature "Red Families v. Blue Families."
Model Assignments
USA's dominant culture. too big to cover entirely or thoroughly
students find something in dominant culture to work with or react to
something to relate to other groups we've studied: immigrant, minority, New World Immigrant, model minority
Midterm2 returns Pleasure of seeing how much you liked texts that worked for you
meeting requirements
Grades rose, more Model Assignments
Essay and paragraph organization + transitions so that ideas develop, build on each other
"guided revision" social / economic exercise of working with an authority figure on common goal
surface quality "housekeeping" metaphor
grading standards (final exam)
literature as entertainment + education
ideally, both--you care and you learn
How does literature engage our emotions or feelings as opposed to just being another expression of culture or history?
Today, learn facts and history about origins of dominant culture
facts are good, but too many to remember or tell--no one listens unless directly self-interested.
convince you that you are self-interested
culture you assimilate to or resist--need to know what you're getting into or up against
need to learn history to appreciate literature
Dominant Culture waves > meritocracy > Scotch-Irish
Pilgrims and ancient Jews 3.4; Bradford & Moses
The Pilgrims and the Hebrew model of national migration; prototype of white exclusiveness and purity? William Bradford, Of Plymouth Plantation ( Student Research Post on "Plain Style" Scots Irish reviewNot genealogically motivated, but partly autobiographical I didn't dislike Scots-Irish culture as much as it dislikes me.
Scots-Irish deny ethnicity: "We're just Americans. Why can't everyone just be an American?"--i.e., an American like me! (you assimilate to me, not I to you) However, Scots-Irish / Red-State culture increasingly plays ethnicity game of victimization and grievance: "Take Back America!" But they don't go there: If Red State culture becomes ethnic instead of "just American," part of its rhetorical and symbolic power diminishes. 1. How do the opening chapters of Plymouth Plantation describe the history, qualities, or styles that will mark the USA's dominant culture? How does Puritanism embody Protestantism, and what does Protestantism contribute to forming the USA's dominant culture? Pilgrims keep moving but miss what gets left behind
Protestantism
literacy
community or individual? > chapter 14 re Plato
1.2 his ancient stratagems, used of old against the first Christians
11.2 in the Presence of God and one another, covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil Body Politick enact, constitute, and frame, such just and equal Laws, Ordinances, Acts, Constitutions, and Officers, from time to time, . . for the general Good of the Colony; unto which we promise all due Submission and Obedience 2. How does the Pilgrims' sojourn in the Netherlands resemble a traditional immigrant story? Why is it significant to the Dominant Culture that the Pilgrims reject that model in order to go to North America?
question re assimilation: Original settlers do not assimilate to existing culture, but bring their own culture, to which later immigrants assimilate
10.3 a good quantity of clear ground where the Indians had formerly set corn, and some of their graves. [The first evidence of the 1612-1617 epidemic of European disease that killed up to 90% of the Massachusett Indians] cf. John Smith, invisible bullets 10.4 found where lately a house had been, . . . found in them divers fair Indian baskets filled with corn 10.7 a special providence of God, and a great mercy to this poor people, that here they got seed to plant them corn the next year, or else they might have starved [Instructor’s note: The Pilgrims’ interpretation of the New World of America as a Promised Land overflowing with blessings thanks to their special relation with God is automatically agreeable to the USA’s evangelical dominant culture. However, with no disrespect to the scripture or faith of the Pilgrims, keep in mind how much this interpretation of events blocks reception of the catastrophic story of the Indians as a result of European contact.]
12.2 Squanto stood them in great stead, showing them both the manner how to set it, and after how to dress and tend it. Also he told them except they got fish and set with it (in these old grounds) it would come to nothing
3. The immigrant narrative emphasizes heroic individualism, but the Pilgrims migrate as a community, and they suffer and survive together as a community. Americans today (including Vance) emphasize individualism but celebrate occasions when we stand together and act as a community, as after 9/11 or after natural disasters. Compare the Pilgrims' narrative of their journey and hard beginnings in North America.
uniqueness of New England other immigrants come as individuals or families
New England comes as a community, sticks together as a community
John Winthrop, "A Model of Christian Charity" opening bullets
2c. Do good to all, especially to the household of faith. Upon this ground the Israelites were to put a difference between the brethren of such as were strangers, though not of the Canaanites.
[preview next week, x-consort with Indians]
4 primitive church + Acts
12 "together"
9.9 heroic generation
3b. How does the United States function as a "community of individuals?"
everybody gets rich
always increasing number of working people to support rich
disasters; cf Pilgrims
help each other out in trouble, otherwise leave each other alone--every man for himself, or are we all in this together?
Winthrop 12 "together"
Bradford notes
1.2 his ancient stratagems, used of old against the first Christians
4.1 30 Years War 4.5 propagating and advancing the gospel of the kingdom of Christ in those remote parts of the world [the Americas] 4.7 vast and unpeopled countries of America, which are fruitful and fit for habitation, being devoid of all civil inhabitants, where there are only savage and brutish men which range up and down, little otherwise than the wild beasts
9.5 God in heaven + Seneca 9.6 amazed at this poor people's condition 9.7 cf. St. Paul at Malta, + savage barbarians 9.8 what could they see but a hideous and desolate wilderness, full of wild beasts and wild men 9.9 If they looked behind them, there was the mighty ocean which they had passed and was now as a main bar and gulf to separate them from all the civil parts of the world. 9.11 What could now sustain them but the Spirit of God and his grace? Our fathers were Englishmen which came over this great ocean, and were ready to perish in this wilderness; but they cried unto the Lord no city to dwell in
10.2 espied five or six persons with a dog coming towards them, who were savages; but they [the “savages”] fled from them [the English] and ran up into the woods, and the English followed them 10.3 a good quantity of clear ground where the Indians had formerly set corn, and some of their graves. [The first evidence of the 1612-1617 epidemic of European disease that killed up to 90% of the Massachusett Indians] cf. John Smith, invisible bullets 10.4 found where lately a house had been, . . . found in them divers fair Indian baskets filled with corn 10.7 a special providence of God, and a great mercy to this poor people, that here they got seed to plant them corn the next year, or else they might have starved [Instructor’s note: The Pilgrims’ interpretation of the New World of America as a Promised Land overflowing with blessings thanks to their special relation with God is automatically agreeable to the USA’s evangelical dominant culture. However, with no disrespect to the scripture or faith of the Pilgrims, keep in mind how much this interpretation of events blocks reception of the catastrophic story of the Indians as a result of European contact.] 10.8 The weather [the precipitation or rain] was very cold and it froze so hard as the spray of the sea lighting on their coats, they were as if they had been glazed. [a rare poetic figure] . . . 10.13 a great and strange cry, which they knew to be the same voices they heard in the night, . . . one of their company being abroad came running in and cried, "Men, Indians! Indians!" And withal, their arrows came flying amongst them. 10.15 a lusty [strong] man, and no less valiant, stood behind a tree within half a musket shot, and let his arrows fly at them . . . an extraordinary shriek
11.1 discontented and mutinous speeches that some of the strangers [non-Pilgrims] amongst them had let fall from them in the ship—That when they came ashore they would use their own liberty; for none had power to command them, the patent they had being for Virginia, and not for New England 11.2 in the Presence of God and one another, covenant and combine ourselves together into a civil Body Politick enact, constitute, and frame, such just and equal Laws, Ordinances, Acts, Constitutions, and Officers, from time to time, . . for the general Good of the Colony; unto which we promise all due Submission and Obedience 11.3 common store begun some small cottages for their habitation, as time would admitte, they met and consulted of laws and orders, both for their civil and military Government 11.4 starving time 11.5 did all the homely and necessary offices for them which dainty and queasy stomachs cannot endure to hear named; and all this willingly and cheerfully, without any grudging in the least, showing herein their true love unto their friends and brethren. A rare example and worthy to be remembered 11.7 But now amongst his company [the ships' sailors] there was far another kind of carriage [behavior] in this misery than amongst the passengers [the Pilgrims] 11.8 about the sixteenth of March a certain Indian came boldly amongst them, and spoke to them in broken English, which they could well understand, but marveled at it. 11.9 Samoset, Squanto, Massasoit 11.11 He was a native of this place, and scarce any left alive beside himself. 11.12 He was carried away with diverse others by one Hunt, a master of a ship, who thought to sell them for slaves in Spain
12.2 Squanto stood them in great stead, showing them both the manner how to set it, and after how to dress and tend it. Also he told them except they got fish and set with it (in these old grounds) it would come to nothing 12.12 now began to come in store of fowl, as winter approached, of which this place did abound when they came first (but afterward decreased by degrees). great store of wild Turkeys, of which they took many, besides venison, etc [Mourt's] amongst other recreations, we exercised our arms, many of the Indians coming amongst us, and among the rest their greatest king Massasoit, with some ninety men, whom for three days we entertained and feasted, and they went out and killed five deer, which they brought to the plantation 12.15-16 Christmas Day
14.1 set corn every man for his own particular [each person or family with their own plot of land], and in that regard trust to themselves; in all other things to go on in the general way as before. And so assigned to every family a parcel of land, according to the proportion of their number 14.2 made all hands very industrious, so as much more corn was planted than other ways would have been by any means the Governor or any other could use, and saved him a great deal of trouble 14.2 The women now went willingly into the field, and took their litle-ones with them to set corn, which before would allege weakness, and inability; whom to have compelled would have been thought great tyranny and oppression. 14.3 The experience that was had in this common course and condition, tried sundry [several] years, and that amongst godly and sober men, may well evince the vanity of that conceit of Plato’s and other ancients, applauded by some of after [modern] times;—that the taking away of property, and bringing in communities into a commonwealth, would make them happy and flourishing; as if they were wiser then God. 14.4 young men that were most able and fit for labor and service did repine [whine, complain] that they should spend their time and strength to work for other men’s wives and children, with out any recompense 14.5 And for men’s wives to be commanded to do service for other men, as dressing their meat, washing their clothes, etc., they deemed it a kind of slavery, neither could many husbands well brook [stand] it.
23.1 people of the plantation began to grow in their outward estates [economic wealth], by reason of the flowing of many people into the country, corn and cattle rose to a great price, by which many were much enriched, and commodities grew plentiful; and yet in other regards this benefit turned to their hurt, and this accession of strength to their weakness. 23.2 no longer any holding them together, 23.3 the town [Plymouth], in which they lived compactly [close together] till now, was left very thin, and in a short time almost desolate. 23.4 the church must also be divided, and those that had lived so long together in Christian and comfortable fellowship must now part and suffer many divisions 23.6 this, I fear, will be the ruin of New England, at least of the churches of God there, and will provoke the Lord’s displeasure against them.
28.1 great terror 28.2 the Pequots, especially in the winter before, sought to make peace with the Narragansetts, and used very pernicious arguments to move them thereunto: as that the English were strangers and began to overspread their country, and would deprive them thereof in time, if they were suffered to grow and increase; and if the Narragansetts did assist the English to subdue them [the Pequots], they [the Narragansetts] did but make way for their own overthrow 28.3 But again when they [the Narragansetts] considered, how much wrong they had received from the Pequot, and what an opportunity they now had by the help of the English to right themselves, revenge was so sweet unto them, as it prevailed above all the rest; so as they resolved to join with the English against them, and did. 28.5 the victory seemed a sweet sacrifice, and they gave the praise thereof to God
33.1 that so many of them should live to very old age! [sounds biblical] 33.6 Many having left this place (as is before noted) by reason of the straitness [narrowness] and barrenness of the same, and their finding of better accommodations elsewhere, more suitable to their ends and minds; and sundry others still upon every occasion desiring their dismissions, the church began seriously to think whether it were not better jointly to remove to some other place, than to be thus weakened, and as it were insensibly dissolved. [¶33.9] And thus was this poor church left, like an ancient mother, grown old, and forsaken of her children, (though not in their affections,) yet in regard of their bodily presence and personal helpfulness. Her ancient members being most of them worn away by death; and these of later time being like children translated into other families, and she like a widow left only to trust in God [1 Timothy 5.5]. Thus she that had made many rich became herself poor [2 Corinthians 6.10].
Problem of individualism and family-centered society, accentuated by migration and mobile society (criticize & celebrate) Can America be a community of individuals?
Earlier semesters: read Exodus story from Bible
compared Jews leaving Egypt for Canaan (Promised Land) to Pilgrims leaving England for America (Promised Land)
migration as a people vs. migration as individuals and families (cf. Mormons)
immigration for religious freedom v. economic opportunity freedom of religion > religion evolves rapidly in freemarket of ideas religion again becomes comfortable with comfort, wealth, material gain
two-way motion: western migration & modernization, but religious primitivism we can't stop moving and changing, but our ancestors or forebears had it right and we don't hope for progress + fear of decline
Modernization and migration erode communities and extended families > nuclear families, divorce, people living alone, rugged individualism as model of success
Pilgrims & Puritans as most community-minded of American immigrants They migrated as a community and work to establish a community based on more than wealth: Christianity > social welfare Puritan diaspora as base of liberal US: New England and northern Midwest
significance of literacy: the Puritans were never that numerous, but they're over-represented in American literary & cultural studies. Why? They wrote everything down, cultivating the most literate middle-class society and the strongest educational systems.
Downsides: community as repression, meddling, policing of morality: blue laws, Salem Witch Trials Just as the Jews in the Promised Land swore not to mix with the Canaanites (i.e., to intermarry and assimilate) the Pilgrims and Puritans in their Promised Land mixed little with American Indians (i.e., no assimilation to previous dominant culture, but became dominant culture themselves)
review Jews & Exodus Jews as model minority?
Jews as dominant culture?
immigrate, act as group--reinforcing and exclusive (no intermarriage) don't assimilate--some assimilation to them, or later "falling off" to assimilation (to Canaanites)
literacy--covenant, social contract, constitution > change + continuity language powers
Information about Bradford-- born 1590 in midlands of England, died 1657
Reasons to like this dead white guy . . . .
born to working people, orphaned at an early age, raised by extended family, worked as a weaver
remarkably studious, taught himself to read Hebrew, Greek, Latin in order to study Bible in original languages and later traditions
attracted to Separatist church at nearby Scrooby
Separatist = radical Protestants
separating from Church of England, of which King or Queen of England is head
Therefore, religious dissent = political dissent
Need or desire of Pilgrims to leave England for a place where they could practice their own religion (NOT exactly the same as our modern concept of freedom of religion)
Jews and Pilgrims
as "People of the Book
Numbers 33.2 Moses wrote their goings out 24.25 covenant, statute, ordinance 14.26 wrote words in book + stone Ex 32.16 the writing was the writing of God (i. e., not speech) 4 according to scriptures 7 no warrant in the Word of God [People of the Book] Possible reaction: Americans no longer as dependent on "scriptures" or "Word of God" as Pilgrims / Puritans But still depend on written forms of law--for
instance, last week's decision to remove the Alabama Chief Justice for failing
to obey orders regarding the Ten Commandments was based on the Constitution,
another written source of laws.
Conclusions: Protestantism contributes: plain style literacy modernity + primitivism!
4. Questions for J.D. Vance, Hillbilly Elegy, ch. 9: How much does Vance's story belong in Immigrant Literature? What crises and transformations are comparable to other immigrant narratives in this course?
8 two generations ago, grandparents got married and moved north in hope of escaping dreadful poverty
8 grandchild graduated from one of the finest educational institutions
129 grandma, importance of doing well academically, if anyone in the family "made it," it would be me
134 I wanted to escape to Jackson; she wanted to escape from it
137 tested into honors Advanced Math class [meritocracy] [contrast bomb threat]
144 [two phases of migration: first everybody, then educated and well-off] 144 Wilson writing about black people in inner cities
What is the value of learning the Scotch-Irish dimension of the USA's dominant culture?
Elites held up as models, but not from elites
one's own people can hold one back
you can be what you want to be, but your range of resources determined by local and family history
136 Abercrombie & Fitch, American Eagle [class markers + plain style]
137 giant menthol cigarette [class marker]
138 more harried the customer, more they purchased precooked food, more likely they were poor [stress > poverty] 138-9 why only poor people bought baby formula, x-breast feed children 139 class divide > resentment
141 blast govt for doing too much or too little
141 ballot failures of school improvement tax
149 positive effect of a loving and stable home
4b. Combined with Plymouth Plantation, how does Hillbilly Elegy provide a composite sense of the USA's dominant culture and a sense of its strengths and limits?
149 positive effect of a loving and stable home
J.D. Vance, Chapter 9, Hillbilly Elegy (PDF emailed 7 November 129 grandma, importance of doing well academically, if anyone in the family "made it," it would be me 130 lawyer, doctor, businessman x high school dropout 130 Mom needs clean urine, a half dozen prescription drugs (cf. Elvis) 130 Mom a survivor, survive encounter with nursing board 131 smoked new stepfather's pot 131 this isn't right, but she's your mother 131 Mamaw always found a way to believe in the people she loved 132 stay with Mamaw permanently 133 get good grades, get a job, and get off your ass and help me 134 I wanted to escape to Jackson; she wanted to escape from it 134 cf. the Sopranos 134 Tony a killer, objectively terrible person x loyalty, family honor 134 [male privilege] sleeping around 136 malpractice but didn't believe in using the legal system 136 [my family] was more non-traditional than most. And we were poor. 136 Abercrombie & Fitch, American Eagle [class markers + plain style] 137 giant menthol cigarette [class marker] 137 tested into honors Advanced Math class [meritocracy] [contrast bomb threat] 137 obtain calculators 138 grades improve 138 talk about problems of community, got a job > amateur sociologist 138 more harried the customer, more they purchased precooked food, more likely they were poor [stress > poverty] 138-9 why only poor people bought baby formula, x-breast feed children 139 class divide > resentment 139 Cadillac trustworthy 139 people gamed welfare system 139 view working people with distrust 139 tax deductions x T-bone steaks 140 x-Dems as party of working man 140 Appalachia and South to Republicans: race relations, religious faith, social conservatism 140 paying people on welfare to do nothing 140 Plan B vouchers bring bad people into neighborhood, drive down housing values 140-1 shared a lot in common 141 blast govt for doing too much or too little 141 aircraft carriers x drug treatment centers 141 ballot failures of school improvement tax 142 in Mamaw's contradictions lay great wisdom [?] 143 our neighbor's teenage daughter's prospects? 143 other people didn't live like we did [American Dream] 144 books about social policy and the working poor 144 [two phases of migration: first everybody, then educated and well-off] 144 Wilson writing about black people in inner cities 144-5 no single book or theory could explain the problems of hillbillies in America 145 sociology, psychology, culture, community, faith 146 her mother never held a job and seemed interested only "in breeding"; her kids never had a chance 146 truly irrational behavior, spend our way into poorhouse 147 even the best and brightest of us will go to college close to home 147 the lies we tell ourselves to cover our cognitive dissonance, broken connection between the lives we live and the values we preach 148 two separate sets of mores and social pressures [traditional and modern?] 148 not to romanticize my grandparents' world 149 I've always straddled those two worlds 149 work so you can spend weekends with your family, go to college 149 Mamaw showed me what was possible and showed me how to get there. 149 positive effect of a loving and stable home 150 Facebook friend constantly changing boyfriends 151 just wanted a home, strangers stay out
J.D. Vance, "Introduction," Hillbilly Elegy (PDF fromemailed 1 November); J.D. Vance, Hillbilly Elegy page; (> Scotch-Irish)
subtitle: A Memoir of a Family and Culture in Crisis
1 [American Dream?] a nice job, a happy marriage, a comfortable house, and two lively dogs [note delay of childbearing] [compare to Reyna Grande author page]
1 poor, Rust Belt, Ohio steel town hemorrhaging jobs and hope Rust Belt maps
2 x-high school, x-college 2 avoid welfare, heroine overdose? [opioid, oxycontin, heroin epidemic] 2 deep anger and resentment harbored by everyone around me 2 loving people rescued me
2 American dream as my family and I encountered it how upward mobility really feels 2 American dream + demons
2 ethnic component > p. 3 Scots-Irish
3 white but x-wasps 3 Working class white Americans of Scots-Irish descent . . . no college degree poverty is the family tradition 3 day laborers, share croppers, coal miners, machinists and millworkers 3 hillbillies, rednecks, white trash [+ Okies in Soto, "Like Mexicans"] > neighbors, friends and family
3 Scots-Irish . . . most distinctive subgroups 3 unchanging regional subculture 3 x-abandonment of tradition (x-assimilation) 3 good traits: loyalty, family and country bad: do not like outsiders or people who are different; most important, how they talk
3 geography
4 Appalachian mountains, culture of greater Appalachia remarkably cohesive cf. Louisian, Alabama 4 switch from Dem to Repub 4 fortunes of working-class whites eem dimmest low social mobility to powerty to divorce and drug addiction
4 a pessimistic bunch, most pessimistic group in America 4 more socially isolated religion has changed . . . churches heavy on emotional rhetoric but light on the kind of social support necessary to enable poor kids to do well
4 dropped out of labor force, chosen not to relocate 4 peculiar crisis of masculinity
5 traits that our culture inculcates make it difficult to succeed in a changing world
5 divorcing more, marrying less . . . if only better access to jobs
5 lost economic security and stable home and family life that comes with it
5 this story at least incomplete
6 Bob was 19 with a pregnant girlfriend . . terrible workers, chronically late, bathroom breaks
6 fired, Bob lashed out at his manager
7 manufacturing jobs have gone overseas and middle-class jobs are harder to come by for people without college degrees
7 reacting to bad circumstances in the worst way possible . . . culture increasingly encourages social decay instead of counteracting it
7 he thought something had been done to him 7 lack of agency, willingness to blame everyone but yourself [grievance or victim culture]
8 known many welfare queens, all were white
8 upward mobility fell off in the 1970s and never really recovered, some regions fared worse
8 tell a true story about what that problem feels like when you were born with it hanging around your neck
8 not just a personal memoir but a family one
8 two generations ago, grandparents got married and moved north in hope of escaping dreadful poverty
8 grandchild graduated from one of the finest educational institutions
9 short version
9 deeply flawed . . . but I love these people
[caught between two worlds of social migration]
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