Unit 1
The first text we read as a class. Bonus points for the author name.
The Glass Menagerie by Tennessee Williams
Unit was primarily focused on what literary era?
The Harlem Renaissance
What is a Vivid Memory File?
A way to keep track of the memories and moments in your life that stand out to you.
Memoir
a personal narrative surrounding one specific moment.
In California, you can’t legally buy a mousetrap without having what?
A Hunting License
Unit 1 focused around one theme, what was that theme?
American Memory
Authors of The Harlem Renaissance were attempting to what with their art?
To recalibrate the black experience in literature and in history by telling stories and sharing their own experiences. To ground the black experience as a distinctly human one.
Memoir is an important genre of literature because?
Memoir allows people to reflect on their lives using a specific moment. It also creates a story that others can see and identify with and hear themselves echoed back.
Stanza
a group of lines forming the basic recurring metrical unit in a poem; a verse.
It was illegal for women to wear what in 19th century Florence?
Buttons
A play that deals specifically in the subjectivity of how we remember things/events in our lives.
Name at least two of the authors of some of the pieces we read in this Unit.
Zora Neale Hurston
Nella Larsen
George Schuyler
Langston Hughes
Countee Cullen
Telling our own story matters because...
Representation matters. People can see themselves in you or your experience.
First Person Point of View
The point of view used when writing a personal narrative or memoir
What do you call a group of unicorns?
A blessing
We used a process to help discussion and understanding this semester where you would meet with a small group and discuss/answer questions. What was this called?
A lit circle
What is the original album/visual album that we discussed and watched part of?
Black is King by Beyonce
What is the point of view a personal narrative uses?
First Person
Stage Directions
The italicized part of a script in which the playwright gives very specific instructions on what the world of the play is supposed to look like.
In a one-story house at the corner of the road, the bedrooms were yellow, the kitchen was orange, the living room was red, the garage was blue, the entry hall was green and the sitting room was purple. What color were the stairs?
There’s no color because there are no stairs—it’s a one-story house.
In what ways was Unit 1 tied to the rest of our units this semester.
Unit 1 - Memories that reflect on our past
Unit 2 - Using memory as a culture and evaluating stories about race and our history.
Unit 3 - Using YOUR memories to tell a story
Why are the stories we read in Unit 2 so important culturally and historically?
The black experience in the United States has been framed by so much trauma and negativity that authors felt like it was important to tell their stories, show their lives as real human lives and to share their experiences in the world in a truthful way
How is memoir different than autobiography?
A memoir uses the lens of one specific event whereas an autobiography tells the story of an entire persons life.
Great Migration
This is what drove black people from the south to northern places like New York, Chicago and Michigan. The Great Migration helped speed/create the Harlem Renaissance
A wealthy family lived in a big circular house. They had a maid, a butler, and a gardener. The parents were going to a party, so they tucked the younger kids into bed and kissed them goodnight and said goodbye, and kissed the older kids goodnight. When the parents came home, all the kids were gone—they had been kidnapped. The authorities ask the butler, maid, and gardener what they were doing at the time of the kidnapping. The butler says he was organizing the library, the maid says she was dusting the corners, and the gardener says he was watering the plants. Who’s lying and actually kidnapped the kids?
The Maid. It's a Circular House.