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Time Period Name: Pre-Colonialism

Years: Pre 1607

Major Historical Events: Christopher Columbus genocides (1492), Juan Ponce de Leon explores Florida (1513), Sitting Bull was killed while being arrested (1871)

Major authors: Tribes of the Sioux and Arapaho

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Sample Work: “Ghost Dance Songs” by the Sioux

Time Period: Pre-Colonial

Dates: 1871 or pre 1607 for oral tales

Point of View: first person

Themes: loyalty, religion, political oppression, nature, God

Connection: Sitting Bull was killed in 1871, and due to his high status, it was hard for Native Americans to keep religion alive. They also struggled with starvation, “I am crying for thirst; All is gone-I have nothing to eat” (stanza 2 line 4-5). Loyalty is shown through the Natives not wanting to give up the fight for their land and culture, “My son, let me grasp your hand” (stanza 1 line 4). With the natives’ strong sense of family, they are able to stick together, fight back against the whites, and gain their culture back.

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Time Period Name: Colonialism

Years:1607-1775

Major Historical Events: Foundation of Massachusets Bay Colony (1628), the creation of Jamestown (1607), Separation of the Catholic Chruch (1770-1795)

Major Authors: William Bradford, Jonathan Edwards, Anne Bradstreet

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Sample Work: “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God” by Jonathan Edwards

Time Period: Colonialism

Dates: set and published in 1741

Point of View: second person

Themes: loyalty, religion, predestination, sin, Calvinism

Connection: Puritans strongly believed that all humans faced predestination, which led to separation from the Catholic church. Puritan people believed, “natural men are held in the hand of God, over the pit of hell” (Edwards 1). Puritans’ beliefs surrounded the idea that people are predestined by God for heaven or hell and there is no way of changing that destination. “Only the power and mere pleasure of God that holds you up”(2). God believed in the good in people, shown through his want to keep humans above “the pit of hell”.

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Time Period Name: Enlightenment

Years: 1776-1820

Major Historical Events: the signing of “The Declaration of Independence” (1776),  “Declaration of Sentiments and
Resolutions” (1848),   Benjamin Franklin publishes his autobiography (1791)

Major authors: Thomas Jefferson, Phillis Wheatley, Elizabeth Cady Stanton

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Sample Work: “The Declaration of Independence”

Time Period: Enlightenment

Dates: set and published in 1776

Point of View: first person

Themes: equality, right to life, liberty, philosophy, divine right of kings

Connection: The signing of ”The Declaration of Independence” marks America freedom from an unruly king. Jefferson discusses, “the establishment of an absolute Tyranny over these states” (2). Liberty is shown in this document by pointing out that the King was unfit to rule and uses the word “tyranny,” cruel and oppressive government rule to explain that. Jefferson writes “Thus marked by every act which may define a Tyrant, is unfit to be ruler of a free people” (4). The King committed horrible and undeserved acts upon the colonies

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Time Period Name: Romanticism / Dark Gothic Romanticism

Years:1820-1860

Major historical Events: Salem Witch Trials (1692), John Winthrop founded Massachusetts Bay Colony (1628), Creek Indian treaty signed (1825)

Authors: Edgar Allan Poe, Nathaniel Hawthorne, Herman Melville

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Sample Work: The Scarlet Letter by

Time period: Romanticism

Dates: published in 1850 set in 1642-1649

Point of view: third person

Theme: sin, punishment, human fallibility, self-destruction, anti-utopia

Connection: Salem Witch trials were set in the book’s time period but not in the time period of romanticism. Witches were seen as cruel,  “[Pearl] made her mother tremble because they had so much the sound of a witch's anathemas in some unknown tongue” (Hawthorne 86) Witchcraft scared many of the puritan belief. During the Scarlet Letter the theme of sin and the devil are prevalent through witchcraft. “Governor Bellingham's bitter-tempered sister, and the same who, a few years later, was executed as a witch” (107) The law was created to burn witches alive if they were caught using magic.

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Time Period Name: Transcendentalism

Years:1840-1860

Major Historical Events:  Annexation Of Texas (1845), Thye fugitive slave act (1850), The Civil War Conflict started (1861)

Major Authors: Henry David Thoreau, Ralph Waldo Emerson, Walt, Whitman

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Sample Work: O Captain! My Captain!

Time Period: Transcendentalism

Dates: published and set in 1865

Point of view: first person

Theme: war, grief, victory, American Voice, human reasoning

Connection: O Captain! My Captain! Written by Walt Whittman portrays the voyage of the Civil War. Whitman refers to the country being peaceful and grounded when he says “The ship is anchored safe and sound” (stanza 3 line 3). The theme of grief is is symbolized through death. As Whitman mourns Abraham Lincolns’ death he says, “But I with mournful tread, Walk the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead” (stanza 3 line 6-8). Whitman is expressing how deeply the men were effected by death. He symbolizes two historical moments during the civil war that brought extreme emotion to America.

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Time Period Name: Slave Narrative

Years: 1820-1865

Major Historical Events: Emancipation Proclamation (1863) Underground Railroad (1800-1865) American Civil War (1861)

Major Authors: Frederick Douglas, William Wells Brown, Harriet Jacobs

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Sample Work: Narrative of the Life of Frederick Douglas

Time Period: Slave Narrative

Dates: published and set in 1845

Point of View: first person

Themes: severity of slavery, white power manipulating, class, religous movements, freedom

Connection:  The underground railroad was an escape route for slaves. “I see and feel assured that those open declarations are a positive evil to the slaves remaining, who are seeking to escape” (Douglass 60). Douglass was opposed to the idea of escape because it was made so public. “I think, by their open declarations, has been made most emphatically the upperground railroad” (Douglass 60). Douglass calls it the “upperground railroad” to explain to the audience that it is practically above ground, considering its lack of privacy.

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Time Period Name: Modernism

Years:1901-1950

Major Historical Events: World War I (1914-1918), The Great Depression (1929-1939), the Holocaust (1941-1945),

Major authors: F. Scott Fitzgerald, Ralph Ellison, Ernest Hemingway

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Sample Work: The Great Gatsby

Time Period: Modernism

Dates: published in 1925 and set in 1922

Point of View: First-person

Themes: the American dream is unattainable, love, class, war, wealth

Connection: WWI highlights the rise of the United States as the world's leading power. Gatsby states, “‘[the War] was a great relief … but I seemed to bear an enchanted life’” (43). This novel, set in the Roaring Twenties, features Gatsby as a product of the era because he lived through the war. Later, Gatsby encountered wealth and prosperity: “They had spent a year in France for no particular reason, and then drifted here and there unrestfully wherever people played polo and were rich together” (10). This quote resembles how after the war, Gatsby lived like it was his last.