ENGL405: The American Renaissance

We begin this course by looking at context: What was it in American culture and society that led to the dramatic outburst of literary creativity in this era? Each unit starts with a broad overview of the literary period and different ways of framing it before moving on to examine the economic, political, and social changes that were transforming the United States and making a profound impact on the literary production of the era: industrialization and urbanization, the development of mass politics, the debate over slavery, and Western expansion.

Following that context, you will explore some of the period’s most famous works, approaching them by genre category and important literary contributions (Units 2–4).

Because of the varied ways that authors in this course invoke literary tropes and techniques like myth, symbolism, imagery, simile, metaphor, narrative structure, allusions, apostrophe, and others in their works, what we find during this period is indeed an American Renaissance of texts that respond to societal changes and upheavals.

Overall, we attempt to define the emerging American identity represented in this literature and think about the larger implications of this robust textual output (Units 5–7).

Unit 1: The American Renaissance in Context

Unit 2: Continuity and Change in Poetic Form

Unit 3: The Invention of the Short Story

Unit 4: The Development of the Novel and its Various Forms

Unit 5: Nature and Technology: Creating and Challenging American Identity

Unit 6: The Question of Women’s Place in Society

Unit 7: The Slavery Controversy and Abolitionist Literature

Study Guides