DIVISION, RECONCILIATION &

EXPANSION

UNIT 4REALISM

NATURALISM

Economic Development

•NORTH – COMMERCE. The industrial revolution, cheap transportation, education, banking, science, reform movements and immigration all were topics of interest.

•SOUTH – COTTON. Slower paced plantations and farms of cotton, sugar, rice, and tobacco. South depended on slavery.

Slavery Controversy

• 1850 - the passing of the Fugitive Slave Act.

• Required all citizens of free or slave states to help catch runaway slaves.

• Fought the use of slaves in the expansion of the west.

• Novel Uncle Tom’s Cabin helped to fuel the controversy, becoming an anti-slavery tool.

The Civil War

•Fighting began on April 12, 1861 in Fort Sumter, Charleston Harbor.

•Ended in the spring of 1865.•Both sides surprised at the loss of life and destruction.

Expanding America• Physical expansion and industrialization

transformed the landscape, economy, and society after the Civil War.

• Homestead Act of 1862 promised 160 acres of land for a certain period of time to improve and live on it.

• Transforming the west were settlers, railroads, mining & cattle ranches.

• Gone were the buffalo, open range, Indian nations.

Late 19th Century

•1880 population about 50 mill, by the turn of the century, it was just under 76 million!

•Just below the surface of the nation’s prosperity was discontentment.

•Mark Twain dubbed this period “The Gilded Age”

Literature of the Period

•BLACKS – spirituals fused traditional African music with stories from the Bible and hymns.

•WARTIME – diaries, letters, journals, and speeches provided a detailed experience of the time.

•FRONTIER – expansion westward. Local color and Regionalism used to represent the Midwest and Far West.

REALISM

•Harsh reality of frontier life and the reaction and aftermath of the Civil War gave rise to this new lit movement.

•Nation’s idealism was shattered.•Writer’s focused on portraying

“real life”; ordinary people in a factual way.

NATURALISM

• Offshoot of Realism.• Depicted real people in real

situations, but believed that larger forces such as nature, fate, and heredity, shaped the individual.

• Depiction always seemed harsh.• Artistic vision of the author’s was a

vision rooted in war, the frontier, and growing cities.