Category: early american literature

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Some Reflections on CLA 2017

Over that past 14-15 years, I have attended numerous academic conferences, typically 1-2 per year. That means I have gone to about 28-30 during that time span. Initially, when I would go to a conference, even one with hundreds of people, I would feel alone and somewhat isolated because, as a graduate student and instructor, I did not necessarily know how to take full … Read More Some Reflections on CLA 2017

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My Five Favorite Posts from 2016

This past year, close to one hundred posts have appeared on Interminable Rambling. With the end of 2016 in our rear-view mirror, I want to take the opportunity to highlight my five favorite posts from last year. You can see my favorite posts from 2015 as well. The posts from 2016 ranged in subject matter from pop culture and music to pedagogical approaches in … Read More My Five Favorite Posts from 2016

Tumblr Projects in the Literature Classroom

Last month, I published “Tumblr, Blogger, and Wikis in the Literature Classroom.” Today, I want to briefly discuss that post then share with you some of the products that students created in my literature survey courses. For the assignment, I gave each group (two students each) a term or historical event. Each group had to have three aspects to their presentation/Tumblr post.

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Herman Melville’s Bartleby and Civil Disobedience?

When I asked students what they thought of Herman Melville’s Bartleby, the Scrivener, most expressed frustration with Bartleby because they did not know his motivations. Truthfully, we never really know for sure what drives Bartleby to continue to tell his employer, “I would prefer not to.” However, I would argue, as some have done, that we should read Melville’s story, as we do Rebecca … Read More Herman Melville’s Bartleby and Civil Disobedience?

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Rebecca Harding Davis And Emerson’s Transcednentalism

In Bits of Gossip (1904), Rebecca Harding Davis tells about a dinner she had with Emerson, Hawthorne, Alcott, and others. Of the dinner conversation, she writes, “You heard much sound philosophy and many sublime guesses at the eternal verities; in fact, never were the eternal verities so discussed and pawed over and turned inside out as they were about that time, in Boston, by … Read More Rebecca Harding Davis And Emerson’s Transcednentalism