Due date: 8/29 – Blocks A & B
8/30 – Blocks C, D, & E
Date assigned: 8/27 – Blocks A & B
8/28 – Blocks C, D, & E
The essential question of American Studies is:
What is the American Dream?
Through our studies of literature this year, we will be tracing this idea of the American Dream, and the role it has played in the evolution of our culture, from colonial times to the present day.
Of course, you are not starting from scratch. As people living in this country, you already have your own conception of the American Dream. This writing assignment is a chance for you to take inventory of your current knowledge before you embark on a year of deeper inquiry.
Write a personal, reflective essay on the American Dream as that phrase means to you. Approach this topic in any way you like. Weave in your personal experience, beliefs, questions, doubts, stories you’ve heard, films you’ve seen, opinions of others, or societal views. You are not necessarily presenting a thesis and backing it up with evidence. You are encouraged to raise questions. You are encouraged to address multiple points of view.
Your only parameter: You must refer to at least three of the “thought provokers”—the film clips or the pieces of text—that were presented on the first day of class. Use your freewrite as a starting point. You don’t need to analyze these artifacts; rather, use them as catalysts, examples, or counterpoints to your thinking on the subject. (The thought-provokers are listed below.)
Be interesting. Be thought-provoking. Your essay is your contribution to the critical dialogue of this course.
Film clip from Friday Night Lights (2004; dir. Peter Berg)
Film clip from Napoleon Dynamite (2004; dir. Jared Hess)
Film clip from American Psycho (2000; dir. Mary Harron)
Film clip from Spellbound (2002; dir. Jeffrey Blitz)
Text from the Declaration of Independence, by Thomas Jefferson (1776):
We hold these truths to be self-evident: that all men are created equal, that they are endowed by their Creator with certain unalienable Rights, that among these are Life, Liberty and the pursuit of Happiness; that to secure these rights, governments are instituted among men, deriving their just powers from the consent of the governed; that whenever any form of Government becomes destructive of these ends, it is the right of the people to alter or to abolish it, and to institute new Government, laying its foundation on such principles and organizing its powers in such form, as to them shall seem most likely to effect their safety and happiness.
Although she feeds me bread of bitterness,
And sinks into my throat her tiger’s tooth,
Stealing my breath of life, I will confess
I love this cultured hell that tests my youth!
Her vigor flows like tides into my blood,
Giving me strength erect against her hate.
Her bigness sweeps my being like a flood.
Yet as a rebel fronts a king in state,
I stand within her walls with not a shred
Of terror, malice, not a word of jeer.
Darkly I gaze into the days ahead,
And see her might and granite wonders there,
Beneath the touch of Time’s unerring hand,
Like priceless treasures sinking in the sand.
———————
from Death of a Salesman, by Arthur Muller, 1949
WILLY LOMAN: Without a penny to his name, three great universities are begging for him, and from there the sky’s the limit, because it’s not what you do, Ben. It’s who you know and the smile on your face! It’s contacts, Ben, contacts! The whole wealth of Alaska passes over the lunch table at the Commodore Hotel, and that’s the wonder, the wonder of this country, that a man can end with diamonds here on the basis of being liked!
———————-
A Dream Deferred
by Langston Hughes
What happens to a dream deferred?
Does it dry up
like a raisin in the sun?
Or fester like a sore—
And then run?
Does it stink like rotten meat?
Or crust and sugar over—
like a syrupy sweet?
Maybe it just sags
like a heavy load.
Or does it explode?
Posted by Justin Wells : 09/08/2007