...Throughout My Antonia, there is one constant symbol that never changes, but brings about change in the characters. This symbol is simply the Nebraskan landscape. The vivid detail that Willa Cather uses in her writing paints a very expressive picture of what living on the frontier in the 1880’s is like. Although all characters are affected by the land they live on, Jim Burden connects on a deeper level of understanding with nature. From a broad perspective, it can truly symbolize Jim’s character as a whole, such as how he believes happiness comes to oneself. The relationships that Jim forms with the people he lived with also show this same symbolic meaning. Jim’s thoughts about himself are portrayed well throughout the books such as when he...
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...Deceased American author, Willa Cather, expressed in My Ántonia, “ More than any other person we remembered, this girl seemed to mean to us the country, the conditions, the whole adventure of our childhood.” The tale of My Ántonia revolves around Jim Burden and his childhood in Nebraska, where he meets a friend named Ántonia Shimerda whose family comes from Bohemia. The storyline of My Ántonia, although interesting in some parts, was difficult for me to become engulfed in. A result of this meant that often I was working to persuade myself just to get through another few pages. However, for those absorbed in mid western stories, My Ántonia would be an exceptional read. All in all, My Ántonia, though an engaging book to most, left me disinterested...
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...Throughout My Antonia, Jim learns many things throughout his childhood that saves him from being a spoiled child. As a sensitive observer of what others experience, he is able to learn important lessons that help enrich his life into one of which he can openly embrace Antonia’s country family. From Jim’s point of view in My Antonia by Willa Cather, Jim is able to take the actions and experiences of other characters to influence his life and own conduct and behavior. Characters such as Mr. Shimerda, Mrs. Shimerda, and Grandfather and Grandmother Burden played a key role in the influencing of Jim’s life. To begin with, Jim was impacted by many lessons he was taught indirectly by Mr. Shimerda. Even though Mr. Shimerda and his family came to America with little belongings and money, he was...
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...Threshold experiences in the novels My Antonia and The Age of Innocence In any a piece of literature setting is an essential pillar of narrative construction: it not only includes some factual information about time and place or provides the background in which the events take place, but also has the power to shape the habits and attitudes of their users, or characters. Both Willa Cather in My Antonia and Edith Wharton in The Age of Innocence create the particular narrative texture that implicates some dynamics, i.e. some shifts and changes – on the one hand, the setting of the novels continually changes, and this invariably entails the changing of the characters. Since the setting doesn’t remain static, each time it changes there should be some “turning point”, from which moment on the further development of events becomes completely different. But what exactly this turning point is, what are those “triggers” that help to create this dynamic picture, how can we trace the changes and the molding and development of characters’ personalities, the changes of their identities? The thing is that the authors of both above-mentioned novels create series of “threshold experiences” taking place at the most significant, climatic points in the lives of the protagonists, acting like triggers, indicating some transformations in the outer world of the characters that entail the changes in their inner world as well. These thresholds operate on all levels: separating the interior...
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...Essay 2: My Ántonia Nostalgia From the outside, farm life reflects the notion of simple living. The same chores are to take place every day, at the same time, during the same season, and so on. However, farm life is much more complicated when explained by a person from within the community; from a more personal level. The men, women and children all have specific tasks to accomplish that are essential to keeping the farm running smoothly. The jobs around the farm have been learned by the young ones, and taught by their elders in a continuous circuit. In a way, the teaching is a reflection of the past by the adults, and a connection to the present by the children. In My Ántonia, by Willa Cather, farm life is looked at from within the circle, but the past and its connection to the present is examined even more closely. The tone of My Ántonia is very nostalgic, and represents the narrator, Jim’s, feelings toward his memories. The epigraph “Optima dies...prima fugit,” or “The best days are the first to flee,” sets up the novel with this sense of wistfulness (Cather 142). Willa Cather juxtaposes the happier times of childhood to the hardships of adulthood through her characters: Jim, Ántonia and Samson. Cather portrays the children as having feelings of more self-worth than they do as adults. Through Jim’s memoir, based on his love for his Ántonia, he is able to connect and reestablish his vanished past in the prairie with his life now as a high powered lawyer. When Jim Burden moved...
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...16 October 2012 College Writing I The novels My Antonia and The Great Gatsby have characters that I believe have many similarities and differences. Nick Carraway and Jim Burden were raised in entirely different ways and settings and both characters play key roles throughout the plot of each story. Although these two characters do not draw many similarities at first glance, I believe the two can be connected from one story to the other. My first point being that both Nick and Jim are the respective narrators in their stories and even though the novels are completely different the role these two characters play can be interpreted as similar. Both of these characters find themselves in interesting dilemma’s, in which they reveal their true colors. Even though most people would say these two characters are very much different, I believe a significant connection can be made between these two characters because they both end up chasing their own American Dream at some point throughout the stories. Nick Carraway describes himself as a hardworking, tolerant, open minded intellectual. Nick was born and raised in Minnesota and attended Yale University; he served in the military during World War 1. I believe the fact that he served in the military showed his dedication to protecting the country even though he had plans to become something greater. He later moved to New York in 1922 to become more educated on the bond business. While in New York he meets Jay Gatsby who happens to be...
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...Shimerda, Antonia's father, is arguably the most tragic character in Cather's story and his life is short-lived on the prairie. But his legacy lives on in his daughter Antonia, her children, and in his influence on Jim Burden. Later, when Mr. Shimerda kills himself it is the depth of winter, and despair is all he sees. His suicide leaves Antonia without a father and a spiritual support, because she was closest to him and she understood him with her heart. Often, Antonia and Jim speak of Mr. Shimerda, and later they meet near his grave. Jim finds a peacefulness there that he cannot find in his adult...
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...1. Jim defines happiness in Book 1, Section II as “... When it comes to one, it comes as naturally as sleep.” In Book 1, Section II it mentions in the beginning “I do not remember the arrival at my grandmother’s farm sometime before daybreak, after a drive nearly twenty miles with heavy work- horses. When I awake, it was afternoon. I was lying in a little room, scarcely bigger than the bed that had held him and the window-shade at his head was flapping softly in a warm wind.” Jim described his grandmother “A tall woman, with wrinkled brown skin and black hair, stood looking down at me; I knew that she must be my grandmother.” Jimmy’s grandmother had been crying, he could see, but when he opened his eyes she smiled, peered at him fearfully and sat...
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...2. I think Jim grows more than she does in thier relationship. Antonia learns to speak english, but Jim grows to like people from all over the world, not caring where they are from. At the begining of the book, Jim doesn't care for people who are not from his own country. When he hears what Antonia's family has to go through, he tells her, "People who don't like this country ought to stay at home … We don't make them come here". At the end of the book, he ends up appreiating and learning what makes Antonia and people like her succesful. "The girls I knew were always helping to pay for ploughs and reapers, brood-sows, or steers to fatten," he explains. "One result of this family solidarity was that the foreign farmers in our county were the first to become prosperous". He sees the valie of a system that isn't his own. At the end of the book, Jim explains to the reader the ways that he has grown. “I knew that I should never be a scholar. I could never lose myself for long among impersonal things. Mental excitement was apt to send me with a rush back to my own naked land and the figures scattered upon it. … I suddenly found myself thinking of the places and people of my own infinitesimal past....
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...[pic] Каушанская. Сборник упражнений по грамматике английского языка Part I. ACCIDENCE THE NOUN Exercise 1. State the morphological composition of the following nouns. Snow, sandstone, impossibility, widower, opinion, exclamation, passer-by, misunderstanding, inactivity, snowball, kingdom, anticyclone, mother-of-pearl, immobility, might, warmth, succession, ex-president, nurse, misdeed, wisdom, blackbird, attention, policeman, merry-go-round, girlhood, usefulness, fortune, friendship, statesman, brother-in-law, population, fellow-boarder, smelling-salt. Exercise 2. Point out the nouns and define the class each belongs to. 1. Don't forget, Pettinger, Europe is still the heart of the world, and Germany the heart of Europe. (Heym) 2. Pursuing his inquiries, Clennam found that the Gowan family were a very distant ramification of the Barnacles... (Dickens) 3. His face was sick with pain and rage. (Maltz) 4. He drank coffee, letting the warmth go through his cold, tired body. (This is America) 5. But there is only one place I met with the brotherhood of man, and it was in the Communist Party. (This is America) 6. The mysteries of storm and the rain and tide were revealed. (Galsworthy) 7. Having set the tea, she stood by the table and said slowly: "Tea's ready, Father. I'm going to London." (Galsworthy) 8. By this time, quite a small crowd had collected, and people were asking each other what was the matter. (Jerome i(. Jerome) 9. There were several...
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...Longman English Grammar L G.Alexander Consultant- R A. Close, CBE Pearson Education Limited, Edinburgh Gate, Harlow, Essex CM20 2JE, England and Associated Companies throughout the world www longman com © Longman Group UK Limited 1988 All rights reserved, no part of the publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the Publishers Distributed in the United States of America by Longman publishing, New York First published 1988 Twentieth impression 2003 BRITISH LIBRARY CATALOGUING IN PUBLICATION DATA Alexander L G Longman English Grammar 1 English language - Text-books for foreign speakers 1 Title 428 2'4 PE1128 LIBRARY OF CONGRESS CATALOGING IN PUBLICATION DATA Alexander, L G Longman English Grammar/L G Alexander, consultant, R A Close p cm Includes index ISBN 0-582-55892-1 1 English language - Grammar - 1950- 2 English language Text-books for foreign speakers 1 Close, R A II Title PE1112A43 1988 428 2'4-dc19 87-22519 CIP Set in 8 on 9 1/2pt Linotron 202 Helvetica Printed in China SWTC/20 Louis Alexander was born in London in 1932 He was educated at Godalming Grammar School and London University He taught English in Germany (1954-56) and Greece (1956-65), where he was Head of the English Department of the Protypon Lykeion, Athens He was adviser to the Deutscher Volkshochschulverband...
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...any information storage or retrieval system, without written permission from the publishers. Trademark Notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. Library of Congress Cataloging‑in‑Publication Data Tyson, Lois, 1950‑ Critical theory today : a user‑friendly guide / Lois Tyson.‑‑ 2nd ed. p. cm. Includes bibliographical references and index. ISBN 0‑415‑97409‑7 (hb) ‑‑ ISBN 0‑415‑97410‑0 (pb) 1. Criticism. I. Title. PN81.T97 2006 801’.95‑‑dc22 Visit the Taylor & Francis Web site at http://www.taylorandfrancis.com and the Routledge Web site at http://www.routledge‑ny.com 2006001722 I gratefully dedicate this book to my students and to my teachers. I hope I will always have difficulty telling you apart. Contents Preface to the second edition Preface for instructors...
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...ALSO BY JOHN GREEN Looking for Alaska An Abundance of Katherines Paper Towns Will Grayson, Will Grayson W ITH DAVID LEVITHAN DUTTON BOOKS | An imprint of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. DUTTON BOOKS A MEMBER O F PENGUIN GRO UP (USA ) INC . Published by the Penguin Group | Penguin Group (USA ) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A . | Penguin Group (C anada), 90 Eglinton A v enue East, Suite 700, Toronto, O ntario M4P 2Y3, C anada (a div ision of Pearson Penguin C anada Inc.) | Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC 2R 0RL, England | Penguin Ireland, 25 St Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a div ision of Penguin Books Ltd) | Penguin Group (A ustralia), 250 C amberw ell Road, C amberw ell, V ictoria 3124, A ustralia (a div ision of Pearson A ustralia Group Pty Ltd) | Penguin Books India Pv t Ltd, 11 C ommunity C entre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi - 110 017, India | Penguin Group (NZ), 67 A pollo Driv e, Rosedale, A uckland 0632, New Zealand (a div ision of Pearson New Zealand Ltd) | Penguin Books (South A frica) (Pty ) Ltd, 24 Sturdee A v enue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South A frica | Penguin Books Ltd, Registered O ffices: 80 Strand, London WC 2R 0RL, England This book is a w ork of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously , and any resemblance to actual persons, liv ing or dead, business establishments, ev ents, or locales is entirely coincidental. C opy right ©...
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...ALSO BY JOHN GREEN Looking for Alaska An Abundance of Katherines Paper Towns Will Grayson, Will Grayson W ITH DAVID LEVITHAN DUTTON BOOKS | An imprint of Penguin Group (USA) Inc. DUTTON BOOKS A MEMBER O F PENGUIN GRO UP (USA ) INC . Published by the Penguin Group | Penguin Group (USA ) Inc., 375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, U.S.A . | Penguin Group (C anada), 90 Eglinton A v enue East, Suite 700, Toronto, O ntario M4P 2Y3, C anada (a div ision of Pearson Penguin C anada Inc.) | Penguin Books Ltd, 80 Strand, London WC 2R 0RL, England | Penguin Ireland, 25 St Stephen’s Green, Dublin 2, Ireland (a div ision of Penguin Books Ltd) | Penguin Group (A ustralia), 250 C amberw ell Road, C amberw ell, V ictoria 3124, A ustralia (a div ision of Pearson A ustralia Group Pty Ltd) | Penguin Books India Pv t Ltd, 11 C ommunity C entre, Panchsheel Park, New Delhi - 110 017, India | Penguin Group (NZ), 67 A pollo Driv e, Rosedale, A uckland 0632, New Zealand (a div ision of Pearson New Zealand Ltd) | Penguin Books (South A frica) (Pty ) Ltd, 24 Sturdee A v enue, Rosebank, Johannesburg 2196, South A frica | Penguin Books Ltd, Registered O ffices: 80 Strand, London WC 2R 0RL, England This book is a w ork of fiction. Names, characters, places, and incidents are either the product of the author’s imagination or are used fictitiously , and any resemblance to actual persons, liv ing or dead, business establishments, ev ents, or locales is entirely coincidental. C opy right ©...
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...[pic] FIRST ARMY EQUAL OPPORTUNITY REPRESENTATIVE COURSE STUDENT GUIDE TO CULTURAL AWARENESS INDEX LESSON TITLE PAGE 1 Philosophical Aspects of Culture SG- 3 C1 Native American Experience SG- 4 C2 White American Experience SG- 23 C3 Arab American Experience SG- 43 C4 Hispanic American Experience SG- 53 C5 Black American Experience SG- 76 C6 Asian American Experience SG-109 C7 Jewish American Experience SG-126 C8 Women in the Military SG-150 C9 Extremist Organizations/Gangs SG-167 STUDENTS ARE RESPONSIBLE FOR BEING FAMILIARIZED WITH ALL CLASS MATERIAL PRIOR TO CLASS. INFORMATION PAPER ON THE PHILOSOPHICAL ASPECTS OF CULTURAL DIFFERENCE Developed by Edwin J. Nichols, Ph.D. |Ethnic Groups/ |Axiology |Epistemology |Logic |Process | |World Views | | | | | |European |Member-Object |Cognitive |Dichotomous |Technology | |Euro-American |The highest value lies in the object |One knows through counting |Either/Or...
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