...The dominant artistic movement from about 1900 to 1940, modernism was characterized by the reexamination of existence from every possible angle. Modernist writers sought to leave the traditions of nineteenth-century literature behind in terms of form, content, and expression. They realized that a new industrial age—full of machines, buildings, and technology—had ushered out rural living forever, and the result was often a pessimistic view of what lay before humankind. Frequent themes in modernist works are loneliness and isolation (even in cities teeming with people), and a significant number of writers tried to capture that sense of solitude by engaging in stream-of-consciousness writing, which captures the thought process of a single character as it happens without interruption. Some of the most famous modernist authors include Ernest Hemingway, F. Scott Fitzgerald, Virginia Woolf, and James Joyce. 1. Open form and free verse are distinguishing characteristics of modernist poetry. Though commonplace now, this style was quite a break from nineteenth-century rules about meter and rhyme. 2. The moniker “The Lost Generation” was coined by Gertrude Stein and refers to those artists of the 1920s who had become disillusioned with America and found themselves living as ex-patriots in Europe, chiefly in France. 3. An example of stream-of-consciousness (also called “interior monologue”) from Virginia Woolf’s Mrs. Dalloway: “She felt somehow very like him—the young man who...
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...Joyce Samantha B. Gula Introduction / Summary of Postmodernism Postmodernism is the belief that: (1) Most theoretical concepts are defined by their role in the conjectured theoretical network. (A subset are 'operationally' defined by a fairly direct tie to observations.) (2) The theoretical network is incomplete. (3) It follows that theoretical concepts are 'open', or what logicians call 'partially interpreted'. Research continues precisely because they are open; the research task is to 'close' them, although never completely. The current Postmodern belief is that a correct description of Reality is impossible. This extreme skepticism, of which Friedrich Nietzsche, Ludwig Wittgenstein, Karl Popper and Thomas Kuhn are particularly famous, assumes that; a) All truth is limited, approximate, and is constantly evolving (Nietzsche, Kuhn, Popper). b) No theory can ever be proved true - we can only show that a theory is false (Popper). c) No theory can ever explain all things consistently (Godel's incompleteness theorem). d) There is always a separation between our mind & ideas of things and the thing in itself (Kant). e) Physical reality is not deterministic (Copenhagen interpretation of quantum physics, Bohr). f) Science concepts are mental constructs (logical positivism, Mach, Carnap). g) Metaphysics is empty of content. h) Thus absolute and certain truth that explains all things is unobtainable. As Taborsky writes of Postmodern philosophy; .. the Mediated concept...
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...Modernism in the Metamorphoses and the depiction of Modern man The modernist movement in literature began around the turn of the century and created a dramatic change in the way that authors viewed their work. The new breed of writers were extremely affected by the new perception of the world and our place as human beings in it. WW2 was on the verge of the beginning, and the literary world was expressing their fears and attitudes toward their impending doom through their writing. Modernism has a few key themes that Franz Kafka follows throughout his piece ‘The Metamorphosis”. One of the most common themes among popular modernist literature are the rejection of literary tradition through experimentation with a darker style writing. Surrealism was common among pieces which often involved the decaying of the human existence that was occurring in the (at the time) current, more face-paced, disconnected society. In this paper, my goal is to show modernism in “Metamorphoses” and highlight the factors which make Gregor, the epitome of modern man. The isolation and despair that Gregor experienced is obvious from the start. From the very first sentence of the story we notice this solitude. Gregor is lying on his bed in a shape of a gigantic insect and there is nobody around to help him. This theme of isolation is even more present in the rest of the story as we see that Gregor can't depend on anyone for support. He locks himself in his room when he is...
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...Modernism/Postmodernism A representation of belonging in the poem ''I Too'' by Hughes Williams and ''A Wife'S Story'' by Mukherjee In this essay, I compare Hughes poem ''I, too'' published in 1925 (Modernism) and Mukherjee's story ''A Wife' Story'' published in 1988 (Postmodernism). The focus of my comparison will be on belonging as I believe this theme could be attributed to both texts. First of all, the poem ''I, too'' is about a black man who belongs to and wants to be seen as an American which is especially emphasised by the poem's title ''I, too''. A similar expression is used in the last line of the poem which therefore forms a frame. Evidently, this can be understood as a statement which expresses that this person is a citizen of America because he is represented throughout the whole poem from the beginning to the end. The little difference between the first and 18th line can be interpreted as a sort of improvement which takes place within the poem because singing America means he does something to actually belong to it. The statement ''I, too, am America'' can be seen as rather passive; hence it can be argued that the narrator is accepted and finally belongs to the American culture. Furthermore, it becomes apparent that the narrator is excluded from American society by stating that ''they sent me to eat in the kitchen when company comes'' (l.3-4). This citation suggests that he is separated from the others as they do not wish to eat with him but; hence it...
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...Throughout the modernist period composers have been continuously creating texts that influence society through the message that they deliver. Modernity typically refers to the post medieval period, but in context insinuates the intellectual and cultural movements of that time. Great composers such as Fritz Lang, T.S. Elliot and George Orwell have created masterpieces, which embellish the meaning and structure of modernity to create modernist texts. Their pieces, Metropolis, Preludes and 1984 display some key features that reflect the ideas of modernity and the situation in the modern era. In the film Metropolis by Lang, there are messages coded into the movie that must be picked out to provide the full understanding of the ideas portrayed by this film. Some of the messages hidden within the foils of the film are futility, loss of identity and power. These three conceptual ideas influence our understanding of the film and our interpretations of its purpose. The aim of this film was to critique aspects of modernity such as the ideas previously listed. Firstly, futility and loss of identity play a major role in this film. These themes combine in one section but have completely different effects on the viewers opinion. Futility is shown by the lack of choice the workers have and how they all must obey the upper classes and act like a machine. Where as the case of lost identity is rather presented in different light but on the same stage. It is portrayed by the fact that all these...
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...The term “modern” in everyday language means contemporary, new, the latest thing. When we talk about “Modernism” term, modernism is a literary and cultural international movement which flourished in the first decades of the 20th century. It was an intellectual movement and a change that defined itself as the latest thing. During Modernism it seemed like religion and culture fell apart. In modernism people tried to reject tradition and tried new things. This period was marked by large technological advances such as invention of new building material, cars, speed and locomotion. Although modernism brought up innovative and experimental changes, this time period witnessed the First World War and the Great Depression. Those events led people to feel a sense of loss and uncertainty. When it comes to literature, experimentation with the form was another defining characteristic of modernism is not a term that can be described in single term. It may be applied both to the content and to the form of a work, or to either in isolation. It reflects a sense of cultural crisis which was both, exciting and scary. Modernism opened up a whole new pallet of human possibilities at the same time as putting into question any previously accepted means of grounding and evaluating new ideas. “Modernism is marked by experimentation, particularly manipulation of form, and by the realization that knowledge is not absolute.” (Ciaffaroni, 2009). While New York City is in the middle of a heat wave, the residents...
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...the necessary complex and contradictory architecture, which essentially contains ambiguity and tension. Rather than exclude everything, inclusion of unity becomes the task of his architecture. He emphasizes the play of compromising of element which leads to difficult whole. The writing doesn’t reject nor accept any prevailing style, instead it abstracts the element of the building that demonstrates the complexity and contradiction in his thought and from them he combines and derives a new form of hybrid architecture. On the other hand, it had been a controversy topic which he claimed that he was never and won’t be a post- modernism architect. However, his works and theory demonstrate postmodernism architecture which they claimed that they never intended to do so. The tension begins to surface, such influential pieces towards the post modernism, is claimed that the intention was never to be one. The relation between practice and theory of his work is then interrogated and investigated in this writing. Analysis Ambiguity and tension are everywhere in an architecture of complexity and contradiction. Architecture is a form and substance-abstract and concrete and its meaning derives from is interior characteristics and its particular context (Venturi, 1977, p20). Presents day architect, in their visionary compulsion to invent new techniques, have neglected their obligation to be experts in existing conventions. (Venturi, 1977, p43) Old clichés in new settings achieve...
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...Universität Bayreuth “ Notes on Indian Country: Native American Literature” SS 2012 Claudia Deetjen American Modernism and House Made of Dawn Daniel Quitz Matrikelnummer: 1164204 Englisch (5) / Geschichte (5), LA Maximilianstrasse 16, 95444 Bayreuth Tel.: 0176/ 73911615 danielquitz@t-online.de Table of Contents 1. Introduction 2. Defining American Modernism 3. American Modernism in House Made of Dawn 3.1 Complex and Modern Urban Life 3.2 Alienation: The Portrait of a Lost Generation 3.3 The Stream of Consciousness 3.4 Other Features 4. Conclusion 5. Bibliography Quitz 1 1. Introduction When Navarre Scott Momaday first published his award-winning novel House Made of Dawn, literary critics celebrated the book as the Renaissance of Native American Literature. The novel, which won the Pulitzer Prize for fiction in 1969, has influenced both readers and well-known Native American writers such as Leslie Marmon Silko or Sherman Alexie since its first publication. Moreover, it has certainly made the success of Native American Literature possible. This is one of the reasons why Momaday can be considered as the “dean of Native American writers“ (Hager 2). House Made of Dawn is about Abel, a young Native American who returns home to Walatowa from World War II. There, he struggles to reintegrate into the tribal community as he is torn between two different worlds. On the one hand, it is the traditional environment of his pueblo...
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...Notes on post-Fordism and postmodernism Post-Fordism and Postmoderism: * Capitalism requires a large number of low-skilled workers willing to put up with alienating, repetitive work on mass production assembly lines. This system is often called Fordism because the Ford motor company was the first to introduce this. * Bowles and Gintis’ correspondence principle states that school mirrors the work place, and see the mass education system as preparing pupils to accept this kind of work. * Postmodernists argue that this view is out-dated and that society has entered a new postmodern phase and are now fundamentally different from the modern society that both Marxists and Functionalists have written about. * Postmodernists reject the Marxist idea that we still live in a two class society, and the claim that education reproduces class inequality. * They argue that class divisions are no longer important and that society is now much more diverse an fragment. * Postmodernists also argue that the economy has shifted away from assembly-line mass production and is now based on ‘flexible specialisation’ where production is customised for small specialist markets. * The Post-Fordism system requires a skilled, adaptable workforce able to use advanced technology and transfer their skills rapidly from one specialised task to another. * Post-Fordism calls for a different kind of education system where instead of preparing pupils to be low-skilled, low-paid...
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...Walter Gropius Born in Germany Walter Gropius was the third child of Walter Adolph Gropius and Manon Auguste. Walter Gropius served as a sergeant and then as a lieutenant in the signal corps in the First World War. He survived being both buried under rubble and dead bodies, and shot out of the sky with a dead pilot. Like his father and his great-uncle Martin Gropius ,Walter Gropius then became an architect. Gropius's career further emerged in the post war period. He was appointed as master of the Bauhaus school in 1919. It was this academy which Gropius transformed into the world famous ‘Bauhaus’, attracting a faculty that included a lot of talented influential modernist artist. In principle, the Bauhaus represented an opportunity to extend beauty and quality to every home through well designed industrially produced objects. This building ‘The Bauhaus’ designed by Walter Gropius in year 1919 was designed with an emerging style that would forever influence architecture. The current state of the graphic design industry today owes a lot to the Bauhaus movement. The Bauhaus which means ‘building house’ in German, was a design school that persevered throughout a tough time of social and political upheaval to leave one of the biggest stamps on art, architecture and design in the 20th century. Four facts that loomed over the founding of the Bauhaus in 1919 in Germany were the; ...
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...Modernism and the Nuclear family Modernist consist of new right and functionalist who see society as clear cut and one family fits all, as seen by parson who explains that one family type that being nuclear family is uniquely suited to that of modern society such as being geometrically being able to move to suit job the primary socialisation of children and the stabilisation of adult personalities. The New right The new right have an anti-feminist perspective on the family. They are firmly opposed to family diversity. They see the same values as functionalist parson who says that male and females have roles males have instrumentals roles where they’re designed to work and earn food labelled bread winner while females have expressive roles that are designed to look after children, The new right see the nuclear family as natural and based upon biological differences, family is the cornerstone which upheld society a place of refuge contentment and harmony The new right argue that the decline of the traditional nuclear family and growth of family diversity are a cause of social problems such as high crime rates and educational failures One way they see this occurring is because single mothers are unnatural and harmful as they cannot discipline their child propley which results in them become delinquency and become a burden on the welfare state by them become a strain on education which they will fail and therefore become dependent on welfare later in life and repeat the...
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...Post-modernism is the sociological perspective that talks about modern social development as the end of the industrial era, while being critical of the Enlightenment era that its bid to achieve “certainty and universal criteria of perfection and a ‘good life’ was a wasted effort” as stated by Zygmunt Bauman. Furthermore, they challenge the positivistic view of objectivity and challenge it with the concept of relativism. Stating that there are no universals, or any objective scientific truths. The post-modernists further shed light on the changes in society from the industrial era or the modern age to the now post modern age. Much of the post-modern perspective is about how it is almost impossible to scientifically analyze the industrial world...
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...According to Heidi Rimke, criminological modernism theory is centred on the requirement that devotion is placed on the rules of scientific endeavours which will give an objective and authoritative language that will enable social problems to be resolved in a civilised manner (2011) Unlike classical criminology of the 18th century which main focus was on calculated choices made by the rational human agent, criminological positivism assumes that natural science should be the implemented method applied to the objective study of criminality. This line of thinking emerged in the 19th century during what was said to be a much more broader movement that saw all social problems scrutinized in the course of a scientific viewpoint. Positivism is a pathological approach to human conduct fashioned either or jointly by biological, psychological or psychiatric factors and attributes which are isolated and measured, at the root of any criminal activity, the mind and body are perceived to be flawed (Hester and Eglin 1992). Criminality is perceived to be a naturally caused beyond individual control, it occurred due to the disordered psyche, mind or body. Theorists argue that criminals commit crime due to a faulty reasoning and the prevention of crime should focus on re-education of criminals. They can be changed into being productive and useful members of the society and can be reformed from criminal activities. Punishment is viewed in order to fit the criminal depending on they type of...
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...Alex Pravat Wednesday, January 7, 2015 Honors English Period 5 MOTM Annotated Bibliography Annotated Bibliography Benigni, Umberto. "Pope Pius X." The Catholic Encyclopedia. Vol. 12. New York: Robert Appleton Company, 1911. 6 Jan. 2015 This website explores Giuseppe Sarto’s life from the time when he was born to when he died in 1914. Through descriptive language and copious details, the author of this biography helped me understand how Sarto got to where he was through the support of his peers. I learned how big of an influence Catholicism was on him and his life. The author is very well-informed, and as a result the details are factual and unbiased. I used many of the facts from this article to write my resume and speech as accurately as possible. "Fondazione Giuseppe Sarto." Fondazione Giuseppe Sarto. N.p., n.d. Web. 08 Jan. 2015. This website was among my most helpful sources because it is dedicated to Pope Pius X, and is therefore very well written and has a great number of articles pertaining to his life. Within the website, there are various links that lead to primary as well as secondary sources. I used a couple of primary sources found here as well as the biography to help write my speech. The articles were great and very original, which proved to be a huge help when trying to write an authentic-seeming speech. The only problem with this source is the language in which it is written, Italian. This meant that in order to read the text, I had to use a translator...
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...Assignment Topic: Which do you think offers more useful lessons to today’s architecture students, Archigram magazine or High-rise social housing? 1. Introduction Modernism in architecture realm, itself is full of controversies and evolution. The definition of modernism, modern or modernity in architecture area has been highly discussed through the development of architecture by plenty of scholars and architects. In general, “Modern” means something pure, logical, universal, rational or at least international (Glendinning and Muthesius, 1956). Both Archigram magazine and High-rise social housing have strongly influenced British Modernism. Archigram proposed fantastic designs with lots of imagination, which brought a brainstorm and a visual shock against classical architecture. However, the development of high-rise social housing tends to be more conventional and realistic than Archigram. Indeed high-rise social housing is fragile owing to the changes in policies and people’s preference. The purpose of this assignment is to discuss, compare and contrast Archigram magazine and high-rise social housing in British Modernism area. A brief introduction of both Archigram magazine and high-rise social housing is provided. Finally, a conclusion about which one is more useful to today’s architecture students will be derived. 2. Main body 2.1 Archigram Magazine A prestigious architecture magazine named Archigram was first published in 1961 by Peter Cook and David Greene with...
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