Final Exam
Ground Rules:
I’m not looking for an official answer. Not an authoritative answer. Instead, your honest answer. Internet language receives 0 points.
Hence, No outside research is warranted. All concepts in this exam can be found in our Module documents, our assigned readings, or classroom discussions.
Remember: Do not offer general, conceptual explanations. No filler explanations. Filler explanations earn 0 points. E.g., Do not explain the sublime to me. I already know what it means. Instead, apply your knowledge of the sublime to your answers.
Hence, write brief paragraphs. A paragraph is about half a page, double spaced. Make your point and move on. There is much to do.
The Sublime in Literature and Art
What example of the sublime did I give in class, which I claimed satisfies both of Kant’s sublime subcategories? (The mathematical and the dynamic sublime). Explain how this example satisfies both subcategories of the sublime—that is, explain from your experience or from your imagination of experiencing this example. (One paragraph, 5 pts.)
In what way(s) was the Dallas solar eclipse a sublime experience? (One paragraph, 5 pts.)
What do you find admirable in this passage from Nature by Emerson? Use the criteria in the Vital Reading doctrine. Cite specific phrasings below to make your case. (One paragraph, 5 points)
“To GO into solitude, a man needs to retire as much from his chamber as from society. I am not solitary whilst I read and write, though nobody is with me. But if a man would be alone, let him look at the stars. The rays that come from those heavenly worlds will separate between him and what he touches. One might think the atmosphere was made transparent with this design, to give man, in the heavenly bodies, the perpetual presence of the sublime. Seen in the streets of cities, how great they are! If the stars should appear one night in a thousand years, how would men believe and adore; and preserve for many generations the remembrance of the city of God which had been shown! But every night come out these envoys of beauty, and light the universe with their admonishing smile.” — Ralph Waldo Emerson
Sublime or Picturesque?
(A) Of the two paintings below, which is classically sublime and which picturesque? Why so?
(B) Identify at least one element or aspect in each painting that you could argue suggests the opposite of the dominant reading (sublime/pictorial). Explain the exception(s) you find. (Two paragraphs, for (A) and (B); 5 pts. each, 10 points total)
Sanford Robinson Gifford, The Wilderness, 1860, o/c, Toledo Museum of Art
Sanford Robinson Gifford, The Wilderness, 1860, o/c, Toledo Museum of Art
Albert Bierstadt, The Hetch Hetchy Valley, California, late 19th c.
Albert Bierstadt, The Hetch Hetchy Valley, California, late 19th c.
The Transcendental
Anna Julia Cooper
How would you interpret this passage as transcendentalist? (One paragraph, 5 points)
“Is it true that the exponents of woman’s advancement, the leaders in woman’s thought, the preachers and teachers of all woman’s reforms, can teach this nation to be courteous, to be pitiful, having compassion one of another, not rendering evil for inoffensiveness, and railing in proportion to the improbability of being struck back; but contrariwise, being all of one mind, to love as brethren?” –Anna Julia Cooper
Song of Myself
Identify at least two ways in which Whitman signals his transcendental disposition in these opening lines from Leaves of Grass. Cite the phrases in the poem you use for evidence. (5 points)
I celebrate myself,
And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you.
I loafe and invite my soul,
I lean and loafe at my ease . . . . observing a spear of summer grass.
– Walt Whitman
Portrait Gallery
(A) Who are these women? (B) What book are they known for? (C) Why are they photographed with books? (I.e., when contemporary men are not photographed with books.) What is the political, social difference, in your opinion? (Two brief paragraphs, 10 points)
Margaret Fuller and Anna Julia Cooper
Sitting Bull
Sitting Bull was not a transcendentalist. Yet, how would you imagine a transcendentalist sympathizing with his statement below? What resonance can you point to? Be specific. Cite specific phrasing for your argument. (One paragraph, 5 points)
“White men like to dig in the ground for their food. My people prefer to hunt the buffalo… White men like to stay in one place. My people want to move their tepees here and there to different hunting grounds. The life of white men is slavery. They are prisoners in their towns or farms. The life my people want is freedom.”
— Sitting Bull
Vital Reading
W. E. B. Du Bois
Perform (a) a “vital reading” of this passage by Du Bois, OR, (b) a contextual reading—i.e., What does this passage exemplify in Du Bois’s essay, “Strivings”? It appears at the bottom of p. 195. (One paragraph, 5points)
“The innate love of harmony and beauty that set the ruder souls of his people a-dancing, a-singing, and a-laughing raised but confusion and doubt in the soul of the black artist; for the beauty revealed to him was the soul-beauty of a race which his larger audience despised, and he could not articulate the message of another people.”
— W. E. B. Du Bois
Portrait Gallery
(A) Who are these men? (B) What are they known for? (C) What effect (significance) did they have on American history? (Beyond any single event.) (D) Interpret the difference between their portraits: How do their portraits convey what they stood for? (One page, 10 points)
Portrait Gallery
Perform a “vital reading” of the following passage by Frederick Douglass, from “We Have Decided to Stay” (1848), p. 22. (One paragraph, 5 points)
“Sir, I would like to bring more vividly to before this audience, the wrongs of my down-trodden countrymen. I have no disposition to look at this matter in any sentimental light, but to bring before you stern facts, and keep forever before the American people the damning and disgraceful fact, that three millions of people are in chains to-day that while we are here speaking in their behalf, saying noble words and doing noble deeds, they are under the yoke, smarting beneath the lash, sundered from each other, trafficked in and brutally treated; and that the American nation, to keep them in their present condition, stands ready with its ten thousand bayonets, to plunge them into their hearts. If they attempt to strike for their freedom, I want every man north of Mason and Dixons line, whenever they attend an Anti-Slavery meeting, to remember that it is the Northern area that does this that you are not only guilty of withholding your influence, but that you are the positive enemies of the slave, the positive holders of the slave, and that in your right arm rests the physical power that keeps him under the yoke.”
— Frederick Douglass
Lydia Maria Child
What is the vital lesson of this passage from Lydia Maria Child’s 1843 letter, “Woman’s Rights”? (p. 186) Cite evidentiary phrasings for your claim. (One paragraph, 5 points)
“This sort of politeness to women is what men call gallantry; an odious word to every sensible woman, because she sees that it is merely the flimsy veil which foppery throws over sensuality, to conceal its grossness. So far is it from indicating sincere esteem and affection for women, that the profligacy of a nation may, in general, be fairly measured by its gallantry. This taking away rights, and condescending to grant privileges, is an old trick of the physical force principle; and with the immense majority, who only look on the surface of things, this mask effectually disguises an ugliness, which would otherwise be abhorred. The most inveterate slaveholders are probably those who take most pride in dressing their household servants handsomely, and who would be most ashamed to have the name of being unnecessarily cruel. And profligates, who form the lowest and most sensual estimate of women, are the very ones to treat them with an excess of outward deference.”
— Lydia Maria Child
What’s Going On?
What’s going on in this cartoon? Frederick Douglass discusses this in “We Have Decided to Stay” (pp. 20–21). Describe at least two historical events depicted in this cartoon that were of concern to 19th-century transcendentalists. (One paragraph, 5 points)
Richard Doyle, The Land of Liberty, 1847, for Punch Magazine, London, EnglandRichard Doyle, The Land of Liberty, 1847, for Punch Magazine, London, England
Education
How do you understand the difference between Experience and Learning, as presented in our class, not in any general sense. Provide an example from our class. (5 points)
Reflection Question
Read this passage from Sarah Moore Geimké’s 1837 letter, “On the Condition of Women in the United States” (p. 48).
“In most families, it is considered a matter of far more consequence to call a girl off from making a pie, or a pudding, than to interrupt her whilst engaged in her studies. This mode of training necessarily exalts, in their view, the animal above the intellectual and spiritual nature, and teaches women to regard themselves as a kind of machinery, necessary to keep the domestic engine in order, but of little value as the intelligent companions of men.”
— Sarah Moore Geimké
How does Grimké’s metaphor about ‘machinery keeping the domestic engine running,’ in contrast to ‘intelligent companionship,’ echo or complement our classroom discussions about education vs. learning? Optional Wry Question: What puddings, if any, do you see yourself making in your imagined future? (One paragraph, 5 points)
The End
