Planes, (subway) trains, automobiles and World War I—A dramatic shift in sensibilities ocurred as a result of these factors of modern life.
Images courtesy of American Memory
Subject Areas
History and Social Studies
U.S. History - World War I
Literature and Language Arts
American
British
Poetry
Time Required
1 class period
Skills
critical analysis and interpretation
using primary sources
“The English novelist Virginia Woolf declared that human nature
underwent a fundamental change "on or about December 1910." The
statement testifies to the modern writer's fervent desire to break with the
past, rejecting literary traditions that seemed outmoded and diction that
seemed too genteel to suit an era of technological breakthroughs and global
violence.”
—from the EDSITEment reviewed Academy
of American Poets “The
Modernist Revolution: Make It New”
Understanding the context of literary modernism (specifically, modernist poetry)
is important for students before they analyze modernist texts themselves. To
that end, this lesson enables students to explore and consider the forces that
prompted such a “fundamental change” in human nature. In this lesson,
students will explore the rise of cities; profound technological changes in
transportation, architecture, and engineering; a rising population that engendered
crowds and chaos in public spaces; factory life; and the aftermath of WWI. Students
will begin to understand how these influential factors contributed to making
individuals feel less unique and more alienated, fragmented, and at a loss in
their daily lives and larger worlds.
Guiding Question
What are several historical, social, and cultural forces that prompted
the modernist movement?
What were the effects of these influential factors?
Learning Objective
Students will understand the historical, social, and cultural context of
modernism at large.
Preparing to Teach This Lesson
Review the lesson plan. Locate and bookmark suggested materials and other
useful websites. Download and print out documents you will use and duplicate
copies as necessary for student viewing.
Ask students to define the term “modern” in general? Write
descriptions on the blackboard/whiteboard, and ask students to think of different
contexts in which the term is used.
“The term modernism refers to the radical shift in aesthetic and
cultural sensibilities evident in the art and literature of the post-World
War One period. The ordered, stable and inherently meaningful world view
of the nineteenth century could not, wrote T.S. Eliot, accord with ‘the
immense panorama of futility and anarchy which is contemporary history.’..
rejecting nineteenth-century optimism, [modernists] presented a profoundly
pessimistic picture of a culture in disarray.”
Pass out the following blank Aspects
of Modernism chart (available as a PDF) or have students use the Online
Interactive Chart.
Based on the quotation above, help students brainstorm some of the differences
between Romantic and modern periods, which may include the following:
Pre-Modern
World (e.g., Romantic, Victorian Periods)
Modern World
(early 20th century)
Ordered
Chaos
Meaningful
Futile
Optimistic
Pessimistic
Stable
Unstable
Faith
Loss of
Faith
Morality/Values
Collapse
of Morality/Values
Clear Sense
of Identity
Confused
Sense of Identity and Place in World
Have students keep this chart, which they will add to as they continue with
Lesson Three of this curriculum unit.
Note that the English novelist Virginia Woolf proclaimed that, “human
nature underwent a fundamental change ‘on or about December 1910.’
[From the Academy of American Poets “The
Modernist Revolution: Make It New” ]. Her claim was in reaction
to the transformative post-Impressionist exhibit curated by critic Robert
Fry, which featured artists such as Gaugin, Cézanne, and Van Gogh.
Ask students to consider what this statement means—to undergo a fundamental
change in human nature. Discuss with students their own experience of such
a shift in human nature. While many students will likely mention September
11th, encourage students to think of other profound changes: computers, the
Internet, and World Wide Web; space travel, including the space station and
the Mars rovers; 24 hour news networks; the prevalence of cameras and digital
photography; and so forth. Ask students to think broadly and write down specific
emotional and social changes they have experienced in their daily lives because
of these changes.
2. Exploring the Context of Modernist Poetry
Now that students have briefly considered how events and inventions can
radically affect our worldview, redirect them to the late nineteenth and early
twentieth centuries. The following exercise may work equally well working
as individuals, in groups, or as a class. If working as a class on a single
computer or if you wish to provide students with a brief introduction before
group work, lead students through a tour of the interactive timeline from
the EDSITEment-reviewed resource Learner.org:
Timeline:
Events of 1876-1999. Focus on the late 1800s and 1900s. The class may
also review the Twentieth-century
Timeline, a link accessed via the EDSITEment-reviewed Internet
Public Library. While not all on the same scale of September 11th, certain
historical, social, and cultural forces prompted the same kind of wide-scale
change in the way individuals thought about their world. Ask students what
some of these influential forces were. Students should see events such as:
the rise of cities; profound technological changes in transportation, architecture,
and engineering; a rising population that engendered crowds and chaos in public
spaces; a growing sense of mass markets often made individuals; and WWI contributed
to making people feel less individual and more alienated, fragmented, and
at a loss in their daily lives and worlds.
Divide students into five small groups. Assign each small group to one of
the five topics listed below. Ask students to explore the assigned resources
and to try to imagine life before and after the key moments in history. These
sites primarily focus on U.S. history.
Have each group assign a scribe, and ask each group to list at least five
adjectives to describe how life must have been within the context of the topic
they explore as a small group. Emphasize that students should consider these
topics within the context of how an individual would respond to these social,
cultural, technological, and historical changes.
Inventions/Technological Breakthroughs
Have students explore the Interactive
Timeline: Inventions 1868-1898, from the EDSITEment-reviewed resource
Learner.org. The group should assign
a person to take notes, jotting down 4-5 inventions for discussion.
Students should explore the following sites as well: “Inventing
Entertainment,” from the Library of Congress American
Memory Project. Point students to the following videos in particular:
Ask students in this group should consider the following questions as they
note key inventions/technological advancements at the turn-of-the-19th century:
What were some of the primary effects/ramifications of each invention/technological
breakthrough?
How do you think individuals responded to the inventions/technological
advancements? What became easier? What became harder in one’s daily
life?
What are some of the effects of the invention of motion pictures (both
in terms of the technology itself and the ability to capture moving images
of various content/subject matters)?
Rise of the City
Prompt students to compare and contrast rural and urban life. Discuss with
them the rise of the city that occurred with the influx of immigration, continued
industrialization of the United States (especially the North), and the rise
of now commonplace features like major department stores and their window
displays.
Have this group watch the following early videos of New York, available
via the EDSITEment reviewed American Memory website, asking them to pay attention to people, traffic, and crowds.
How would you feel if you were an individual navigating these city
scenes?
What elements of each city scene video stand out to you and why?
Imagine first riding on an elevated railroad through a city or in a
city subway? What would this ride feel like if you never had experienced
it before?
How might these changes effect how people responded to the city? To
each other? Teachers might prompt students to consider, for example, how
the layout of the school building or the way they move between classes—or
from class to home—influences their relationships with other people.
Imagine first riding on an elevated railroad through a city or in a
city subway? What would this ride feel like if you never had experienced
it before?
Compare the pedestrians, horse/carriages you see to the new forms of
transportation. What differences do you notice in these early films?
What would life be like before the advancements in transportation in
the late 1800s/early 1900s? What effects did such technological breakthroughs
have on individuals in their local and larger worlds?
How would you describe working in a factory in the early 20th century?
What is the relationship between the factory worker and the machines
such as those depicted in the Westinghouse videos?
Think about “Girls taking time checks,” “Girls winding
armatures,” and the panoramic overviews? What do these images suggest
about an individual factory worker’s own place within the factory
at large?
What do you imagine the experience of emerging from a WWI trench was
like for a soldier? To what can you compare such an experience?
What do you think of the war-devastated landscape? How would you feel
if you lived in such a European city after WWI?
What emotional effects do the before and after pictures elicit? Compare
these pictures to contemporary images (of September 11th, the War in Afghanistan,
the War in Iraq).
Assessment
Assessment options include the following exercises:
Have each student group present their findings, including their list of
adjectives, from the small group activity to the full class. Write all adjectives
on the blackboard/whiteboard. Lead brief full class discussions on each topic,
and begin to chart primary characteristics of a modernist sense of the world.
Have each individual student write a typed, two-page letter in the voice
of an individual living during the late 1800s to early 1900s. The letter can
be written to imaginary individuals from future generations. The letter should
address the individual’s response to the social, cultural, technological,
or historical change explored during the small group activity. Be sure to
integrate into your letter the adjectives your group identified during the
small group activity, and explain why those terms apply to you as an individual
(in the persona you have chosen to adopt).
Trench
junction at Martinpuich with infantry,
[http://www.hcu.ox.ac.uk/jtap/video/ancre/mpeg/vanc10.mpg] some carrying
boxes of grenades, moving up, presumably to the front line, 1916
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