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Full-Text Articles in Arts and Humanities
Dialogue In Fiction, Tracy A. Townsend
Dialogue In Fiction, Tracy A. Townsend
The Short Story
This close-reading and discussion-oriented lesson, which takes between sixty and seventy minutes, uses Ernest Hemingway’s “Hills Like White Elephants” as a model of how dialogue advances plot and develops character in fiction. It is useful in literature classrooms for its emphasis on drawing inferences from text and in creative writing contexts for teaching effective dialogue writing. This lesson is suitable for grades 9-12.
Setting As Character, Tracy A. Townsend
Setting As Character, Tracy A. Townsend
The Short Story
This lesson uses Nathaniel Hawthorne’s short story “Young Goodman Brown” to explore tone and characterization in short fiction. It requires students to demonstrate an understanding of the role character plays in fiction and to use specific textual evidence to support a claim. The lesson can be completed in a single class period of fifty to seventy minutes and is suitable for grades 9-12.
“My Life With My Cell Phone”: Creating A Magical Realist Story, Dan Gleason
“My Life With My Cell Phone”: Creating A Magical Realist Story, Dan Gleason
The Short Story
In this lesson students are introduced to the basic elements of magical realism, a genre that combines fantastical events with the mundane normalcy of life. Students examine Octavio Paz’s short story “My Life with the Wave” as an example of the genre. In the story, the narrator travels to the ocean and falls in love with a wave, whom he bottles and takes home with him; the two go on to both cherish each other and fight terribly. After discussing the story, students create, in groups, plot sketches for their own adaptations. Students might imagine relationships with cell phones, the …
Storytelling In Comics: Who, When, And Where In “Here”, Michael W. Hancock
Storytelling In Comics: Who, When, And Where In “Here”, Michael W. Hancock
Comics and Graphic Novels
Richard McGuire’s groundbreaking short comic “Here” (1989) revolutionized storytelling possibilities in comics. It may be used within a short story unit to demonstrate familiar elements of fiction, including setting, plot, and character. Moreover, its inventive use of panels within panels to juxtapose past, present, and future can serve as a model for students’ visual rendering of multiple points in time within a single location.
Introducing The Anthology, Margaret T. Cain
Introducing The Anthology, Margaret T. Cain
The Short Story
This assignment requires students to write an introduction to a “pretend” anthology of short stories. Given at the beginning of the short story unit so as to focus their reading, the prompt directs them to examine several introductions to anthologies in the library in order to see what it is that anthologizers talk about; to determine the principle on which to choose stories; to find the right voice; and to critique three stories from the faux anthology to demonstrate their aptness for the collection as well as the students’ own understanding of the characteristics of good short story writing.