American Studies Commons^™

New Wave Science Fiction Considered As A Popular Religious Phenomenon: A Definition And An Example, John Rothfork

American Studies ETDs

In the latter part of the 1960's the status of science fiction in America changed. Suddenly it ceased to be characterized as an insignificant formula-fiction. Its new importance rested on the seldom stated fact that it served a parareligious function during a decade when the common man discovered the "death of God." This was also the decade of Gemini and Apollo which saw the fulfillment of President Kennedy's promise to land a man on the moon and return him safely to earth. Thus science fact and fiction complemented each other to offer the common man a paradigm and ritual absorbing …

American Statesmen As Men Of Letters:Franklin, Adams, Jefferson, John Quincy Adams, Lincoln, Theodore Roosevelt And Wilson Considered As Writers., Starr Jenkins

American Studies ETDs

The purpose of this study is descriptive and analytical: to introduce the reader to seven American statesmen as writers, and to trace the interrelation of their writing abilities to their successful achievement and exercise of power. Subsidiary aims are to present interesting samples of their better writing, and furnish bibliographical information on others.

The Aesthetics Of Juan Carlos Onetti's Novel., Djelal Kadir Ii

American Studies ETDs

The novelistic genre within the contemporary scene of world literature is clearly under the aegis of today's Latin American writers.

In the rise of the contemporary Latin American novel, Juan Carlos Onetti is a key figure, if not the key figure as the Peruvian novelist Mario Vargas Llosa claims. With Onetti, reality and a vision o( the world which comprise fiction are subjected to a consciously derived system of aesthetics for the first time in Latin America. The focus of this study is the nature of Onetti's aesthetics. Its scope attempts to some extent to see Onetti in the light …

The American Dream: A Study Of The Beliefs, Possibilities, And Problems Inherent In The American Dream As Dramatized In The Lives And Writings Of Major American Authors, Robert Glen Deamer

American Studies ETDs

This is an innovative, interdisciplinary dissertation devoted to achieving new perspectives on that cluster of indigenous American myths known as the American Dream. My purpose is not to analyze, or to philosophize or to pontificate about, these myths, but rather to dramatize them: to show that they are an essential part of our history and cultural heritage, as is to be seen most cogently in the lives and writings of our major authors. I have, however, at no point shirked the fact that the writing of such a study involves a moral as well as an intellectual commit­ment: in brief, …

Against The Grain: The Achievement Of John Hersey, Samuel Bruce Girgus

American Studies ETDs

Since the Second World War, John Hersey has produced a sizeable body of work in both fiction and non-fiction. In 1950, a Pulitzer Prize for fiction, a phenomenally successful and significant piece of journalism and a major American novel gave him the reputation for being one of America's most promising young writers. For the past twenty years, however, his work largely has been unacclaimed and major critics have excluded him from their discussions of the contemporary novel and contemporary culture. In general, his works have not received the close critical examination they deserve. This is partly because Hersey's complex attitude …

The Philosophy Of Symbolic Interactionism, Richard Wendell Beeson

American Studies ETDs

The major purpose of this study is to demonstrate the theoretical formulation of symbolic interactionism. An historical examination reveals that philosophical pragmatism is foundational to the methodology of symbolic interactionism. Pragmatism itself is based on major conceptual contributions from empiricism, idealism, and evolutionism. From these older systems various aspects have been selected by pragmatism and oriented toward a unique American cultural experience to produce a unified method of inquiry applicable to the understanding of individual, group, and societal problem solving. The unification of methodology found in symbolic interactionism is shown by the construction of a diagrammatic model which reveals the …

The Short Stories Of MáRio De Andrade, Gerald Glen Curtis

American Studies ETDs

In spite of much critical material about other aspects of Mario's literary production, little has heretofore appeared in regard to his short stories.

The man and the artist in Mário are intimately related, a proper appreciation of the latter depending upon understanding the former. Mario was outstanding for his love for mankind, his exuberance for life, his concept of happiness. His religious and political convictions were less stable, his concert of art and the artist was utilitarian and pragmatic, a reflection of his human solidarity and his desire to reduce the gap separating the artist from the common man.

Mário's …

The Emergence Of The American Aesthetic Statement In The Nineteenth Century:James Jackson Jarves., David A. Holtz

American Studies ETDs

This dissertation is an investigation of the later, or art historical and aesthetic writings of James Jackson Jarves with the purpose of showing how Jares was the recipient of the colonial, Federalist and Jacksonian strains of aesthetic thinking of the United States, and how he combined these with contemporary European influences, especially Ruskin, Rio, Lindsay and Jameson to produce the first fully integrated documents on art by an American before American art and aesthetics became predominantly international in their concept and execution. An effort was made to trace the emergence and development of such canons of thought as idealism, pietism, …

A Cross-Disciplinary Study Of The European Immigrants Of 1870 To 1925, Loretta Matulich

American Studies ETDs

Both native-born and foreign-born Americans throughout the twen­tieth century have written about the European immigrants who came to American shores between 1870 and 1925. Many of the social science accounts and fiction works about these newcomers centered on one im­plicit question: How could these immigrants become Americans? Two views of assimilation into American society are presented in this study: Henry Pratt Fairchild's static definition of the goal of Ameri­canization and Jane Addams' dynamic definition of American cultural growth. Rejecting Fairchild's view that immigrants must lose all traces of their foreign origin in order to become real Americans, this study adopts …

Ortega As A System, Lawrence Benton

American Studies ETDs

The Spanish philosopher, José Ortega y Gasset, is best known in this country for his provocative essays on contemporary social and aesthetic issues. Several of his books have been translated into English and widely distributed (see the Bibliography for a list of English translations). Apparently he has a wide readership in the English-speaking world. In spite of the popularity of his own works, however, very little has been written in English about him, the total critical output amounting to a few articles in scholarly journals and a book or two (again, see the Bibliography). Thus, the central critical questions surrounding …

The Formation Of The Brazilian Army And Its Political Behavior (1807-1930)., Robert Ames Hayes

American Studies ETDs

This study identifies and evaluates the various factors which have, historically, affected the formation of the Brazilian army, the primary source of political leadership within the Brazilian military class, and its political behavior during the period 1807-1930. These factors include professional preparation and conditions within the army as well as its social position, military-civilian relations, the sources of political ideology evident within the military class, the effect of immigration, and even evidence of the influence of personalities upon the nature of the political activities of Brazilian military leaders, primarily army officers.

A Humorist In Hollywood: Robert Benchley And His Comedy Films, Robert William Redding

American Studies ETDs

Although he preferred to always be known as writer, Robert Benchley gained some renown, during the latter half of this career, as a performer in motion pictures. His activities in Hollywood included some script writing, but he was especially noted as a character actor in feature films, and as author and star of forty-eight comedy short subjects produced between 1928 and 1945. In spite of his dissatisfaction with this phase of his career, and his lack of real interest in motion pictures, his short subjects represent an important segment of hi achievement as a humorist.

Benchley's emergence as a performer …

Carlos Sabat Ercasty Y La Poesia Uruguaya Del Siglo Xx., Gary Lewis Haws

American Studies ETDs

No abstract provided.

The Satire Of Sinclair Lewis, Jack Laverne Davis

American Studies ETDs

Sinclair Lewis was the first American to receive the Nobel Prize in Literature. In his acceptance speech Lewis characterized himself as "a writer whose most anarchistic assertion has been that America, with all her wealth and power, has not yet produced a civilization good enough to satisfy the deepest wants of human creatures.” And this assertion underlies most of Lewis's satiric attack upon a wide range of American middle-class values. These attacks were quite often contained in passages which are memorable today for their satiric brilliance. No doubt Lewis chose satire for his principal weapon because it permitted him to …

Monsignor John A. Ryan: American Social Gospeller: 1900-1945, Paul Albert Gopaul

American Studies ETDs

With the publication of "A Country Without Strikes" in 1900, describing the enactment of a system of compulsory arbitration in New Zealand, John Augustine Ryan, thirty-five years old, a Roman Catholic priest, student at the Catholic University of America, and middlewestern-reared Populist, joined the lists of the Social Gospellers who were trying in the late 19th and early 20th centuries to bring America to grips with an industrial and economic situation that left 71 per cent of the wealth in the hands of 9 per cent of the families. This condition threatened to scar the United States permanently with a …

A Political Portrait: FéLix Varela Y Morales, 1788-1853, Gemma Marie Del Duca

American Studies ETDs

This is a political portrait of a Cuban priest and patriot, Félix Varela y Morales. One of the most fascinating and influential figures in the great history of Cuba during the 19^th century, he moved easily from philosophy and science to politics and finally to theology. Others have dealt in some detail with Varela’s accomplishments as reformer and teacher of philosophy in Cuba (Antonio Hernández Travieso) and as Catholic apologist and priest in New York (José Ignacio Rodríguez, Doctor Joseph McCadden.) A few Cuban scholars have examined phases of Félix Varela’s political career, but thus far no single work …

Everyman's Usable Past: The American Historical Novel, Joel Mackey Jones

American Studies ETDs

The intent of this dissertation will be to define, and by defining defend, an art form too often disdained as being a literary mélange des genres—the American historical novel. To do so seems appropriate for a dissertation written in an area of scholarship often considered an academic mélange des genres—American Studies.

The Literary Reputation Of F. Scott Fitzgerald, James Knight Elliott

American Studies ETDs

The purpose of this study of the literary reputation of F. Scott Fitzgerald is to examine the aspects of Fitzgerald’s life and work which have been most frequently discussed by his American critics and thus to discover the foundations of his reputation. The criticism used for the study covers the forty-five-year period from the publication of Fitzgerald’s first novel in 1920 to the end of 1964. The study is limited to American criticism because the novels and stories deal with distinctly American themes, materials, and values; because they have enjoyed great popularity among Americans, and because a thorough appreciation of …

The New Western: Studies In Modern Western American Fiction, Gerald John Brenner

American Studies ETDs

This is a study of a handful of American novels, all of them written since 1939, all of them concerned in some manner with the American West. I have chosen 1939 as a beginning point for the study because it was then that Walter Van Tilburg Clark published The Ox-Bow Incident, a novel which took many of the standard in­gredients of the stereotyped "Western and turned them to the uses of serious fiction. Unlike the hacks who followed the formula for success established by the dime novels and Zane Grey, and who dealt in fiction as in an earlier time …

Civil-Military Relations In Chile, 1891-1938, Frederick Mckinley Nunn

American Studies ETDs

Chilean civil-military relations between 1891 and 1938 have been discussed in varying degrees by many authors in many works. Nowhere, however, is there a complete treatment available which incorporates adequate background material and adequate coverage of all events during the period in question to explain the peculiar Chilean situation. It is hoped that this study, perhaps lacking in many respects, will contribute towards a proper understanding of this problem.

Charles Godfrey Leland: The American Years, 1824-1869, Ralph Carlisle Smith

American Studies ETDs

Charles Godfrey Leland was born on August 15, 1824, in a boarding house where his parents lived, an old colonial house on Chestnut Street below Third Street of Philadelphia. Convinced of hereditary influence, even of the inheritance of “acquired characteristics,” Leland in his mature years recorded something of the background of his forebears and contemporary relatives. Because such emphasis was placed on his ancestry and because some of the collateral relatives entered his life now and again, it is appropriate to consider briefly first his mother’s family, then his father's lilleage, and finally his brother and sisters. His Memoirs have …

Jack London's Heroes: A Study Of Evolutionary Thought, Roy W. Carlson

American Studies ETDs

The important thing, in terms of this study, is that evolutionary speculation had a popular audience and a relatively large audience. Not only did people who had never seen copies of The Origin of Species or The Descent of Man feel perfectly familiar with their contents and qualified to talk about them, but serious thinkers were reading scientific and pseudo-scientific books at an unprecedented rate. For instance, Spencer's books had a sale of 368,755 copies in the authorized editions in the United States between 1860 and 1903. The testimony of John R. Commons as to Spencer's popularity is well known. …

Faulkner In Hollywood: A Study Of His Career As A Scenarist, George Sidney

American Studies ETDs

This study explores a significant aspect of William Faulkner's life and work: his Hollywood career. For Faulkner, Hollywood served as a remunerative avocation. It provided him with a financial security which his literary public at that time did not. The money he earned as a scenarist seems to have enabled him to evade the economic necessity of writing for a commercial market, permitting him to write "for himself." But Faulkner also gave for what he got. He gave his time and creative energy, the results of which--his Hollywood writings-- reveal the mind of the artist at work. Faulkner the novelist …

William Allen White: The Respectable Rebel, John Dewitt Mckee

American Studies ETDs

To understand the growth of William Allen White from a spokesman for the business-in-government conservatism of Mark Hanna to leadership in the revolt of the middle-class liberals one has to see him in the surroundings of the society into which he was born, to examine parental influence, and to realize the importance of the ideas he absorbed in his schooling and in his early journalistic training. It is also necessary, in explaining White's rebellion against the conservatism of his youth, to take into full account the impact of Theodore Roosevelt's personality on the life of William Allen White.

A History Of The Italians In New Mexico, Frederick G. Bohme

American Studies ETDs

Several years ago one of Albuquerque's long-time Italian-American residents remarked, "I feel like a big fellow here... I am glad I came- back there [in Italy] I would still be a little fellow." Although Italians represent one of the largest sources of American immigration, they have never comprised more than six-tenths of one percent of New Mexico's population. They are important, nevertheless, because next to natives of Mexico they comprise the largest foreign-born group in the state. They are significant because Italian churchman and Italian settlers, more than any others, provided a "bridge" between the Anglo-Saxon and Hispano cultures found …

Patterns Of Dissent: The Reform Ideas And Activities Of George D. Herron, Herbert R. Dieterich

American Studies ETDs

The search of George D. Herron for a means which might lead mankind to a better life was an important one in the current of American reform between 1890 and 1920. Herron--clergyman, socialist, and diplomat--has figured in recent studies of Protestant Christianity and reform in post-Civil War industrial America. His impact on Protestant theology in the 1890's is the subject of a more specialized study; in it, Professor Robert Handy of Union Theological Seminary states that Herron's "Kingdom Movement" was the "single most important phase" of social gospel history during the nineties.

Charles Austin Beard: A Free Spirit 1874-1919, Paul Lynn Schmunk

American Studies ETDs

The biography which follows, the first part of a projected three-volume work, will cover the years from 1874 to 1919, the end of Beard's formal teaching career. During this period, starting in 1900, he wrote more than fifteen books and a hundred book reviews, besides numerous pamphlets and articles. More than ten million of his books have been sold, some of them abroad, and they are still being reprinted. Eventually he became the president of both the American Political Science Association and the American Historical Association, and in 1948 the National Institute of Arts and Letters recognized his life's work …

The Idea Of Failure In Henry Adams, Charles Sanders Peirce, And Mark Twain, Robert M. Bunker

American Studies ETDs

Mark Twain, Henry Adams, and Charles Sanders Peirce, three great Americans of the Gilded Age, described themselves as grotesque failures. These pages have been written in the hope to make clear what they meant by success: the communication of their failure.

Carl Van Vechten And The Twenties: Literature, Society And The Arts, Edward G. Lueders

American Studies ETDs

It is seldom that a critical assessment of a writer's work can even attempt to be definitive during the writer's lifetime. It is even more rare when that writer continues as an active observer, participant and contributor in the humanities for two decades after publishing his last book and publicly announcing his retirement from writing. But such a writer is Carl Van Vechten. His first volume was published in 1915, his last in 1932. In those seventeen years he produced nineteen volumes, ten of them collections of essays on music and the arts, two devoted to the lore of the …