Essential Question(s) What is a literary period? What are the characteristics of the Native American Period?
What is a literary period? The period concept suggests (1) that literary works can be grouped according to what they share with each other within a given time span, (2) that this grouping can be differentiated from other such chronological groupings. Literary periods share, in phrase, "systems of norms," which include such things as conventions, styles, themes, and philosophies (Rene Wellek)
Literary Periods in American Literature Native American Colonial/Revolutionary/National Romanticism/Transcendentalism Realism Naturalism Modernism Postmodernism/Contemporary
Native American Period pre-1620-1840 Native American literature is an oral tradition of song and stories. Any written literature is an account of these songs and stories.
Much Native American literature focuses on the natural world and the sacred world and the importance of land and place. The dates for this period refer to the period of Native American dominance in the New World.