“Who is known as the “poet of the American Revolution”? Philip Freneau (1752-1832), whose poems include “American Liberty” (1775) and “The Indian Burying Ground” (1788). He was a favorite of Thomas Jefferson’s.”
Excerpted from: Corey, Melinda, and George Ochoa. Literature: The New York Public Library Book of Answers. New York: Simon and Schuster, 1993.
Posted in English Language Arts, Quotes, Reference, Social Sciences
Tagged poetry, readings/research, united states history
“Benevolence, n. Subscribing five dollars towards the relief of one’s aged grandfather in the alms house, and publishing it in the newspaper.”
Excerpted from: Bierce, Ambrose. David E. Schultz and S.J. Joshi, eds. The Unabridged Devil’s Dictionary. Athens: The University of Georgia Press, 2000.
Posted in English Language Arts, Quotes, Reference, Social Sciences
Tagged humor, literary oddities, philosophy/religion
“Romanticism: (romantic art): A style prevalent in the first half of the 19th century, particularly in painting, in which imagination played the dominant role. Referring more to a state of mind then to a style, romanticism was a marked reaction against the rationalism associated with Neoclassicism. One of the chief concerns of the romantic artist was the illustration of literary themes, often derived from contemporary romantic writings. Leading romantic artists included Eugene Delacroix, William Turner, and Caspar David Friedrich.”
Excerpted from: Diamond, David G. The Bulfinch Pocket Dictionary of Art Terms. Boston: Little Brown, 1992.
“Usually, terrible things that are done with the excuse that progress requires them are not really progress at all, but just terrible things.”
Excerpted from: Winokur, Jon, ed. The Big Curmudgeon. New York: Black Dog & Leventhal, 2007.
Posted in English Language Arts, Quotes, Reference, Social Sciences
Tagged fiction/literature, humor, literary oddities
“In identifying important organizing principles, it is necessary to note that the criteria, continuity, sequence, and integration apply to the experiences of the learner and not to the way in which these matters may be viewed by someone already in command of the elements to be learned. Thus, continuity involves the recurring emphasis in the learner’s experience upon these particular elements; sequence refers to the increasing breadth and depth of the learner’s development; and integration refers to the learner’s increased unity of behavior in relating to the elements involved.”
Basic Principles of Curriculum and Instruction
Excerpted from: Wiggins, Grant, and Jay McTighe. Understanding by Design. Alexandria, VA: ASCD, 1998.
“Form the possessive singular of nouns by adding ‘s.
Follow this rule whatever the final consonant. Thus write,
Charles’s friend
Burns’s Poems
The witch’s malice
Exceptions are the possessives of ancient proper names ending in –es and ‘is, the possessive Jesus’, and such forms as for conscience’ sake, for righteousness sake. But such forms as Moses’ Laws, Isis’ temple are commonly replaced by
The laws of Moses
The temple of Isis
The pronominal possessives hers, its, theirs, yours and ours have no apostrophe. Indefinite pronouns, however, use the apostrophe to show possession.
One’s rights
Somebody else’s umbrella
A common error is to write it’s for its, or vice versa. The second is possessive.
It’s a wise dog that scratches its own fleas.”
Excerpted from: Strunk, William Jr., and E.B. White. The Elements of Style, Fourth Edition. New York: Longman, 2000.
Posted in English Language Arts, Quotes, Reference
“Cognitive Dissonance: A major cognitive theory propounded by Leon Festinger in A Theory of Cognitive Dissonance (1957). The theory addresses competing, contradictory, or opposing elements of cognition and behavior: for example, why do people continue smoking, when they know that smoking damages health? Festinger suggests that individuals do not believe so much out of logic as out of psychological need—a kind of psycho-logic. He argues that, striving for harmony and balance, there is a drive towards consonance amongst cognitions. Dissonance reduction may happen either through a change in a person’s behavior or a shift in attitude; thus, in the example cited above, either they stop smoking, or else modify their knowledge, for example, to the belief that ‘most people who smoke don’t die young and so aren’t really at risk.’ The theory is almost tautological in postulating some inner need for consistency, and has been criticized for ambiguity, but it has been enormously influential.”
Excerpted from: Marshall, Gordon, ed. Oxford Dictionary of Sociology. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994.
“Proposition for Proposal. ‘He made a proposition.” In current slang almost anything is a proposition. A difficult enterprise is a ‘tough proposition,’ an agile wrestler, ‘a slippery proposition,’ and so forth.”
Excerpted from: Bierce, Ambrose. Write it Right: A Little Blacklist of Literary Faults. Mineola, NY: Dover, 2010.
Posted in English Language Arts, Quotes, Reference, Social Sciences
Tagged diction/grammar/style/usage
“Addams, Jane: (1860-1935) Addams was an American sociologist of central importance to the work of the Chicago School in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. A powerful influence on many other women in sociology, such as Charlotte Perkins Gilman and Emily Greene Balch, in 1889 she set up a social settlement in Chicago, Hull House, which was partly inspired by London’s Toynbee Hall, but more woman-influenced, more egalitarian, and less religious. She argued that one of the main problems for women was trying to manage the conflicting demands of family and society, and believed social settlements were one way to resolve the problem. Hull House was an important sociological center for the University of Chicago, and also attracted other leading social theorists, Marxists, anarchists, and socialists of the time. A spokeswoman for women and working-class immigrants in particular, Addams was a cultural feminist who believed female values were inherently superior to those of men, and argued that a more productive and more peaceful society could be built by drawing on, and integrating, such values. Her commitment to pacifism made her a social pariah during the First World War, although in 1931 she was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize.”
Excerpted from: Marshall, Gordon, ed. Oxford Dictionary of Sociology. New York: Oxford University Press, 1994.
“While entertaining musician-wit Oscar Levant at this new Bucks County home, George Kaufman offered his friend an engaging business proposition (based on Levant’s reputation as a noxious influence): ‘We’ll both walk through the main thoroughfares of Bucks County and I’ll have blueprints in my hand and this will lead people to think that you are going to build and settle down here. The local inhabitants will become panic-stricken and real estate will go down. Then we’ll buy, you won’t build, and we’ll clean up.’”
Excerpted from: Drennan, Robert E., ed. The Algonquin Wits. New York: Kensington, 1985.
Posted in English Language Arts, New York City, Quotes, Reference
Tagged humor, literary oddities
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