Misfits pre-reading questions...

What is the relationship between natural, untamed places and the American identity?

When you enter the working world, do you want to be your own boss or would you be okay working for someone else?

What type of work do you think would best fit your personality and how you see yourself as an individual?

What does it mean to be a man in America? 

Do you think boys or girls better prepared for life in the modern world? Why? Beyond gender, what personality types thrive in school, work, society?

Homework:  Read and annotate The Misfits.

Post two textually based discussion questions on turnitin.com discussion board (The Misfits) One inferential question which seeks either a deeper or clearer understanding a specific line/passage/character, etc. and one evaluative question in which you try to make some connection between an issue raised in the text and the world you live in.

Interpretive Question: Emerson claims that "Society never advances. It recedes as fast on one side as it gains on the other. It undergoes continual changes; it is barbarous, it is civilized, it is Christianized, it is rich, it is scientific; but this change is not amelioration" (36). What do you think Emerson means by "society never advances", yet "it undergoes continual changes"? Is society in a never ending cycle of changes? Explain. 

Inferential: When Emerson says, "travelling is a fool's paradise", is he making the point that one should be content where they are, and need not travel? Or is he touching on a deeper idea about what can truly be found if you leave what you know and explore the world?

Evaluative: "If the young merchant fails, men say he is ruined. If the finest genius studies at one of our colleges, and is not installed in an office within one year afterwards in the cities or suburbs of Boston or New York, it seems to his friends and to himself that he is right in being disheartened, an din complaining the rest of his life" (Emerson 32). Do you agree with Emerson's ideas of success? How have these ideas changed during the modern era? Does technology play a role in changing peoples' view of success? 


Evaluative Question: On page 35, Emerson says to "Insist on yourself;never imitate... Every great man is a unique... Do that which is assigned you, and you cannot hope too much or dare too much" (35). Name two things in your life that make you unique. Why do these things make you a unique person? Also, are you proud of these things?