Reflective Essay ERH FINAL <— Link to document download

Reflective Essay ERH-205WX:

Cultural Insights of Great Britain from the Medieval Period to the Modern Period:

What I Have Learned

Cody Bottoms

LTC Ticen

ERH-205WX

12 December, 2014

Help received: Spell Check+ all sources listed under subsequent sources

            Great Britain has an extremely rich and colorful history which contributed much in the way of literature and other cultural developments.  Through the four periods of time that encapsulated the area of study within this course, the Medieval period, the Renaissance period, the Romantic period, and the Modern period, we can see major events in history, as well as the cultural and literary developments and contributions that Great Britain has provided the world.  This includes, but is not limited to, a fundamental break from the Catholic Church in Europe, internal conflict, political development over time to a more democratic system, change in the language, war with outside forces, ideas on Chivalry, the Black Death, education and enlightenment in the Renaissance, and developmental changes in thinking between all four periods.  The course allowed for and encouraged the exploration of those many factors of cultural development through class discussion and self-produced artifacts such as five point fact sheets for each literary period, a comprehensive eportfolio, and specific analysis of certain works like Falstaff and honor in Henry IV Part I.  The overarching theme which best allows for the understanding of Great Britain’s culture is its developmental changes in ideology between the four periods through Literature.  It is through literature that we understand cultures and how they develop.  These societal ideals and changes effected the literature and way of life in Great Britain the most over time. Great Britain in the Medieval period was not a very developed or educated location.  That is the reason that this time was known as the dark or middle ages in history.  Life during this time was generally centered on the church and working in the fields for most.  Life was also fairly dirty during this time too because of lack of knowledge on the subject.  “Education was a Luxury of the rich in the middle ages because it was so expensive”, and this kept much of any possible development from happening on the sides of the masses (Medieval 5pt Fact Sheet).  Literature during this time in Great Britain was also usually in Latin or French.  The pivotal development in literature for this time was Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Canterbury Tales.  This is because Chaucer’s work was the first major work to be written in the English language and for this Chaucer is commonly known as the father of English Literature as stated in my analysis of Chaucer in my eportfolio.  The significance of the work being in English is that it could be understood by more people, and it was written in the vernacular of England. The Renaissance brought a myriad of changes with it.  Education became more common during this time period but “was still mainly limited to nobles and upper classes”.  English was widely spread now as the prominent language and literacy had improved by this time.  Great Britain also saw its separation from the Catholic Church and the Protestant Reformation and even a focus on secularism.  A major development for English literature in the Renaissance period was the printing press, which helped to spread works with greater speed, and the theatre.  The advent of plays, playwrights, and theatres in England permanently changed the face of British literature (Renaissance 5pt Fact Sheet).  Playwrights such as Shakespeare dominated English literature during this period and heavily influenced society with the plays that he put on in the Globe theatre in London.  The most culturally significant thing about the theatre is that all of the classes were known to attend the plays, and this could arguably be one of the first events that helped to break down class barriers, which was a very prevalent idea for the Romantic Era of Great Britain. The Romantic period ushered in industrialization to Great Britain, and with this came a great reaction against it known as romanticism.  These Romantics “strongly centered themselves around the ideas of emotion and natural beauty” in an attempt to get away from all of the changes happening around them (ERH-205WX eportfolio).  Literature during this time was focused on poetry extoling the beauty of nature.  “Poetry began to embrace less formal language in this time” and began to embrace less formal subjects of poetry as well (Renaissance 5pt Fact Sheet).  Education was greatly improved in this time with extremely high literacy rates, thus allowing the influence of the literature to reach the masses much more easily than before.  Another key aspect to Romanticism is the concept of evangelical ideas.  These ideas stated essentially that “humans are corrupt and need God to save them” (ERH-205WX eportfolio).  These ideas heavily influenced the Romantic views on the beauty of nature, and with the coming of all of the industrialism in England, they believed they would lose touch with God. The Modern period saw the most radical changes from all of the periods; in the wake of World War I, people’s ideas on God and life began to separate from those traditional beliefs of the past.  The wide scale death and destruction of the First World War “turned most people away from the prospects of war and made them value life more” (Modern 5pt Fact Sheet).  The death made people question God’s existence.  Studies on the human psyche came about during this time as well.  These changes were very apparent in the world of literature.  People’s literature began to explore sexuality and other so called “social abnormalities” openly, which would have never been done as openly in previous literature.  People who fought in the war used poetry to document what happened in the war and how it affected them (Modern 5pt act Sheet).  These events signified a very prominent cultural change in Great Britain. In conclusion, Great Britain is a very rich source of cultural, religious, and literary history.  Through the analysis of British literary traditions from works read within the course, I was able to gain an understanding for the culture which housed them.  The fact sheets allowed me to mesh historical contexts with what was understood within the literature read through the course, and the artifacts allowed for interpretation of how certain aspects of culture within the society were perceived.  The work on the ERH eportfolio allowed for a culminating work to create a holistic picture of the culture and its development through time.  As stated before, it is through a society’s literature that we come to better understand the society in the whole.

Works Cited

https://sites.vmi.edu/bottomscl17/erh-205wx/

Medieval 5pt Fact Sheet

Renaissance 5pt Fact Sheet

Romantic 5pt Fact Sheet

Modern 5pt Fact Sheet

2nd Artifact on Falstaff and Honor