This is a paper that is focusing on the American Scholar to Emerson and Thoreau discussion post. The paper also provides additional information to use in writing the assignment paper.
American Scholar to Emerson and Thoreau discussion post
As per usual, your discussion post can be based on your own interests and inquiry. However, for this Module, I’m especially interested in thinking about the ideas and ideals expressed by our two representative authors. After having read both Emerson and Thoreau, you may wish to reflect on these questions for your post:
What and who is the “American Scholar” to Emerson? What does it mean to be an “American Scholar” today? How does life in the 21st century complicate, expand or challenge this notion? As a college student, are you an “American Scholar” or something else? If you choose to take this question on, you should include the introductory reading in order to compare the climate and currents of Emerson’s 19th century context to our own. For Thoreau, you were to select a chapter of your own choosing to include in your reading. Which was it and why did you choose it? What’s important/interesting about your choice? How do you understand it in the context of your reading overall (including the other selected chapters of Walden as well as the portion of “Nature” that you read in Emerson)? Requirements for replies:
As per usual, two replies are requirement before or by the end of the Module for full credit. However, there’s an additional requirement this time. If you choose not to discuss both Emerson and Thoreau in your initial post and only write about one author, you must reply to at least one other classmate’s posts on the author you didn’t cover. So, for example, if you wrote about Emerson but didn’t cover Thoreau in your post, you should respond to a student who included Thoreau in their discussion