Four 45-minute class periods (Times will vary depending on the
type of class being taught. It will go faster in a self-contained
class where the lesson can be cross-curricular.)
Ernest J. Gaines grew up in rural Louisiana
during the racial protest period of the fifties and sixties.
His memories of separatism, prejudice, and word of mouth stories
led to a book that reads as an actual autobiography. The character,
Miss Jane Pittman, appears to be a composite of historical facts
and the conversations of people Gaines knew. It is historical
fiction at its best as the 110 year old protagonist carries
the reader from the end of the civil war to the winning of civil
rights for all minorities.
Through the activities in this lesson, students will become
familiar with the effects of reconstruction, the challenges
faced by newly freed slaves, and the empirical influence a writer’s
life has on his works. After examining the interview of Ernest
J. Gaines, introducing the first two chapters of The Autobiography
of Miss Jane Pittman utilizing a readers’ theatre
approach, and examining historical web sites the students will
write monologues that internalize the physiological and psychological
difficulties of the character.
Social Studies, Louisiana History, and English Literature
The student will:
• Identify the significance of the author’s experiences
on his written work.
• Describe the hardships faced by slaves and plantation
owners once the slaves were set free.
• Explain the role of the Seceses (the precursor to the
KKK) and why they were a threat to freed slaves.
• Interpret the material to generate connections to the
real life situation faced by the protagonist through reading,
research, and a written monologue.
National Standards for the English Language Arts
http://www.ncte.org/standards/standards.shtml
Standard 2: Students read a wide range of literature
from many periods in many genres to build an understanding of
the many dimensions (e.g., philosophical, ethical, aesthetic)
of human experience.
Standard 4: Students adjust their use of spoken, written,
and visual language (e.g., conventions, style, vocabulary) to
communicate effectively with a variety of audiences and for
different purposes.
Standard 6: Students apply knowledge of language structure,
language convention (e.g., spelling and punctuation), media
techniques, figurative language, and genre to create, critique,
and discuss print and non-print texts.
Standard 8: Students use a variety of technological and
information resources (e.g., libraries, databases, computer
networks, video) to gather and synthesize information and to
create and communicate knowledge.
Standard 9: Students develop an understanding of and
respect for diversity in language use, patterns, and dialects
across cultures, ethnic groups, geographic regions, and social
roles.
United States History Standards for Grades
5-12
http://www.sscnet.ucla.edu/nchs/standards/era5-5-12.html
Standard 1A: Explain the causes of the Civil War and
evaluate the importance
of slavery as a principle cause of the conflict.
Standard 3B: Explain the economic and social problems
facing the South and
appraise their impact on different social groups.
Louisiana English Language Arts Content
Standards,
http://www.doe.state.la.us/DOE/asps/home.asp
ELA-1-M4: Interpreting texts with supportive explanations
to generate connections to real-life situations and other texts.
ELA-1-M5: Using purposes for reading (e.g., enjoying,
learning, researching, problem solving) to achieve a variety
of objectives.
ELA-2-M4: using narration, description, exposition, and
persuasion to develop various modes of writing.
ELA-4-M3: Using the features of speaking when giving
rehearsed and unrehearsed presentations.
ELA-4-M5: Listening and responding to a wide variety
of media.
ELA-5-M2: Locating and evaluating information sources.
ELA-6-M2: Identifying, comparing, and responding to a
variety of classic and contemporary literature from many genres.
ELA-7-M3: Analyzing the effects of an author’s purpose
and point of view.
ELA-7-M4: Distinguishing fact from opinion and probability,
skimming and scanning for facts, determining cause and effect,
inductive and deductive reasoning, generating inquiry, and making
connections with real-life situations across texts.
Louisiana Social Studies Content Standards
http://www.doe.state.la.us/DOE/asps/home.asp
Places and Regions
G-1B-M4: Describing and explaining how personal interests,
culture, and technology affect people’s perceptions and
uses of places and regions.
G-1C-M7: Explaining how cooperation and conflict among
people contribute to the political divisions on Earth’s
surface.
Foundations of the American Political System
C-1B-M2: Identifying and describing the historical experiences
and the geographic, social, and economic factors that have helped
to shape American political culture.
Historical Thinking Skills
H-1A-M2: Demonstrating historical perspective through
the political, social, and economic context in which an event
or idea occurred.
H-1A-M3: Analyzing the impact that specific individuals,
ideas, events, and decisions had on the course of history.
United States History
H-1B-M12: describing the causes and course of the Civil
War and examining the impact of the war on the American people.
Louisiana History
H-1D-M1: describing the contributions of people, events,
movements, and ideas that have been significant in the history
of Louisiana.
H-1D-M3: identifying and discussing the major conflicts
in Louisiana’s past.
Video:
Louisiana Legends: Ernest Gaines
Web Sites: (If there is a problem
with the Web site address, type the title into the search box.)
“I heard the voices...of my Louisiana people”
http://www.neh.gov/new/humanities/1998-07/gaines.html
A Conversation with Ernest Gaines
This conversation with Ernest Gaines and Bill Ferris, NEH Chairman,
is an in depth view of the approaches an author takes to writing
a novel. The influence of an author’s background, research
to include events of the era, and hearing the voices of the
past through people of the present are presented in an explicit
process of creating a written work.
“The African American Journey”
http://www2.worldbook.com/features/aajourney/html/bh004.html
African American history from the slave boats in Africa to present-day
civil rights movements is presented in this Web site. The index
provides an easy avenue to the specific area the students will
research.
“American Slavery: A Composite Autobiography”
http://www.slavenarratives.com/narr/samp.html#windham
Narratives from freed slaves were sought after the Civil War.
In this site, the requirements for the interviews, the explanations
of language differences, and the interviews are found.
“American Colonization Society”
http://www.encyclopedia.com/printablenew/00424.html
The reasons for the Back to Africa Movement, occurring from
1816-1865, are explored in this Web site. During this time the
colony of Liberia was formed in Africa for freed American slaves.
Per Class:
• picture of a slave family in front of the
cabin(or one per group of students)
For each student:
• The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman
by Ernest J. Gaines (if possible)
• Pencil and paper
• Access to computers
Prior to teaching this lesson, bookmark the Web sites used in
the lesson on each computer in your classroom or computer lab.
1. Distribute a picture to each group of the slave family
in front of the cabin. The setting is in southern Louisiana
and the major produce of the area is sugar cane. Tell the students
that the news has just come to the plantation that the war is
over and they are free. They may stay on the plantation and
be paid for their work or leave. If they choose to leave, they
may take some potatoes and apples with them. Please discuss
within your group which choice you should make. Remember that
basics for survival are food, shelter, and clothing. Where would
a newly freed person go, and how would he get there?
2. After the group discussions, have each group explain
their decision and why. If they decided to leave, where are
they going, and how do they plan on taking care of themselves
along the way. What do they expect to find at the end of the
journey. What dangers do they think they will encounter?
(After listening to the students answers,
ask them about the confederate soldiers that were against freedom,
whether Confederate supporters who had just lost a war would
be helpful or harmful to their cause. What would the freed slaves
use for money in order to pay for ferrying across a river or
bayou. How would they acquire food? They have no guns or money.
Who would give them a safe place to sleep? What about the children
and old people?)
3. Have the students take turns reading
orally the second chapter of The Autobiography of Miss
Jane Pittman by Ernest J. Gaines. Ask the students if
this would alter their position about staying or leaving.
4. Show the video, “Louisiana
Legends: Ernest J. Gaines” instructing the students
as a FOCUS FOR MEDIA INTERACTION to listen closely and
remember the information they would want to know about someone
new they were meeting. Several general Questions for the Video,
“Louisiana Legends: Ernest Gaines” can be
used to provide the students with some guidelines for information
they should collect while watching the video.
a. Is this a real autobiography? This
is not a real autobiography. The characters are fiction, but
developed based on the lives real people led.
b. Where was he born? New Roads, Louisiana (about twenty
miles northwest of Baton Rouge)
c. Who did he work for and from what age? Gaines worked
for both black and white sharecroppers from the age of eight.
d. How many brothers and sisters did he have? He had nine
brothers and three sisters.
e. What did all the hard work give him? A large family
and working from an early age gave him a sense of family responsibility.
f. In what decade did he grow up? Gaines grew up during
the early forties.
g. How did he feel about being treated differently than white
people? He did not question being treated differently
than whites because he had never known anything else.
Have the students answer the question attachment
while watching the film. Stop the film after he talks about
not being able to find books about black people in the rural
South in the San Francisco libraries.
5. Have the students go to their groups’
assigned Web sites. If a computer lab is available, this is
the ideal setting. If not, the students will have to take turns
on the computers available in the classroom and the library.
See the attached group assignments, questions, and Web sites.
The students may work from the text if social studies or Louisiana
history while taking turns at the Internet. If an English or
reading class is the avenue to this lesson plan, the other students
may be doing SSR.
6. On day two, open the lesson with
a review of day one and ask them what is the next important
step after deciding to leave. What percentage of the population
would decide to leave and what would their age group be? Read
Chapter 3, "Heading Home." After reading Chapter 3,
ask the students what the most important part of the chapter
was and why? The most important part is finding new names for
themselves. What kind of names did they choose? They chose the
names of heroes that gave them hope and words like “Freedman”
that expressed their new state.
7. Introduce Chapter 4, "Massacre,"
with a brief explanation that the freed slaves are on the road.
What do you think they might encounter? Read the chapter. Following
the reading, be ready to discuss in depth feelings the children
have about the massacre. The children will be most touched by
the death of Big Laura and the baby. Touch on the fact that
Miss Jane is no longer a child. She has to take on the role
of an adult because she had no one to watch out for her and
she now has the responsibility of Ned. Students can continue
to present their reports. The following details the succession
of the reports and the relevant areas they cover.
A series of questions is provided as a FOCUS For MEDIA INTERACTION
with each Web site.
Group 1
“I heard the voices...of my Louisiana people”
A Conversation with Ernest Gaines
http://www.neh.gov/news/humanities/1998-07/gaines.html
Leaving the South
A. Why did Gaines leave the South?
B. How did he have part of Louisiana with him?
C. Does leaving Louisiana mean that he has abandoned his past?
The Camera and the Mind’s Eye
A. When Gaines takes pictures of Louisiana, what does he take
pictures of and what might those scenes represent?
B. Of what scene can he never get a really good picture?
C. How does Gaines compare still photographs to the mind’s
eye?
Discuss with the children how difficult it would be to leave
your family and friends and move. Would they have a “mind’s
eye” of where they grew up? Would those memories become
more valuable to them than if they had stayed?
Answers will vary.
Group 2
“I heard the voices...of my Louisiana people”
A Conversation with Ernest Gaines
http://www.neh.gov/news/humanities/1998-07/gaines.html
Writing about the Unexpressed
A. At what age did Gaines leave the South?
B. What is the “unexpressed”?
C. Why did he want to write about his family members?
D. What steps led him further and further into the past?
The Saga of Miss Jane
A. What was the purpose of the forward of the book?
B. Explain the steps in research Gaines took before writing
The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman.
C. Why do you think he chose Miss Jane as the protagonist?
Did Gaines want to read books about the South because he
missed his family?
Did he realized for the first time how little people actually
knew about the lives of black people?
Do you have a family member that you have lived the past through?
Answers will vary.
Group 3
American Slavery: A Composite Autobiography
http://www.slavenarratives.com/narr/samp.html
Slave Narratives
http://xroads.virginia.edu/~hyper/wpa/crocket1.html
Find two slave interviews to present and be ready to lead a
class discussion.
Read the parts of the interviews that deal with the following:
A. What was their life like as a slave?
B. How did the slaves feel about being freed?
C. What did they do following the end of the war?
What new things did we find out about the slaves by reading
their narratives?
Do they seem resentful about their life?
Were their families important to them?
Answers will vary.
Group 4
“I heard the voices...of my Louisiana people”
A Conversation with Ernest Gaines
http://www.neh.gov/news/humanities/1998-07/gaines.html
History as a Backdrop
A. How does Gaines feel about written history?
B. If Gaines was not trying to rewrite history, what was he
showing with Miss Jane’s life?
C. Which character in the novel was real?
Whose Story was it?
A. How did he approach the telling Miss Jane’s story in
the beginning?
B. What had Gaines read in the past that showed him how to narrate?
through one character?
What does Gaines feel about the truth? History recounts events,
but not always the feelings and living conditions of the people.
Why do you think that the monologue was a better idea than a
group discussion?
Who do you know that talks at length about another time?
Parents, Aunts, Uncles, Grandparents
Group 5
“I heard the voices...of my Louisiana people”
A Conversation with Ernest Gaines
http://www.neh.gov/news/humanities/1998-07/gaines.html
The Art of Storytelling
A. How does Gaines write and what audience is he writing for?
B. Storytelling is done in the first person. What country does
Gaines give credit to for the best storytelling?
Writers Black and White
A. Who invented the novel form?
B. What does he bring into his own work?
Who do you know that is a good storyteller? What makes the
stories come alive? Why would a person be a good writer and
not a good storyteller?
Group 6
“I heard the voices...of my Louisiana people”
A Conversation with Ernest Gaines
http://www.neh.gov/news/humanities/1998-07/gaines.html
Searching for the Edges
A. What writing technique does Gaines use to bring contrast
to his work?
B. How does he use nature to reflect the mood of the character?
C. How many major events does Gaines use in one book?
D. Does he compare his characters to actual people that existed
as heroes?
Rules of the Racial Game
A. Explain the rules of the racial game and what Gaines felt
would happen when blacks and whites live closely with each other.
Why is nature so important to a story? Would a baseball game
be the same on a cool spring day as it would on a blistering
hot July afternoon?
Why would Gaines not compare his characters to heroes?
The character would loose his individuality. No person is exactly
the same as another.
Do you believe that the rules of the racial game still exist?
Answers will vary.
Group 7
The African American Journey
http://www2.worldbook.com/features/aajourney/html/bh004.htm
Find four African American heroes that were born into or immediately
following slavery. Write a short summary to explain how they
became heroes.
Did all these heroes have the same opinion on the best course
for blacks following slavery? What did they all have in common?
They differed on the best course for the black man (Washington
thought they would be better off with a skills education and
Dubois felt that they should be receiving as high an education
as possible), but all were working for the betterment of the
black community.
Group 8
American Colonization Society
http://www.encyclopedia.com/printablenew/00424.html
A. Why was Liberia founded?
B. Who opposed the Back to Africa Movement?
C. When did the movement stop?
D. Would Miss Jane Pittman have been happier going back to Africa
and why?
Post civil war reconstruction and confederate immigration
to Brazil
http://mi.essortment.com/postcivilwarr_rrid.htm
A. Why did 9,000 white people from the southern states immigrate
to Brazil? after the end of the Civil War?
B. What did they bring to Brazilian agriculture?
C. Have they stayed separate or assimilated into the Brazilian
culture?
D. Do any of the ancestors exist and acknowledge their white
American roots today?
What would you have done? Would you have gone back to Africa
where the majority of the people were black? Would you go north,
hoping that white people there were fairer? If you were white,
would you have stayed or taken the offer from the Brazilian
Emperor?
Answers will vary.
Step 8. Have the students present the research.
Discuss each section and fill in where the group did not gather
all the information required.
The students will write a monologue putting himself or herself
in the place of a slave just set free. The student may choose
to stay on the plantation and work for the owner for shares
or leave. The written piece should be no longer than seventy-five
to one hundred words. The characteristics of Gaines’ writing
style will be included.
1. Use the “mind’s eye” to recall your
own rural scenes.
2. Remember that rivers, roads, railroad tracks, and
bayous are all symbolic of traveling.
3. Discuss the inner feelings that would not necessarily
be found in literature (part of the family is leaving, there
is no money, and nothing has changed just because of being set
free, what if they get sick, what about the patrol?).
4. Center the monologue on one important event that occurred
as a result of freedom.
5. Use some form of high contrast (heat versus cold,
weak character versus strong character.
6. Use nature to reflect the mood of your character.
Mathematics: Have the students use the map scale on a
Louisiana map to measure how far Miss Jane would have walked
from New Roads to Grosse Tete. If a person could walk five miles
in one day in the underbrush with a small child, how long would
this trip take? Use a United States Map and measure the distance
from New Roads to Ohio. How long would it have taken her to
walk there?
Technology/Social Studies:
• Research the effectiveness of the government programs
during Reconstruction.
• Compare and contrast the beliefs of Booker T. Washington
and W.E.B. Dubois. Have a debate on which was right in their
approach to leading the black people to independence and respect.
• Study more of the slave narratives done by the WPA and
have a forum on how things could have been handled more effectively
for the freed slaves.
VISUAL ARTS:
Surf the net to find information on First Stop to Freedom: A
Look at Cincinnati’s Pivotal role in the Underground Railroad
http://www.criticalfusion.org/artintro.html
Slave Art: The Hidden Meaning in Music and Quilts
This site offers evidence of music and quilts as the art forms
of the American slaves. The wording of songs and patterns in
the quilts became instrumental for the Underground Railroad.
See attached.
Student Materials include:
• Questions
for the film segment ( PDF
)
• Group assignments (
PDF)
• Directions for
the monologue ( PDF
)
Teacher Materials include:
• Answers for
the film segment ( PDF
)
• Answers for group assignments (
PDF )
• Rubric
for the monologue (
PDF )
1. Is this a real autobiography?
2. Where was he born?
3. Who did he work for and from what age?
4. How many brothers and sisters did he have?
5. What did all the hard work give him?
6. In what decade did he grow up?
7. How did he feel about being treated differently
than white people?
1. This is not a real autobiography. The characters are fiction,
but developed based on the lives real people led.
2. New Roads, Louisiana (about twenty miles northwest of Baton
Rouge)
3. Gaines worked for both black and white sharecroppers from
the age of eight.
4. He had nine brothers and three sisters.
5. A large family and working from an early age gave him a sense
of family responsibility.
6. Gaines grew up during the early forties.
7. He did not question being treated differently than whites
because he had never known anything else.
Group 1
“I heard the voices...of my Louisiana people”
A Conversation with Ernest Gaines
Leaving the South
A. Gaines left the south in order to get a good education in
San Francisco.
B. There were a lot of people from Louisiana in San Francisco.
Also, during the writing of The Autobiography of Miss Jane Pittman,
his grandmother was staying with him and cooked Louisiana food
all the time.
C. He didn’t leave Louisiana in his heart because he left
a place and people he loved. Gaines visits frequently. He can
sit at his desk and still see the scenes of his childhood.
The Camera and the Mind’s Eye:
A. Gaines takes pictures of lines of houses, bayous, rivers,
roads, and railroad tracks. The pictures may represent his leaving
the South and a way of life that is also leaving.
B. He can never get a good picture of the railroad tracks.
C. Gaines says that still pictures don’t show what a person
can see with the “mind’s eye”. “The mind’s
eye can travel down the road like a movie camera.”
Group 2
“I heard the voices...of my Louisiana people”
A Conversation with Ernest Gaines
Writing about the Unexpressed
A. Gaines left Louisiana at the age of fifteen.
B. The “unexpressed” are stories of the rural south
about black people that are similar to Gaines’ family.
C. He wanted to write about how people like his family grew
up in the South because he could not find a description of this
in any of the books he read. He wanted to tell their story.
D. With each book he wrote, he found that he had not gotten
everything he had hoped for into the book. Gaines began by looking
into the 1940’s, then 1930’s, and searching for experiences
that his family could have had in the past.
The Saga of Miss Jane
A. The purpose of the forward of the book is to prepare the
reader for Miss Jane’s language and to show that the story
could not be told without help.
B. Gaines’ research included reading history by whites
and blacks, slave narratives, biographies, rural blues, sermons
of ministers, and listening to the old people.
C. Gaines appears to have a lot of respect for his aunt and
grandmother. I think he could feel close to this illiterate
old woman who managed to survive so much.
Group 3
American Slavery: A Composite Autobiography
On this website are two sample interviews, Ann Ulrich Evans
and Tom Windham. Basically have the students highlight the parts
of the interview that answer the questions and any other very
interesting parts to read to the class. Be sure that they bring
in the part about Tom Windham’s daughter and two sisters
that live in Liberia. This will connect Group 8’s section
on the development of Liberia as a place to send freed slaves
in the Back to Africa Movement.
Group 4
“I heard the voices...of my Louisiana people”
A Conversation with Ernest Gaines
History as a Backdrop
A. Gaines feels that history and truth are two different things.
B. He was writing to show things that could have happened to
Miss Jane on personal level during this time period. Gaines
used local, state, and national events as a backdrop to her
life.
C. Albert Cluveau, the Cajun assassin, is the real character
in this book.
Whose Story Was It, Anyway?
A. He tried to write the story from a group conversation about
Miss Jane after she was dead.
B. Gaines believes that our greatest books have been written
in first person. He learned how to do it from reading Tugenev’s
Father and Sons, Joyce’s Dubliners or The Portrait of the
Artist as a Young Man, and Sherwood Anderson’s Winesburg
Ohio. He was able to take the Southern oral tradition and put
it on paper.
Group 5
“I heard the voices...of my Louisiana people”
A Conversation with Ernest Gaines
The Art of Storytelling
A. Gaines tries to write what he hears and write as truly and
simply as he can for all readers.
B. Americans are the best first person storytellers according
to Gaines
Writers Black and White.
A. The novel and the English language are creations of white
people.
B. He brings jazz, folk music, blues, spirituals, and the tradition
of storytelling into his work. These things give it distinction.
Group 6
“I heard the voices...of my Louisiana people”
A Conversation with Ernest Gaines
Searching for the Edges
A. Gaines will go to extremes such as a very subservient man
contrasted to a to a hard domineering man. He might contrast
a cowardly person with one that would take risks. He would use
complete darkness against complete light and extreme cold versus
extreme heat.
B. Nature is as much a character in the book as the people.
Nature has an effect on the storyline and characters in the
story. Gaines would use heat to intensify violence.
The Road to My Father’s House
A. Gaines tries to keep the events simple. He only wrapped the
story around two major events in the book My Father’s House.
B. As an author, he does not compare a character to a hero,
but may have the other characters in the story do it.
The Rules of the Racial Game
A. Blacks and whites can be friends when they are young, but
there comes a time that they stay with their own kind. Gaines
felt that as long as society is going to have blacks and whites,
some form of mixing will eventually occur.
Group 7
The African Journey
The students should only do short summaries of each hero. The
following are examples of things that might be contained in
the summaries.
Booker T. Washington (1856-1915)
He was the most important black leader of that time. Washington
founded a vocational school for black people in Tuskegee, Alabama.
Tuskegee Normal and Industrial Institute was started in an old
abandoned church and taught mechanics, carpentry, farming and
teaching. He believed that black people should get a practical
skills education rather than a college education. They should
build a strong economic base and begin to own property in order
to be accepted.
George Washington Carver (1864?-1943)
He was a black American scientist that became famous for his
research with peanuts. He made over 300 products from face powder,
to milk substitute, to soap with the humble peanut. He joined
the Tuskegee Institute and worked for soil conservation and
crop production. Carver worked hard toward promoting black people
and improving race relations.
Ida Bell Wells-Barnett (1862-1931)
She was an American journalist and reformer. During the late
1800’s and early 1900’s, she exposed lynchings that
took place without a trial and worked toward laws that would
outlaw this practice. Mrs. Wells-Barnett and her husband helped
found the National Association for the Advancement of Colored
People (NAACP).
W.E.B. Dubois (1868-1963)
He was a leader of the African American protest against racial
discrimination. Dubois was the first to suggest Pan Africanism
in which all people of African descent have interests in common
and should work together. He was the first African American
to receive a Ph.D. from Harvard. Dubois helped to found the
NAACP and worked for them. He was also a professor at Atlanta
University. He believed that black people should get college
educations and lead the fight against discrimination. Dubois
later became a communist, thinking that this was the solution
to black problems. He moved to Ghana.
Group 8
American Colonization Society
A. In 1821, land in Africa was bought with $100,000 appropriated
by Congress in order to found a colony for blacks illegally
brought into America.
B. The abolitionists opposed the creation of Liberia because
it would strengthen slavery by removing the freed blacks. The
blacks were not eager to leave what had now become their native
land.
C After more than 11,000 blacks were sent back, the movement
slowed. From 1840 and 1860 was the last time of the immigration
to Africa. From 1865 to 1912, the American Colonization Society
worked as a trustee for Liberia.
D. Miss Jane would not have wanted to go to Africa. She knew
no one there and was unfamiliar with the culture. She just wanted
to go to Ohio.
Post civil war reconstruction and confederate immigration
to Brazil
A. The Southern economy was virtually ruined and the people
went at the request of Emperor Dom Pedro II. He was interested
in immigrants with experience in farming and cotton planting.
B. The soil and climate of this part of Brazil, within Sao Paulo
State, was similar to that of the South. Pecans, peaches, corn,
and cotton did very well there. They also brought their culture.
C. Some Americans returned to the states, but many stayed. They
slowly assimilated into the Brazilian culture. Many would be
considered black or mulatto if visiting in America.
D. They still remember their southern heritage today. A group
that settled in a community on the Amazon River celebrates the
Junino Festival (a cultural celebration throughout Brazil during
the last half of June) by dressing as southerners and square
dancing to music that includes accordions and banjos. Sons of
Confederate Veterans was formed in 1994 by descendents of the
original immigrants. They celebrate with Southern-fried chicken,
cornbread, blue grass music, and confederate flags are in abundance.
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| 1. Inclusion of the
six characteristics of writing. |
50 pts_______
|
| 2. Spelling and punctuation |
20 pts_______
|
| 3. Evidence of knowledge
of the times and events. |
20 pts_______
|
| 4. Presentation (loud
enough, feeling, familiar with work) |
10 pts_______
|
