LESSON TWENTY BIBLICAL ALLUSIONS IN “THE CREATION” POEM BY JAMES WELDON JOHNSON
Lesson Overview James Weldon Johnson, one of the best known African American poets, wrote “The Creation." The poem was published in Johnson’s poetry collection The Book of American Negro Poetry in 1922. In his poem, "The Creation: A Negro Sermon," the poetic style and diction used by Johnson reflect his awareness of African American culture. This westernized version of the story of Genesis is an indigenous expression of a black sermon. The overall poem is an allusion to the biblical episode of Genesis. An allusion is an expression designed to call something to mind without mentioning it explicitly; an indirect or passing reference. This lesson will explore the literary techniques in Johnson’s poem and connect the biblical allusions to the Creation narratives in Genesis, Chapters 1 and 2. Key Concepts: allusion, stanza, pulpit oratory, alliteration, free verse-, hyperbole, stanza, refrain, repetition, personification, anaphora, rhyming, epistrophe, consonance, synecdoche, simile, situational irony, metonymy, theme, parallelism, figurative versus literal language Lesson Objectives: Students will: • • •
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analyze how an author draws on and transforms source material in a specific work (literary works in Western literature with Creation themes/allusions. determine a theme or central idea of a text and analyze in detail its development over the course of the text. determine the meaning of key words and phrases used in the text, including figurative and connotative meanings; analyze the cumulative impact of specific word choices on meaning and tone. analyze how an author's choices concerning how to structure a text, order events within it (e.g., parallel plots), and manipulate time (e.g., pacing, flashbacks) create such effects as mystery, tension, or surprise. analyze how an author draws on and transforms source material in a specific work. edit writing to correct errors in spelling, grammar, punctuation, sentence structure, etc.
Learning Objectives Upon completion of this lesson, students will be able to: • •
summarize and analyze the literary details of James Weldon Johnson's poem "The Creation" and compare Johnson's poem to the biblical text (Genesis, Chapters 1 & 2). examine how the author of the poem draws from the Bible to create a unique work.
Academic Initiatives for Biblical Literacy in Secondary Education
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