When was local color written and by whom

Freeman, Rose Terry Cooke, and R. Robinson in New England; T. Page in Virginia; J. Harris in Georgia; G. Davis, H. Bunner, Brander Matthews, and O.

Henry in New York City. A broader concept of sectional differences lies behind regionalism. View all related items in Oxford Reference ». Search for: 'Local color' in Oxford Reference ». All Rights Reserved. Under the terms of the licence agreement, an individual user may print out a PDF of a single entry from a reference work in OR for personal use for details see Privacy Policy and Legal Notice. Oxford Reference.

In addition, many critics now focus on "critical regionalism," a term derived from architecture and associated with Neil Campbell's book The Rhizomatic West Critical regionalism therefore is not a synonym for transnational analysis but a method of critical or global study attuned both the comparative big picture analyses and linked to the deep local.

Setting: The emphasis is frequently on nature and the limitations it imposes; settings are frequently remote and inaccessible. The setting is integral to the story and may sometimes become a character in itself. Characters : Local color stories tend to be concerned with the character of the district or region rather than with the individual: characters may become character types, sometimes quaint or stereotypical.

The characters are marked by their adherence to the old ways, by dialect, and by particular personality traits central to the region. In women's local color fiction, the heroines are often unmarried women or young girls.

Narrator : The narrator is typically an educated observer from the world beyond who learns something from the characters while preserving a sometimes sympathetic, sometimes ironic distance from them. The narrator serves as mediator between the rural folk of the tale and the urban audience to whom the tale is directed.

It has been said that "nothing happens" in local color stories by women authors, and often very little does happen. Stories may include lots of storytelling and revolve around the community and its rituals.

Themes: Many local color stories share an antipathy to change and a certain degree of nostalgia for an always-past golden age. A celebration of community and acceptance in the face of adversity characterizes women's local color fiction. Thematic tension or conflict between urban ways and old-fashioned rural values is often symbolized by the intrusion of an outsider or interloper who seeks something from the community.

In Together by Accident , Stephanie C. Palmer identifies the "motif of the travel accident" as characteristic of local color: it "requires a distressing or surprising event that occurs to a character in transit. It must shift the grounds of sociability in the text, so that the traveling character is obliged to rely on locals to a greater and more humiliating degree. A travel accident challenges a traveler's identity, independence, or power.

A travel accident also changes the relationship between the traveling character who becomes a thwarted traveler and the implied reader. If an accident occurs, the reader is encouraged to question the character's virtue. Fetterley, Judith, and Marjorie Pryse, eds. American Women Regionalists, — Fletcher, Mary Dell, ed. The Short Story in Louisiana, — Lafayette: The Center for Louisiana Studies, Larson, Susan. McKee, Kathryn B. Joseph M. Flora and Lucinda H. Rhode, Robert. The Hague: Mouton, Simpson, Claude M.

Taylor, Helen.