Assignment: Consider our course description: On defining the creation of identity, American essayist, novelist, and playwright James Arthur Baldwin comments, “An identity would seem to be arrived at by the way in which the person faces and uses his experience.” Baldwin’s statement encompasses far-ranging ideas and introduces questions that have historically characterized American literature: How have Americans characterized their own identities at different points in time, and how have historical events, cultural phenomena, social environments, and personal experiences become meshed with and changed these identities? To what extent does the American landscape, either as a physical or symbolic space, attribute to this definition? Is the definition “American” even a valid identity? As we closely examined these questions by examining the various literary genres that span almost four centuries, we have focused on how language and writing has been used to construct and alter the meaning of “American identity.” In addition, we have also delved into the formation of identity from the perspectives of race, gender, and social class and examined how each has been used for this purpose. After considering this description, review the online lecture notes, assignments, your own class notes, etc., and think about how our discussion of the historical context, literary movements, and specific texts have all combined to create what we define as the “American identity.” You can write this essay from several different angles, focusing on history, the literary time period, the texts themselves, the authors’ purposes when writing these texts, etc. Your essay should focus on a combination of texts.  You are also required to incorporate at least one textual discussion from the postmodern time period (since you were not required to submit a response essay from this specific group of authors/texts). This assignment does leave room for movement and individual focus; however, remember your main goal should be to create a clear and argumentative thesis, creating a claim that addresses, from your point of view, how American Literature is defined.