The professor is discussing Realism.

Realism as a literary technic was most popular in U.S. literature from around 1860 till 1890.

Realism tells it like it is.

And at the same time that realism was becoming popular, there were a lot of political and socioeconomic changes happening in the country.

A scourer named Amy Chaplin says, and I’m just paraphrasing here, that Realism is a way to understand and deal with social change, which makes a lot of sense I think. 

So, besides verisimilitude, another important characteristic of realism is the narrator’s objectivity.

Ok, now we have an idea of what realism was.

You should realize too that this was quite a contrast to earlier writers in the U.S., who try to emulate the British writers, try to be very elegant, at the expense of Realism.

She combined some elements of realism.

What’s realism, Alison?

So Neel combined realism with, well, actually, with expressionism.

Realism was important in the sense that she wanted to show people as they really were, much like a photographer would.

But Neel wasn’t satisfied with photo-like realism, she went beyond that.

The 19th century was the time that saw what we called Realism developed in the European theater.

So, as I said, the well-made play, this form of playwriting, became the basis for realism in drama, and for a lot of very popular 19th-century plays.

So you've probably studied both of these movements separately, separate movements, Realism and Impressionism, in some of your art history courses.

So, what about Realism?

What are the elements of Realism we should be looking for in Frantzen’s work?

This is realism.

It was time now to show more political realism.

Youthful enthusiasm soon changed to realism.

Experiments so far have ruled out locality and realism as a combination.