"Grant and Lee: A Study in Contrasts"

The nonfiction narrative was originally a chapter in a collection of essays entitled "The American Story." But the writing style of Bruce Catton as he compares two historical figures makes it stand out. As you study this list, look for antonyms and synonyms.

Here are all the word lists to support the reading of Grade 8 Unit 2's texts from SpringBoard's Common Core ELA series: Grant and Lee, Harrison Bergeron, The Giver, Banned Books Week, Fatal Text Message, Distracted Driving, How the Brain Reacts, Cellphones and driving
15 words 157 learners

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Full list of words from this list:

words only definitions & notes
  1. conflicting
    in disagreement
    They were two strong men, these oddly different generals, and they represented the strengths of two conflicting currents that, through them, had come into final collision.
  2. aristocratic
    belonging to or characteristic of the nobility
    Back of Robert E. Lee was the notion that the old aristocratic concept might somehow survive and be dominant in American life.
  3. embody
    represent or express something abstract in tangible form
    He embodied a way of life that had come down through the age of knighthood and the English country squire.
  4. obligation
    the social force that binds you to a course of action
    It would bring forth (according to this ideal) a class of men with a strong sense of obligation to the community; men who lived not to gain advantage for themselves, but to meet the solemn obligations which had been laid on them by the very fact that they were privileged.
  5. deportment
    the way a person behaves toward other people
    From them the country would get its leadership; to them it could look for higher values--of thought, of conduct, or personal deportment--to give it strength and virtue.
  6. tanner
    a craftsman who tans skins and hides
    Grant, the son of a tanner on the Western frontier, was everything Lee was not.
  7. obeisance
    bending the head or body in reverence or submission
    He was one of a body of men who owed reverence and obeisance to no one, who were self-reliant to a fault, who cared hardly anything for the past but who had a sharp eye for the future.
  8. frontier
    a wilderness at the edge of a settled area of a country
    These frontier men were the precise opposites of the tidewater aristocrats.
  9. implicit
    suggested though not directly expressed
    Back of them, in the great surge that had taken people over the Alleghenies and into the opening Western country, there was a deep, implicit dissatisfaction with a past that had settled into grooves.
  10. static
    showing little if any change
    The Virginia aristocrat, inevitably, saw himself in relation to his own region. He lived in a static society which could endure almost anything except change.
  11. tenacity
    persistent determination
    The Westerner, on the other hand, would fight with an equal tenacity for the broader concept of society.
  12. burgeon
    grow and flourish
    Grant was the modern man emerging; beyond him, ready to come on the stage was the great age of steel and machinery, of crowded cities and a restless burgeoning vitality.
  13. chivalry
    the medieval principles governing knightly conduct
    Lee might have ridden down from the old age of chivalry, lance in hand, silken banner fluttering over his head.
  14. fidelity
    the quality of being faithful
    Each man had, to begin with, the great virtue of utter tenacity and fidelity.
  15. reconciliation
    the reestablishment of cordial relations
    Out of the way these two men behaved at Appomattox came the possibility of peace, of reconciliation.
Created on Mon Dec 15 09:30:57 EST 2014 (updated Mon Dec 15 14:29:14 EST 2014)

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