8.+‍Religion,+Reform,+and+Renaissance+in+Antebellum+America

Cynthia Antenor

8: Religion, Reform, and Renaissance in Antebellum America Antebellum - a period before war.


 * a) Evangelical Protestant revivalism || * ||
 * b) Social reforms || * Gender Roles were a concern in the utopian communities because of the established relationship between women and men.
 * Transcendentalism gaveway to a immature form of feminism.
 * Margaret Fuller - as a transcendentalist she suggested that the way to find the relationship and discovery and self is to challenge the gender roles. How can a society be fair if women are not being presented with equality as a utopia suggested?
 * >__Oneida Community__- esbalished in upstate New York by John Humphrey Noyes.
 * They called themselves "perfectionists" and rejected traditional notions of family and marraige
 * All residents were married to all other residents. But they still monitored sexual behavior were women were protected fromunwanted childbearing.
 * CHildren were raised by the community sometimes seeng little fo their own parents.
 * >__Shakers__ were like the Oneidans, but focused more on the redefintion of traditional sexuality and gender roles with in their society
 * most distinct feature of shakerism was complete celibacy
 * there were more women than men
 * endorsed sexual equality
 * women practiced most of the power
 * they were more interested in socal discipline than personal freedom.
 * > __Mormons__ - Church of Jesus Christ of Latter Day Saints
 * began in upstate New York by Joseph Smith
 * Mormons tried to establish their "New Jerusalem"
 * their practices consisted of polygomy - the right of men to have several wives
 * Because of the unapproaval of surrounding commuites and societies the Mormons moved to locations such as Missouri, Kirtland, Ohio, Illinois. The people that opposed them though that teu were forming conspircies and etc.
 * Joseph Smith got killed by an agry mob and the Mormins moved to another location with a new leader-- Brigham Young. htey were able to establish a permanent community in Utah
 * The Asylum Mvement - people advocated prison and hospital reform to treat the criminals and the mentally ill. They wanted to separate the crimina from the mentaly ill. So their were efforts of creating facilities such as penitentiaries and mental instituions to provida proper environment for the inmates.
 * prison reform- "asylums" were to reform, rehabilitated and hopefullt discipline the inmates
 * solitary confinment
 * Feminism ﻿- during the antebellum period women were the center of reform movements(esp. temperance and the abolition of slavery)
 * women argued that men and women were equal .( Sarh and Angelina Grimke)
 * Catherine Beecher, Harriet Breecher, Lucretia Mott, Elizabeth Cady Staton, and Dorthea Dix
 * Lucretia Mott and Elizabeth Cady Staton were convinced that their duty as reformers elavate the status of women.
 * Seneca Falls ﻿- a convention organized by Susan B. Anthony, Mott, and Stanton.
 * established the Declaration of Sentiments and Resolutions- "stated that all men and women are created equal" and that women should have the same rights.
 * right to vote-launched womens suffrage
 * supported by Quakers
 * Issue of Slavery ﻿- the crusade against slavery helped limiy and eliminate the institution even before this period.
 * American Colonization Society- challenged salvery without challenging property rights or southern sensabilities.
 * they proposed that slaves be free by the act of masters recieving compensation through funds raised by private charity or raised by state legislaters ||
 * c) Ideals of domesticity ||  ||
 * d) Transcendentalism and utopian communities || * Transcendentalism - the theory of an individual that was supported by "reason" and "understanding.
 * Reason had to do with little rationality. Instead it had to do to the ability of an individual to understand and detect beauty and truth by using the full efect of their instincts and emotions.
 * Transcendentalist (1st Americans to anticipate the environmental movement in the 20th century) believed:
 * >people should seek libertation from the restrictions of understanding and the culture of reason.
 * >people should seek to communicate with the world through feelng,instinct and the soul.
 * >nature was a source of deep, personal human inspiration whoch individuals could use to find truth with in their souls.
 * >Genuine spirtuality came from communion with the natural world.
 * >The wild and nature should be preserved.
 * Ralph Waldo Emerson - the leader of the first group of transcendentalist philosophers.
 * left the church of Utarianism to devote his time to writing and teaching the elements of transcendentalism.
 * wrote about nature, sel-fullment, the need fr humans to form a communion with the natural world
 * Henry David Thoreu - believed that people should work for self-realization by resisting the pressures of their surrounding society.
 * Author of //Walden// (1854)- he wrote when he wen to build a small cabin in the wood on the edge of Wladen Pond to find out the true facts about life. He wanted to find real life without the "disruptive and intrusive" world of rapid modernization that the railroads symbolized.
 * Believed in "resistance to Civil Government" by practicing "civil disobedience" or "passive resistance"
 * Utopia
 * Brook Farm- the 19th entury experiment of communal living in West Roxbury, Massachusetts.
 * effort for individuals to gather to create a new form of social organization whcih would help them with an opportunity of sel-realization.
 * all residents would share equal in labor so that everyonecould have the same amount of leisure.
 * FAIL- individualism gave into socialism and the experiment was destroyed when buldings were set on fire.
 * egotism made the idea of transcendentalism hard and nearly impossible. ||
 * e) American Renaissance: literary and artistic expressions || * Paintings portraying the nations landscape were the most important and popular of American painting. They wanted to view more than European paintings they wanted to create new artistic traditions. Americans wanted to capture nature and wildlife
 * Hudson River School- The first great school of American painiters in New York.
 * they painted Yosemite Valley, Yellowstone, and the Rocky Mountians
 * The Americans attempted to create their own distinct literature
 * James Fenimore Cooper = first great American novelist--> master of adventure and conveying wilderness. He liked to share man's relationship with nature and with the challenges and dangers of westward expansion of the Americans.
 * Walt Whitman - through his poems he showed his personal need for physical release and personal fulfillment
 * Herman Melville - An example of the pesimistic effects and works that was brought through the act of unleashing emotions.
 * author of //Moby Dick//(1851)- communicated that the human spirit was troubled and was often self-destructive
 * The North and the South produce many different views of the American culture and life.
 * Southern Romanticism - writers of the south produce historical romances of the plantation system of the upper south.
 * They defended southern institutions (esp. slavery)
 * Some writers focused on the humors of everydya life and people in the south and less committed to glorifying it. ||

Sources:
 * Brinkley, Alan. American History 12th edition. Chapter 12 page 316-