1. Romanticism

2. American Romanticism  1800-1860

3. What 3 Elements of the Industrial Revolution influenced the Romantic Period? coursesite.uhcl.edu

4. Industrial Revolution: Progress with a Price  Mid-1700s.  Factories and industry replace agriculture as chief means of support for lower classes.  Americans see themselves as moving forward and growing as a country.

5. 1: Better transportation leads to better exchange of ideas  The steamboat and the railroad become common.  Greater infrastructure brings together different parts of the country.

6. 2: More options for women  Typical jobs for women had been to sew,“take in” laundry, work as dairy maid, or act as housekeeper or maid. All of these require a stable household.  New jobs for women were factory work. Women could live at the factory and make their own money.

7. 3: Poor working conditions for most  Lowell’s Factories working conditions:  A. Women worked at least 12 hours a day.  B. Women required to go to church; no male visitors allowed at factory/dormitory.

9. **Poor Working Conditions  C. Boarding house rooms held up to 6 girls  D. Average age=24; some as young=10 years old. http://www.library.csi.cuny.edu /dept/americanstudies/lavende r/graphics/ttable.jpg

10. **The Mills and Factories http://www.laugalaekjarskoli. is/verk/NaAm2/Lowell.html Triangle Shirtwaist Factory fire victims 1911

11. American Romanticism Affected by Industrial Revolution, but based largely on optimism

12. Optimism: Half empty or half full?

13. Optimism—US citizens felt optimistic for many reasons:  The little colonies beat the big British Empire.  Everyone can succeed. Andrew Jackson—not an upper-class guy— becomes president in 1828.  Reform movements are common.

14. Optimism led to the Age of Reform (during Romantic Period)  Prisons and Mental Institutions Prison Reform 1850s Treatment of Mentally Ill 1840s

15. Age of Reform Women’s Suffrage Abolitionist movement

16. Idealism and Transcendentalism  Idealism—philosophy based on idea that evidence of the divine is not found in the outer world as much as the inner world of the individual. This philosophy originated in Germany.  Transcend—to move above or beyond.  Transcendentalism—philosophy based on the idea that one moves beyond the physical to the spiritual through awareness. Intuition, introspection, and self-trust. Many American Romantic writers were also Transcendentalists.

17. Romanticism  1800-1860.  Not a Valentine’s Day idea.  Romantic writers did share two key beliefs:  1. Emotion was valued over intellect.  2. Basic goodness and equality were a part of everyone.

18. The “Big” Romantic Ideas  Optimism and Individualism (not conformity)  Kinship with Nature  The Power of Darkness (fascination with disease, madness, death, evil, the supernatural, and the destructive qualities of nature)

19. Important Romantic Writers:  Ralph Waldo Emerson  Margaret Fuller  Henry David Thoreau  Walt Whitman

20. “Dark” Romantic Writers  Edgar Allan Poe  Washington Irving  Nathaniel Hawthorne

21. Tensions would lead to Civil War—End of the Romantic Era