In a 1782 collection of essays entitled, Letters From an American Farmer, J. Hector St. John de Crèvecoeur sets out to truly define all that America represents. His admiration of America’s motherly providence is conveyed through an arrangement of observations and pragmatic comparisons. St. John implores those who come across his writing to flock to this extraordinary land of opportunity in order to reap the same benefits that he has already gained through his own experience. A mere glance at the opening lines of Crevecoeur’s piece may throw the reader for a loop, as he ushers in a darker look at the land by comparing his surrogate sanctuary to an “asylum”. By referencing an establishment known for it’s incarceration of the mentally ill, Crevecoeur establishes an uncanny look at the nation he admires; although, by continuing further into the passage, the reader is able to recognize that Crevecoeur postulates that America is welcoming, but not necessarily a home for the faint of heart. …show more content…
Crevecoeur draws attention to the prosperity that awaits on American soil by stating that these “unwanted plants” can truly “take root and flourish” in this unspoiled homeland. He institutes a train of thought that tempts readers to escape from the holdings of their meager nations and flock to a land of immense beauty and freedom. John Hector’s receptive broaching of such a relevant topic encourages modern-day readers to look at America through the same inspired eyes that so many hopeless migrants have viewed it through
In today’s society, American citizens tend to believe that America has been, “American” since the day that Christopher Columbus set foot in the Bahamas. This is a myth that has been in our society for a multitude of years now. In A New England Town by Kenneth A. Lockridge, he proves that America was not always democratic. Additionally, he proves that America has not always been “American”, by presenting the town of Dedham in 1635. Lockridge presents this town through the course of over one hundred years, in that time many changes happened as it made its way to a type of democracy.
From the prologue through chapter one in “Wilderness and the American Mind”, the author emphasizes the affect wilderness had on the Europeans during the colonization of America. In today’s society, we are familiar with the concept of wilderness but few of us have experienced the feeling of being encapsulated in the unfamiliar territory. Today we long for wilderness, crave it even. We use it as an outlet to escape the pace of life. However, we have a sense of safety that the Europeans did not. We are not isolated in the unfamiliar, help is usually a phone call away. Though we now view the wilderness as an oasis because we enter at our own terms, in the early colonial and national periods, the wilderness was an unknown environment that was viewed as evil and dangerous.
In the early years of America, the founding fathers’ passion for gardening and agriculture shaped America’s national identity. At least, that is what Andrea Wulf communicates in her novel, Founding Gardeners. During the revolutionary generation, agricultural success was vital to the nation’s economic well-being. During the struggles of political life, the founding fathers utilized gardening as a therapeutic outlet and their love of nature reflects in some of their political endeavors. Due to this fascination with nature, the founding fathers sought to expand their horizons westward.
The United States of America is known as the land of opportunity and dreams. People dream of migrating to this nation for a chance of a better a life. This belief has been around for many years, ever since the birth of the United States; therefore it’s a factor in which motivate many people migrate to the United States. Upton Sinclair, author of the Jungle, narrates the life of a Lithuanian family and there struggles with work, crime, family loss, and survival in the city of Packingtown. Sinclair expresses her disgust as well as the unbelievable truth of life in the United States involving politics, corruption, and daily struggle that many suffered through in the 19th and 20th century.
America has always been a land of opportunity ever since the pilgrims first arrived. During the infancy of America’s history, the country was under developed and would be considered a third world country today. Even though America was under developed compared to the previous motherland of Great Britain it always had the potential to exceed the many limits set upon by others. For example, Andrew Jackson, also known as the man of the people, was raised by a single mother who struggled to raise two other children and struggled with economic hardships. Regardless of his upbringings, Andrew Jackson became the seventh president of the United States in which he invited the public to his inaugural ball. Some people who migrated from other countries to America, such as Frances Trollope, failed to recognize the potential that America had. Instead of Mrs. Trollope acknowledging the promises the newly found country had, she decided to critically compare it to her homeland.
In a lively account filled that is with personal accounts and the voices of people that were in the past left out of the historical armament, Ronald Takaki proffers us a new perspective of America’s envisioned past. Mr. Takaki confronts and disputes the Anglo-centric historical point of view. This dispute and confrontation is started in the within the seventeenth-century arrival of the colonists from England as witnessed by the Powhatan Indians of Virginia and the Wamapanoag Indians from the Massachusetts area. From there, Mr. Takaki turns our attention to several different cultures and how they had been affected by North America. The English colonists had brought the African people with force to the Atlantic coasts of America. The Irish women that sought to facilitate their need to work in factory settings and maids for our towns. The Chinese who migrated with ideas of a golden mountain and the Japanese who came and labored in the cane fields of Hawaii and on the farms of California. The Jewish people that fled from shtetls of Russia and created new urban communities here. The Latinos who crossed the border had come in search of the mythic and fabulous life El Norte.
When the first American settlement on Roanoke Island was established in 1585 it’s primary force, Sir Walter Raleigh, had no idea that this “New World” would evolve into one of the most powerful voices in the modern world. But before it developed it would have to shaped by it’s founders from the Western world. Two of the largest voices in America’s early development are John Smith, who with a group of English merchants, hoped to get rich in this new land, and William Bradford, a puritan farmer who was one of the most influential men involved with the Mayflower compact. In their two pieces they both convey America as a place to escape but fail to reach many other similar conclusions on what America was like at this time.
Divine, Robert A. America past and Present. 10th ed. Upper Saddle River, NJ: Pearson Education/Longman, 2013. 245. Print.
Roark, James L. et al., eds. The American Promise: A Compact, Vol. I: To 1877. 3rd edition. Boston and New York: Bedford/St. Martin’s, 2007.
Michel-Guillaume-Jean de Crevecoeur was a French born citizen who moved to New York and became a naturalized citizen of Great Britain. After living in America as a citizen for a while, Crevecoeur decided to write an essay titled “Letters from an American Farmer”. During this time, tensions in America between the colonists and loyalists were increasing, and because of this the idea of America as a sovereign nation and territory was becoming popular. Crevecoeur wrote this essay in order to discuss what it means to be an American, and why people should be honored to be called an American. Crevecoeur believes that America is a melting pot of the world, and is full of opportunities for anyone who lives there. In order to back up his claim, Crevecoeur uses rhetorical devices, especially pathos, while he does also use ethos and logos as well.
His successors grabbed California, the southwest, and Oregon. "Manifest Destiny" was a conscious attempt by Jefferson's political descendants to prolong the agrarian present and deny the industrial future. American agrarianism expanded greatly during the 1800s, in theory Jeffersonian Democracy opened the gate way for Jacksonian Democracy to settle. As both Jefferson and Jackson desired for a greater agricultural America, yet this wasn’t the first time in American history that agrarianism was present. In the year 1769, J. Hector St. John De Crevecoeur settled in New York, inhabiting the life of an American farmer. Crevecoeur in sight of a fresh start, decided to live the perfect American dream. His notion of the ideal American was unconventional; as he didn’t want to be a potent businessman or a wealthy tycoon. No, he saw the simple orderly farmer as the ideal American, thus to express his sentiments on the matter he took on a persona in his book, farmer James, from Letters from an American Farmer. Through this novel, Crevecoeur displays his views of a perfect agrarian society. Crevecoeur explains the humble principles of societies blossoming throughout the colonies, the inhabitants of America converting immense forests into pleasant fields and creating thirteen colonies of minimal subsistence, and content governmental harmony. Crevecoeur’s views on men were much like
In “ A Description of New England ”, Smith starts by describing the pleasure and content that risking your life for getting your own piece of land brings to men. On the other hand, Bradford reminds us how harsh and difficult the trip to the New World was for the p...
Roark, James L. The American Promise: A Compact History. 4th. ed. Volume 1: 1877. New York: BEDFORD/ST. MARTIN'S, 2010. Print.
Immigrants traveled hundreds of miles from their homes, only with what possessions they could carry, in order to obtain the rights and chase the promise that America had to offer. Mary Antin illustrates in The Promised Land how if given the chance, immigrants will represent the promises and virtues of American society. Antin shows that public education, freedom from religious persecution, and freedom of expression as a citizen are aspects of life Americans may take for granted but immigrants certainly do not.
American exceptionalism is a belief that the United States is different from other nations around the world and as such superior; the term was coined by Alexis de Tocqueville in 1831, yet the philosophy of American superiority can be traced all the way back to the days before the United States was even an idea. They saw their new culture as “A city upon a hill” and sought to achieve moral and spiritual perfection. With this moral superiority the colonists, later Americans, saw a duty presented upon them by God and nature to instill such superior values into other cultures and the world. One such example can be clearly seen in the work of St. John de Crèvecoeur in Letters from an American Farmer where the narrator “Farmer James” states his belief